by Jan Fennell
Obviously at this point I had the option of simply picking her up and forcing her into the car. As I have explained before, however, I want dogs to make decisions of their own free will. I want them to make positive associations with situations and act accordingly. Simply shoving Daisy May into the car would have been a completely negative association. So I decided to try something else. As she continued playing around, I climbed into the car and drove off without her. In doing this I was presenting her with a choice. Everything within her told her that her place was with the pack. Her survival depended on it. Was she now willing to live without that pack?
After about twenty yards I came to a stop, got out and called her again. Daisy May ran to the car but continued frolicking around. It was clear she wanted to carry on playing this game. Again she refused to come. Once more I got back into the car, but this time I drove off at greater speed and over a farther distance. My question to her now was do you really want to be on your own? I immediately saw Daisy May in my rear-view mirror. She was barrelling along behind me. This time when I stopped she leapt straight in to join the other dogs. I rewarded her behaviour with praise.
My work with other people’s dogs has taught me that important lessons like this need underlining as soon as possible. So the next day I attempted to repeat this and went back to the same spot. Once more Daisy May refused to get into the car at my first request. I was not going to play her game this time, however. As soon as she started playing around I decided to show her that her actions were going to have consequences. I immediately drove off at speed, heading almost two hundred yards into the open countryside. At all times, I should add, we were never less than a quarter of a mile from any road. Once more, Daisy May was in hot pursuit. As I opened the car door she leapt in. It was the last time I had to go through that particular procedure. After that, Daisy May was always the first dog into the car.
Chapter 13
Dog v. Dog: Taking the Heat out of Canine Confrontations
A few years ago, as I tried to find the links between the behaviour of domestic dogs and wolf packs, I watched a remarkable film. The documentary traced the story of a community of wolves living in the wild in Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. Despite the fact that North America is a stronghold of the grey wolf, the species had been absent from Yellowstone’s wilderness for more than sixty years. The pack was one that had been placed in the park in an effort to reintroduce the species to the area. The documentary followed their progress as they settled into this environment.
The film was hugely influential in helping me as I put together the ideas that now underpin my method. None of its insights was more useful than those provided in a sequence in which the pack was forced to find itself a new Alpha male. The previous incumbent had been killed, the victim of a human hunter’s bullet, leaving only the Alpha female to lead the pack. Soon, however, another wolf from a neighbouring pack arrived in an attempt to impose himself. The process that ensued was fascinating. The outsider began by howling to see whether he heard the trademark bass howl of an Alpha male in response. Encouraged by the fact that there was no such howl, he began to prowl the perimeter of the pack’s territory.
His attentions soon produced a response from the pack who began going through an elaborate, and at times highly aggressive, ritual. Wolves would take it in turn to charge aggressively towards the interloper. They would pull up short and go through an elaborate routine. It was all posturing. It reminded me of Native Americans throwing a spear into the ground at the feet of a potential foe. Each time, the wolves would retreat before charging again. In addition to all this there was an immense amount of body language going on.
Throughout this, the outsider remained steadfast. He simply stood his ground, wagging his tail. He did not threaten the other pack wolves in any way. Yet at the same time he showed no signs of weakness. The pack continued with this repertoire for a staggering six-and-a-half hours. At the end of that time, however, something remarkable happened. Suddenly the charging stopped and the wolves started going to the newcomer one by one. He had faced an all-or-nothing situation. If he had lost, the pack would almost certainly have killed him. But he had triumphed.
Once the pack membership had paid its homage, the Alpha female came over. In one final piece of symbolism, he placed his front leg over her shoulder and his head over her neck. He retained that position for no more than half a second. It was long enough to signal that the deal had been struck. He was the new Alpha male. It was a beautiful sight to behold, an example of nature at its most pure and powerful. The rest of the pack greeted it by leaping around, clearly overjoyed at the fact that order had been restored and the pack had a leader once more.
The dog may have been taken out of the wolf pack, but the instincts of the wolf pack have not been taken out of the dog. Our domestic pets go through their own versions of this behaviour on a daily basis. And it is never more obvious than in one of the most common situations dog owners face: when one dog challenges another. Like every other dog owner alive, I regard the idea of one of my dogs being attacked by another dog as the worst possible nightmare. Dogs are capable of inflicting hideous injuries on each other. It is not beyond them to deliver wounds that prove fatal.
Whenever a dog fights, the physical toll it takes on the animal is invariably matched by the psychological damage it causes the owner. This was certainly true in the case of Christine, a lady I helped as part of my work on television. Christine had begun renting a smallholding in Yorkshire where she had taken in a couple of dogs, Basil, a lively tan and white, Border collie-type mongrel and Tess, a small black crossbreed.
