Far more confusing to a dog for his human to pretend to be his mummy !

Pidge, honestly, you are NOT your dog's mummy ! Even metaphorically speaking ! that is anthropomorphisation at its worst !

Thank you Gnasher, apology accepted and I'm just sorry there was ever any issue.

We will have to agree to disagree on the snap. Perhaps this is because, as you said previously, you've not experienced this problem.

There is a huge difference between a snap and a bite in my view. And that comes from living with a dog that previously used to snap a lot and I live in the knowledge that she could do it again.

This does not frighten me because she has never bitten me. Had she been a different dog and she had bitten me on those occasions that she snapped she may well have been pts by now as I'm not convinced I would trust her enough to live with her day by day. But that is irrelevant because that would be a totally different dog. Never ever have I thought that I am not safe with her.

She was taught bite inhibition as a pup, she has been taught that good dogs don't bite - or at least not hard.
I would never condemn her for biting me if she was in pain, she has mouthed me before when I was prodding at a sliced open paw and she wanted me to know it hurt - she put her mouth around my hand but did I feel her teeth? Nope. Not at all.

I can tell you with 100% honesty that on those occasions that she snapped at me, I'm pretty sure that on every single occasion it was possible for her to bite me. I didn't move away in time, she didn't want to bite.

So a snap is a snap and a bite is a bite. If a dog wants to bite, it'll bite. Takara's reflexes are a heck of a lot faster than mine and there's no way I could've gotten out of her way if she had wanted to bite me. And yet I've never been bitten.

Personally I would rather heed a warning snap and work on building the tolerance level than punish the dog for the snap and teach the dog that snapping doesn't work so it's best to go straight in for the bite. Takara knows she can communicate with me using a snap and that she doesn't need to go any further and I feel safe knowing that.

The fact she hasn't snapped for a long, long time reassures me that I am in fact, quite succesful in building her tolerance and I don't mind putting in all that hard work.

I'm not arguing with you - I'm explaining why I feel this way and hoping you will understand, from the experience of someone who has a dog known to snap that a snap, really isn't a bite.

Why?? What is a mummy?

I call my dogs my babies and they know me as 'mummy' (that's not to say I'm one of these idiots who dresses them in dresses and pushes them around in prams!). They also get incredibly excited if I say 'where's grandad?'

Pidge isn't and will never be a dog's biological parent but I see a 'mummy' as someone who protects, cares for, provides for, teaches, guides, accompanies and loves her charge. That's what my mum did...

What's wrong with that? What do you see a 'mummy' as? (I'm actually making a genuine point... I'm not picking on you )

Yup Lottie, I can understand. My greatest concern is not for the owner of the dog who snaps ... but the parents of the traumatised child who has experienced a warning snap.

Children must learn to respect dogs, and not to behave in an unruly way around them, not to approach strange dogs without asking first, etc. etc. However, we do not live in an ideal world, we live in a very PC and litigious world, and I would never tolerate a dog of mine who snapped, full stop. For the reason just outlined. It something that you clearly are well aware of with your Takara, but I am genuinely concerned for anyone who feels that it is OK for their dogs to snap as a way of registering their disapproval. A growl, or a rumble, should be the worst that a dog should ever do, and even that, I would come down very heavy on Tai if he growled at a child or an adult.

For the reason I have already said ! It is anthropomorphisation. Our dogs are NOT our children, and should never be treated as such. They are our dear and beloved pets, our comrades, but to call them our children I think is to demean the nobility of the dog. He is not a human, he is a dog, I'm sure if our dogs would speak they would not describe their humans as their mummies and daddies !!

I'm not getting at you either I'm making a genuine point about which I feel passionately. I hate to see any dog "humanised", I feel it is very disrespectful and demeaning to the dog.

I have eight dogs that all see me as their leader, they respect me and do what they can to please. Am I alpha, I don't know????? Not really sure what it means as, reading through a few posts, there are many different takes on what 'alpha' is regarding dogs and their owners. I am definitely in charge of my dogs and have to be (eight Chis, 6 females (5 intact) and two males (both intact) or it would be mayhem here!

I am also "Mummy" to my Chi Babies! I think, like on many subjects, you can't put me in a pigeon hole. I love my Chis to bits, like I do my kids but I am the leader where my kids are concerned too. There has to be boundaries and dislipline whether fur babies or skin babies. I enforce that discipline so am I alpha, suppose I am

I am in charge but I treat my little ones with love and respect.

I would say a boss and leader are the same thing too. I am the boss OR leader ... I don't mind which, as long as the dog knows he/she has to do as he/she is told

So would I. I am boss and leader, so is my OH. Which = alpha, but that word seems to be so emotive I think I won't use it any more.

Just out of curiousity, if you say you are the boss or leader, and you speak english, why would you just not use the words 'boss' or 'leader'?

But there's nothing humanised about my dogs

They sleep on the floor, they don't get human food, they are treated very much as dogs.

They have no clue what 'mummy' means to us... just that it is a term that refers to me.

I find it rather anthropomorphic to think that a dog could feel undermined by the term we choose to use to describe them or ourselves.. they are blissfully unaware.

I am in total agreement that dogs are wonderful creatures and should be respected and viewed as dogs. They should not be humanised in my opinion, but I disagree that a term we use in a language that they don't understand is disrespectful to them.


For the record, as a child I never had a dog, I was snapped at by a dog (not bitten) and I was not left traumatised. I was however, much more careful about asking if I could stroke strange dogs.

Takara doesn't snap at children although she has been known to bark at approaching children to keep them away from her - only when she's on the lead. Off the lead she just runs away (due to yobbish children running towards her screaming on various occasions in the past) and there's no way I'm going to punish my dog for barking at children to stop them approaching her, if they refuse to listen to me telling them no, and their parents refuse to teach them manners around dogs then they can bloody well learn from my dog (who again has regularly been in a situation where she could've bitten but she hasn't and I trust her not to)!

Trust me I'd rather this didn't happen as it only reinforces the issues she has with them but I can't control other people's children and so far I have a traumatised dog who has been frightened by children and she hasn't traumatised any children...