Please Help - Doggy Destruction!

yorkshire_terrier_owner

Now, I have extensive experience with dogs - as a breeder, agility to competition level and training.

I base everything I know about dogs on my own experience.

I absolutely believe in the pack. Dogs need leadership, and to be taught how to behave. This can only happen with a strong leader. Part of being a strong leader involves positive reward training, affection, play, and the ability to say 'no'.

I am sure many dog trainers would sneer at the pack theory, but I would point out that dog trainers do not have to undertake and formal training/certification, and disapproving the pack theory does not have any scientific basis as far as I can see (someone correct me if I'm wrong about that).

Re humanising dogs - we do have a habit of humanising them, but we have to understand that their mentality is not at all like ours. If you understand the dog psyche then you understand how to work with them. Every behaviour problem I have ever seen has been as a result of the dog trying to tell us something, and because we humanise them, we do not understand what they are telling us and the problem gets worse.

I have yet to encounter a dog with a behaviour problem that couldn't be sorted with time, effort, and possibly money. If someone can't commit to that, then they shouldn't have a dog. One of the questions I ask prospective buyers of pups is "explain to me what steps you would take if your puppy developed a problem such as separation anxiety". Give me the wrong answer and you're going home empty handed.

I re homed a dog with major behaviour problems 2 years ago. It took me 12 months to sort her but I did it - it cost me money, time, I shed tears over this dog - because my number one rule is that when a dog comes to live with me it comes For the rest of its life. At 12 years old she is now happy, normal dog living out the rest of her days in peace and without stress. I would NEVER have given up on her because none of it was her fault.

SeaLion_2

I think it depends on your definition of the word pack.

If you are using it in the very specific sense of wolf like behaviour and alpha male ranking, leading to a belief in humans doing alpha rolling and standing in their dog beds rather than using a bit of strategic brain usage and training, then I agree that dogs are not pack animals.
Anyone who thinks a dog wants to get on your bed because they can then lord it over you is deluded - a dog wants to get on your bed for all sorts of other reasons - a novel place, the smell of person, nice and soft and warm, you can survey the room from a higher than usual perspective - any old reason.

If you use pacl in the sense of a social animal that likes to be part of a social group, commonly known as a pack, with a clear and known pecking order and social interactions within that group, plus a shared intent in certain activities, then all the behaviourists in the world saying 'dogs are not pack animals' doesn't change the fact that they are.

(Doggy groups do not come into conflict generally as much as they might do, because a)most dogs are not looking to have a good punch up, and b) dogs in a social group will tend not to push each other's buttons deliberately, but fundamentally any observer knows the pecking order if push comes to shove.)

yorkshire_terrier_owner

SeaLion wrote: »

I think it depends on your definition of the word pack.

If you are using it in the very specific sense of wolf like behaviour and alpha male ranking, leading to a belief in humans doing alpha rolling and standing in their dog beds rather than using a bit of strategic brain usage and training, then I agree that dogs are not pack animals.
Anyone who thinks a dog wants to get on your bed because they can then lord it over you is deluded - a dog wants to get on your bed for all sorts of other reasons - a novel place, the smell of person, nice and soft and warm, you can survey the room from a higher than usual perspective - any old reason.

If you use pacl in the sense of a social animal that likes to be part of a social group, commonly known as a pack, with a clear and known pecking order and social interactions within that group, plus a shared intent in certain activities, then all the behaviourists in the world saying 'dogs are not pack animals' doesn't change the fact that they are.

(Doggy groups do not come into conflict generally as much as they might do, because a)most dogs are not looking to have a good punch up, and b) dogs in a social group will tend not to push each other's buttons deliberately, but fundamentally any observer knows the pecking order if push comes to shove.)

This puts it really well.

I sleep with my pack - because my dogs absolutely want to be with me every minute they can and it is their natural instinct to sleep together as a pack. I am part of the pack and therefore it only works BECAUSE we all sleep together (but they know which side of the bed is mine!). Whilst I still prefer to eat my dinner at the dining table I do sit on the kitchen floor with them while they eat. There is a clear structure, but everyone knows their place and how they are supposed to behave. When I have a litter of pups, once they are old enough they are integrated with the pack because they learn more quickly that way. To a certain extent my pack does a lot of the training of pups for me.