The source of Christine’s problem was another dog, however. Reggie, a big, tan-coloured Rottweiler crossbreed was part of the fixtures and fittings she had inherited when she took over the smallholding. Rottweilers’ fearsome reputation is undeserved in my opinion. I have met many lovable examples of the breed. Many people forget they were originally bred as guard dogs by cattle farmers in Germany and Switzerland. Reggie was fulfilling his breed’s historic role admirably. Reggie was kept on a chain that was attached to a running pole. Again, this is a principle I cannot condone in any way. Despite the restrictions placed on him, he was more than able to scare off any unwanted visitors: he was a fearsome-looking animal.
Christine’s problem was that Basil was one of the few who was not scared one bit by Reggie. On several occasions, he had slipped out of the house, headed for the Rottweiler’s part of the yard and fought with him. We have all come across the Yorkshire terrier that is willing to take on a giant German shepherd, or the dachshund that squares up to the Doberman. While we are all too aware of the size differential, dogs themselves seem to have little or no concept of their relative stature. This is again our human perspective at work. It is we who have diverted dogs along different evolutionary routes. In reality, all breeds are within five re-generations of each other. Given this, it is natural that all dogs regard themselves as the physical equal of each other. Put simply in this case, Basil imagined he too was a Rottweiler. Unfortunately the advantage in size and power was all too real. Reggie was at least twice Basil’s size. Because he was chained, he had also been put in a situation where he had no option but to defend himself. He had inflicted rips, tears and puncture wounds to Basil’s ears, legs and body: Basil was beginning to resemble a patchwork quilt. Reggie carried a few battle scars too. Slowly but surely the two were literally ripping each other to pieces.
It is important to say at this point that my method is not going to remove the aggressive tendencies of any dog. As I have explained earlier, the biting instinct is not one that can be unlearned: it is a part of a dog’s personality. I sometimes liken dogs to the Rambo character in the First Blood movie. Left in peace, Rambo was able to live his life like any normal well-adjusted person. Asked to defend himself, he fell back on knowledge that allowed him to become ultra-violent. Make no mistake, there are dogs that are capable of doing terrible damage to humans in confrontational circ
umstances. Breeds like pit bulls, for instance, were raised specifically for the purpose of fighting – called upon to do so, they draw on that savage nature to the full. My method cannot remove these basic instincts from any dog, whatever its breed. What it can do, however, is allow people to manage their pets so that the confrontations that bring out this aggressive nature never take place.
Unfortunately I was not free to help Reggie, as Christine was not able to get his owner’s permission so that I could work with him. The owner of the property simply wanted a guard dog on duty 24 hours a day. Basil, however, was a different case. The moment I met him, it was obvious Basil was as clear a case of an unelected Alpha as you could wish to see. When I first met him he displayed all the classic symptoms, he was pulling on the lead, jumping up, and barking. He clearly believed he was head of the household. He had even developed the habit of jumping up on to the kitchen worktop so as to be able to keep a lookout through the window.
Christine began by going through the normal bonding process with Basil. During this time, I asked her to be extra vigilant about keeping him away from Reggie’s part of the yard. The two dogs were not to see each other. When I felt Basil was ready, we took him out to the yard. I had him attached not only to a lead but to a harness as well. I knew how agitated he was likely to get and did not want to risk the possibility of him slipping his lead. In preparation for what was about to happen, we had put Reggie into a shed.
As soon as we got Basil on to his old foe’s patch, however, we let Reggie back out. He remained attached to his chain. At the same time I knelt down, quietly and calmly holding Basil at a distance of twenty feet from the end of the chain. Exactly how Reggie’s chain remained in place I don’t know to this day. Reggie roared into life and flew at Basil. Basil was as ready as ever for the confrontation, however: it was all I could do to hold on to my dog. The two dogs were ready to tear each other to pieces. But as long as they were signalling aggression towards each other, I made sure they would not physically be able to reach each other.
Eventually, the adrenaline levels subsided and tiredness set in. It was not the six-and-a-half hour ritual wolves go through, more like a quarter of an hour. The moment the threatening behaviour stopped Christine, as we had arranged in advance, appeared with a bowl of food for each of the dogs. The signal we were sending out was two-fold. We wanted the dogs to make a positive association with each other’s presence. And we wanted them to understand that positive association only occurred when they were being peaceful.
