Thoughts on splitting dogs

These are fairly ramdom thoughts, brought on by the thread on the GSD playing rough and yesterday here.

More or less all day yesterday I had loads of dogs interacting around me. Tassle and a friend with 5 dogs went to a funeral in the afternoon and I stayed to dog watch----originally we were all going but it was far too hot to leave any dogs in cars for a length of time.

Dogs are all shapes and ages and do know each other well. It is rare that we need to interfere in their play/interactions but Zeff and the deaf pointer sometimes get OTT so that is stopped fast. Often another dog will pick up on something they don't like and will split the offending pair. They seem to pick it up before we do sometimes and other times although it seems not good to us the splitter dogs will ignore it.

All the dogs have frequent interactions with lots of other dogs, here, training or on walks. Several started off with little idea of how to deal with other dogs. Champa came to me at 10 mths and had spent his life being allowed to bully the older dog he lived with----and hurting him. He went to a home for a week and came back to me as they said he was dog aggressive. He sort of was----but he has learnt to understand other dogs and how to cope with them. Muzzled at first and then attached to a ball and with me helping out if he feels worried at all. He is a major splitter now-----has le learnt from me or have I learnt from him or is it a bit of both?

In the situation we are in and the area we live in this works, many dogs are running free on the beach in winter and in woods and national trust areas in Summer. So dogs get a chance to meet up and learn.

In other situations and places I can see from what I read about them that this is not viable.

rune

yes,i had mixed feelings about that thread,of course if playing gets ott i stop it,but Tupac(lets face it has alot of gsd in him)is allowed to play rough depending on how and who he is playing with,i know some peeps would say not to let him,but for all the times he is doing the 'slamming' there are more times he is the one on the floor...and floored by dogs a quarter of his size.

I think a lot is instinct, not sure how much is knowledge and/or experience (in humans that is).

Although people who never walk in groups do not appear to me to have developed an eye for a potential situation and defusing it before it kicks off.

One of the reasons I am very cautious about my dogs playing with other dogs is not so much the dogs, but the owners, who, because they have not got this eye/instinct/knowledge/experience tend to panic which can then escalate issues.

When I am at competitive events several of us often walk together with 9 or more dogs with no issues, but we all know our dogs, each other and are happy to intervene or have each other intervene if and when appropriate.

It is very rare that we have to do that because often a "word" said by us, is sufficient; but I think that is because our dogs are very responsive to us, more so than many "pet" dogs (I hate to use that term as it could appear somewhat derogatory but it is not meant that way as of course all our dogs are pets and of course many are very well trained).

There are some dogs (and I have seen this in horses) who appear to naturally take on the role of "nanny" if you like who butt in and split up offending parties.

I have not spent a great deal of time with any other species to see if what I have observed in humans, dogs and horses applies to others, maybe it does from what I have seen on TV eg elephants?

yes,i had mixed feelings about that thread,of course if playing gets ott i stop it,but Tupac(lets face it has alot of gsd in him)is allowed to play rough depending on how and who he is playing with,i know some peeps would say not to let him,but for all the times he is doing the 'slamming' there are more times he is the one on the floor...and floored by dogs a quarter of his size.

I understand what you are saying but there are some key points to keep in mind

1 How happpy is the "other" dog with this behaviour
2 What sort of dogs are involved
3 How skilled the owner is

With my male he is a very cocky, self assured male who, if he was allowed, WOULD get stronger and stronger. I don't actually want my dog practising behaviours that could get him (or me) into trouble or distress or even damage other dogs.

very true!!
even more true the amount of 'panickers' i meet

i have a nanny dog here among my lot....luckily he is Tupac's idol so alls cool

Well I would never have thought of Champa as a 'nanny'---although he was a great 'uncle' to Tassle (the dog) when she was a pup. We have found that the younger males in the group do a lot of 'uncle' work when they are with pups. Zeff does now.

I agree about the control, with dogs that are 'a lot of dog' it is imperative to have at least a bit of it!

rune

true,i guess im talking my 'own pack' and close friends dogs...not strangers dogs,strangers dogs are a different kettle of fish

Tupac is still maturing and finding his feet,he is only cocky with my other dogs(and not me).......so far

Excuse typos - on iPhone at minute (my excuse)!

First off i didnt see the otherr thread

Secondly i found the idea of a "nanny" dog an interesting term, not necessarily what i would use but rather an apt description monetheless

In our last trio (or pack) of dogs we had - older bitch (by 10 months) younger bitch & her brother. The male did his own thing, focused on us & occasionally ran with the girls. The older bitch had a fetish for "pretty" male dogs such as Setters & long haired GSD's - flirted enough to make you roll your eyes & yes she was spayed. She is the one i competed with at obedience & working demos alrho i do have to say if there was a "pretty" male dog around, she could be distracted. The younger bitch was the quiet sensible one, she kept the other two in a nest orderly fashion. If J (older bitch) took herself off after a pretty boy, Z would have went after her, either headed J off or enticed J with play, rarely failed & this was without instruction from us

You alwaYs get idiots with dogs wh dont give a monkeys that they have aggressive dogs & let them run loose - one one memirable occasion we had the dogs in the country park playing quite happily running in & out of bracken & gorse trails when over the ridge came two teenages with 2 dogs - Lab x & what looked like a GSD x.

It was immediately clear that the teens had no control over the dogs & both neant business which was not goung to bode well & the Lab was the instigator & most aggressive.
Unfortunately our dogs were just too far away for us to do
anything immediately

Both dogs focused on our eldest bitch - scatty friendly flirty J who thought thr world was a lovely friendly happy place. The younger dogs were a fair bit off from her. Z however picked up immediately what was happening - i swear if you had seen this happen on camera you would have thought it set up or Z was trained to do what she did. As the two dogs clised in in J - still blissfully smooching around near some cow pats (thats another story) Z bolted across the meadow, cut acroos tge Gsd x & knocked him off course - enough to 'shock' his attack - he was a follower. Z then picked up speed & just before he got to J - who had at last realised what was happening, Z "hit" the Lab x hard with her shoulder literally knocking him off his feet. She circled the dog then went to stand beside J. Our boy realising what was going on had come over to stand by the girls - all Boxer stance, all quiet, all with a look that said - "try it". By whi h time we had got there.

So yes can quite understand the "nanny" term

Well I call Ben the fun police
He tries to get himself in between dogs when they are getting too rough

It sometimes backfires tho - because Mias fave way to play with new dogs is mad zoomies - and if Ben thinks it gets a bit OTT he jumps and flattens Mia
Problem is this can involve the other dogs piling ontop of Mia and this can freak her out and cause a bit of a scuffle
So I have to stop Ben doing his fun police there

Was so cute tho when he was a tiny pup trying to keep up with the GSD and collie and try and stop them playing

I was really lucky when I first got Ben, that first summer there was a huge group of us - sometimes up to 40 dogs so they all learnt some pretty good doggy manners - and we learnt what was good and what was bad play

In the whole summer we only saw 2 scuffles and that was only handbags

I call Parker the "fun police" too!

I noticed this behaviour in him at the agility class we used to attend. The dogs were all allowed off-lead to have a run round after the class whilst the owners put the equipment away. Parker would start wuffing loudly and get in between 2 dogs if they were getting a bit OTT.

I didn't realise why he was doing this until I read about it in a dog magazine.

He's also done this on the heath once with a Bulldog x Boxer he knows when it was playing a bit roughly with a Labrador.