something i wonder about....

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Postby chance's mom » March 13th, 2006, 11:38 pm

let me first say i hope this doesnt open a can of worms and that no one takes me the wrong way when i ask this, it is just something i wonder about dog behavior so i know what to expect, or at least have an idea...

with that being said, i often wonder since i baby chance and i train him to be nice to everyone and everydog, would he know instinctively what to do if he was attacked by another dog? would he be able to defend himself? no not kill or harm, just defend himself as a dog! or if we are walking and someone attacked me from behind or tried to hurt me, would he still great them as mr wiggle butt or would he growl or know something was wrong? i read about dogs warning their owners in a fire, or a burgler. chance half the time doesnt bother to get off the couch when i come home, so i know he is house guard, nor do i want him to be!!! please dont think i want my dog to be aggressive that is exactly what i train him not to be. i still understand his background and could more so judge what he would do if a dog attacked him than a person attacking me. i want to understand my dogs instincts as a dog and an animal to be able to better understand him and his reactions or possible reactions.

i hope i made sense, this is something i have always pondered since i watched my dad train his partner w/ lapd swat our dog King who was aust/germ shephard. i know what they can be trained to do, but i was very young and still wonder, is it easier to train them becuase of their natural instincts or is it purely training that they know the difference between a threat and just another person? King was trained on body language, etc just like we know if a dog gets stiff and that tail goes up (several different things to look for) they are nervous or may attack, he knew if someone was a threat vs a baby who may smack him with toy becuase they are a baby and dont know different. he knew the difference. he would walk around with a bird on his head that would peck, peck, peck and he wouldnt flinch, but approach my dad wrong, you would see a different dog. you would see a trained police officer ready to defend his partner!
i hope this comes across right, sometimes i have trouble putting my thoughts into words, so please dont jump to the wrong conclusion when you read this.
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Postby mnp13 » March 14th, 2006, 12:52 am

There is no 'wrong conclusion' to jump to!

Everything depends in the dog... as always.

Your dog knows the sound of your car and the sound of your foot steps. If I walk up to my door and she is loose in the house she is an excited lunatic. If one of my friends walks up to the door in the exact same manner she barks and carries on.

the only way to know what she would do if someone else came in is to send someone else in... but that can be dangerous because that person would find out the hardway that she is protective (assuming she is)

Ruby has growled at people on the street. That's ok with me. I'd rather she warned off someone who was not a threat than not warn off the person who is.

Dogs read body language. In a real attack you would sweat, your body language would change, your voice, everything. A dog sees that and responde to it. Of course, there was a case in Buffalo, NY, last summer where a guy was mugged and died of his wounds... he died on the sidewalk while his dog stood there and watched.

If you want to be sure your dog will protect you when/if necessary you have to train for that.
Michelle

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Postby Malli » March 14th, 2006, 10:40 pm

There are many accounts of Pit Bulls simply watching as their owner's were hurt. (I think 2 instances in Ontario where the owner was beat up and the dogs were too and the dogs did nothng to defend themselves or their people)
My own dog, an APBT by best guess, will protect me, he has shown me once and I have been able to read his caution on several occaisions; my friends PB (or mix there of, I swear she is a funny looking Pit) watched as a robber came into her mum's house and started loading up the electronics, my friend came out of the shower in a towel when she heard a noise to find her dog on the floor posing for belly rubs from the robber.
That dog is a rescue and won't forget it, she LOVES her mum, likes to be near her all the time or in her lap, she is like a golden or a lab for attention, and that was her reaction. My own dog likes pets but not tons, never sits in my lap, is happy enough to be in the same room as me, he's very nonchalaunt, and give kisses few and far between, yet he will protect me, and would most likely give his life for me(please may that never happen) :|
Like Michelle said, it just depends on the dog :D

Malli
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Postby SisMorphine » March 15th, 2006, 12:46 am

At first glance no one would think that my Greyhound would protect me. Strangers walk in and out of the house all day long, people and dogs, and he rarely gets up from the couch.

But one night, when I was still living with my parents, my father opened my bedroom door at about 4am to get the keys to my car so he could move it and go to work. Well Wally jumped out of bed and stood over me, growling, snarling, frothing, and baring his teeth. But once he realized it was my father he went back to bed.
He also saved me from a renegade sock one day! He was sleeping clear across the room. I was on the computer and suddenly heard him growl and run to me. I turn in my chair to see that a sock I had taken off and thrown on the floor earlier was slowly being blown across the floor, towards me, by the fan. He had gotten up, ran across the room, and placed himself in between me and the sock. After I picked up the sock he stopped his growling and went back to bed.

I have been told that this was fear and he wanted to be near me (though in both situations he made sure he was in between me and the scary thing), but even if it is fear, if you've ever seen his teeth you would definitely run the other way!!
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Postby mnp13 » March 15th, 2006, 12:51 am

That doesn't sound like fear to me.

