by Leslie H » October 1st, 2006, 8:45 am
I think there are a lot of variables to consider, especially the breed of dog, the type of sport or work, and the level of training.
For example, Xanny is what I consider a low level sport dog. She has moderate drive, she loves bitework, and she is not particularly well trained. She is extremely friendly, and has had only minimal defensive wiork done. She has passed a variety of temperament tests after beginning bitework, CGC, TDI, TT, GDT, BST. NKCCGTT A trainer/decoy referred to her as "Dr. Jekyl and Mrs. Hyde", telling me that he had never seen a dog so intense in bitework, and so calm about everything else.
Even then, I do have to be attentive. Her ball drive is fairly high, and if people are playing with balls, she fires up, and disregards everything else. She has wantonly slaughtered a kickball, and 2 footballs, all through training errors on my part (I'm not sure why I'd think that if I threw a tennis ball, she'd run by the football. Thank goodness the boys at my work, that she was visiting, all thought it was awesome.) This summer at our Grantville show, a location she's done bitework at several times, she looked across the ring while we were walking along, saw our judge walking, and started getting all hyper, like she had seen a decoy, ears pricked forward, yipping and bouncing. It caught me off guard, I suspect she thought the judges billowy clothes were a bitesuit, I walked her up to the judge, and she realized her error, greeted her, and looked eagerly around, disappointed that no one was wearing bitework equipment.
All that ramble being said, I wouldn't expect a serious working dog, of a guardian breed to be friendly, it might well bite me if I was foolish enough to try to pet it, or doing something else that intruded upon its personal space, or otherwise challenged its dominance. A very different creature than our silly, loving APBT's.