Ruby has proteted me from renegade squrrils more times than I can count. She is so brave!
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Postby SisMorphine » March 15th, 2006, 12:57 am

mnp13 wrote:That doesn't sound like fear to me.

Ruby has proteted me from renegade squrrils more times than I can count. She is so brave!

It didn't seem like fear to me, either. Especially since he is such a dominant dog who is very bomb-proof (literally, bomb-proof, he slept while they were doing some blasting work in my parent's front yard . . . the only bomb-proof Grey I've met to date).

It was my training instructor (I had to take a mandatory class on how to train a dog for my degree) who I really hold little faith in. But who knows, she could be right and I could just have some wishful thinking :|
"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -Anatole France
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Postby Malli » March 15th, 2006, 1:59 pm

a fearful dog, IMO, would come to you for comfort, not place himself in between you and whatever he percieved as the threat. Wally is definately a valiant Grey hound :lol:

My Oscar came to my defence when I had an altercation with my landlord. I asked the landlord to leave, and he would not (my roomie had not payed her 1/2 of the rent and we had a heated argument etc etc etc), I attempted to push him out my door, he pushed back, and stomped on my shoeless feet several times(this is a older, maybe 50-60 yr old man). When I realized that the whole shoving match was going no where, I called Oscar, he came around the corner, barked once, and as the man backed into the corner-after he saw the dog- he jumped up on him(his head about level with the man's), I told him enough, he stopped, I put him in a down in the hallway so the man couldn't go anywhere, and dialed 911. A policeman came, and low and behold, my landlord stepped back over the threshold of my doorway when he saw the Officer.
Oscar got many extra pets that day, and later I brought him back to the door and treated him several times. He did not bite, he didn't even growl, he knew the man was already afraid of him and only did what was necessary, he was my little(well, kinda big, lol) knight in shining armor.

I have only seen a few people he truly did not like throughout his entire life, (3, maybe 4?) and even then his reaction is only reservation and indifference. I always wonder what horrible people they must be, for my dog not to like them...

Malli
Last edited by Malli on March 15th, 2006, 8:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby chance's mom » March 15th, 2006, 8:13 pm

thank you very much for sharing your expreriences and thoughts on this with me, i really appretiate that we can talk about this i wont be accused of wanting the type of dog who will wind up on tv from attacking someone, which was kind of what i was afraid would happen so thank you.
i guess i agree with michelle and feel chance would need to be trained. he doesnt get off the couch when i come home, however when my man comes home chance will bark, growl slightly then run downstairs to greet his daddy with big wiggle butt!! he is scared of loud bangs at night, so i think he would run before he would attack if he were scared! becuase of things i myself have gone through and becuase of being used to having a police dog in the family until he was 17 yrs old, i would like to make sure chance will protect me. i guess i will be looking into some training to get us to that point. i need to make sure i understand him, his signals, his stresses, and his happinesses in order to achieve what i want from training. your experiences and thoughts definately help me u/s the breed more, i thought the big baby wiggle but was just my own dog, yea right!!! i knew better. hehehe
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Postby Maryellen » March 15th, 2006, 8:33 pm

i dont think any of my nutcases would protect me . if they did i would be highly shocked.
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Postby pitbullmamaliz » March 15th, 2006, 11:06 pm

I like to think Inara would protect me, but I don't know. She hasn't yet met a person or dog she didn't like. Granted, she's only 4 months old, but I may also consider protection training. I'm a parole officer and work with convicted felons (specifically sex offenders) so I trust nobody. I want to know my girl will protect me if need be. It's hard for me to imagine her being mean though! One of our friends she hadn't met before came over to the house and just walked in. We weren't expecting him so were very surprised, but Inara didn't even raise her head until he was actually in the room. Crazy loving pup. :love:
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Postby mnp13 » March 15th, 2006, 11:09 pm

If you want to be sure your dog will protect you, you need to train that dog to protect you. Your dog might do it, but do you want to take that chance?
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Postby chance's mom » March 15th, 2006, 11:31 pm

mnp13 wrote:If you want to be sure your dog will protect you, you need to train that dog to protect you. Your dog might do it, but do you want to take that chance?


you are right on this one! again my last dog was my dads partner w/ lapd swat, i know what can happen, my police dog saved me from an attack by a pit bull and a rotweiler that got loose when we walked by and came after us. luckily for 14 year old me, he knew what to do, i screamed and kicked!! i had an abusive ex-step dad, i do not want to go there, i have been around bad people, i do not want to HOPE i will be protected. i only weigh 120 lbs after i just ate, it would not be hard to overpower me. not that i ever want to have to use such force, but the reassurance would be nice. plus i have to say, with that kind of training, i have seen how much better you come to understand your dog, you also learn much better control and respect between you and your dog. yes that kind of training trains the owner too!
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