I cannot report complete success in this case as yet. The two had been fighting for a long time. This was no quick-fix situation. Basil responded well to the bonding process and began to be much calmer in his confrontations with Reggie. The two have not had a fight for some time. Basil has not needed stitches for some time. If the Rottweiler too had been given the right signals, I have no doubt the two would be able to peacefully coexist. This has not yet happened, however. The best I can hope for is that Basil remains a stranger to his local vet for years to come.
Whenever we jump in our car, we face the reality that, no matter how expert a driver we may be, there is a risk we will be confronted with another motorist who is unfit to be on the road. The same reality confronts every dog owner every time he or she steps out of the safety of their home. In the main, walking a dog is an enjoyable – and at times highly sociable – activity. I have forged many a friendship while out walking my pack. Yet it is a sad fact of life that most dog owners will come across a situation where their pet is faced with the aggression of another animal at some time.
There is, it is sad to say, nothing we can do about this. Not all owners exercise the care and control I encounter in most of the people I work with. Every decent dog owner is the victim of an irresponsible one at some time; we have to recognise that. Apart from anything else, as I have said before, we cannot remove the natural defensive instincts a dog falls back on when it cannot escape a confrontational situation. My best advice is that we should all avoid and ignore any such situation to the best of our ability.
There is much that can be done to ensure our dogs are not the aggressors, however. Again, the central ideas here are rooted in the nature of the animal and in the dynamics of the wolf pack. In the wild, wolf packs do all they possibly can to avoid other packs. The intensity with which they mark dens and hunting trails is designed to ensure packs remain confined to their own territories. Confrontations are rare.
When we bear this in mind, we realise how unnatural it is for domestic dogs to come into contact with other packs. We must remember here again that, to a dog, a pack can consist of as few as two members: a human and another dog. To a dog that believes it is the leader of its pack, it is a moment of potential danger. If a confrontation occurs, it will do anything necessary to protect its charges. The anxiety may be heightened if such meetings occur in a dog’s familiar walking environment, its local park for instance. On top of its responsibility to its pack, a dog may sense some territorial threat too.
To overcome the natural anxiety that occurs, I recommend all dogs I deal with go through a process I have called ‘cross-packing’. It is something that can be developed as owners learn to take charge of the walk. The idea is to get the dog used to coming into contact with other dogs and their owners, so that their packs cross without incident. The long-term aim is to make dogs as impervious to others as modern urban man is to his fellow humans. Whenever a dog comes into contact with another, I ask owners to simply ignore the other dog. If the dog responds to their example by letting the other dog pass without any reaction, it is rewarded with food. Again the dog is being encouraged to make a positive association with this situation. The key to ensuring this is a painless process lies in the principles that will already have been learned in the home. Most important of all, owners must demonstrate leadership qualities that the dog can identify and believe in.
As I have said, however, no matter how much control an individual owner is exercising over his or her dog, there is nothing he or she can do to control the behaviour of other people’s dogs. I am often asked what clues people should look for in the body language of aggressive dogs. People, understandably, want to know how to deal with the inevitable situations where one dog challenges another. What makes a growling dog turn into a fighting dog, what are the triggers to the attack and so on? My answer is always the same: they should look to the owner rather than the dog – leave the dog to weigh up its own kind.
If an owner is relaxed and happy, his or her dog invariably feels the same way. On the other hand, if an owner is waving his or her arms around, looking stressed or aggressive and struggling to hold on to their dog, then the chances are the dog, too, is in a highly combustible state. A dog accompanied by this type of owner is far more likely to attack. An attack by another dog presents perhaps the greatest test of an owner’s leadership. My advice is to avoid confrontations at all costs. I certainly advise against aggravating the situation by berating the other owner. It is imperative that someone remains calm. Again it is a time to think of Kipling, and to keep your head.
I am often asked why I do not recommend people simply pick their dog up in such situations. My reasoning here is that it sends out confusing signals to the dog. Firstly it is being removed from the level of its fellow animal and cannot, therefore, assess the situation for itself. Secondly, the owner risks getting bitten in the process. Far better in my opinion to show strong leadership and guide the dog to a way of dealing with the situation which it will be able to make again and again if necessary.
There is no doubt that anxiety about potential aggression between dogs can ruin the life an owner enjoys with his or her dog. The case of a retired nurse, Miss Artley, exemplifies this better than any other I have come across. Miss Artley lived in a lovely cottage in the seaside resort of Bridlington. She shared her life there with two beautiful Old English sheepdogs called Ben and Danny. Unfortunately the dogs had become very aggressive towards other dogs during her daily walk. A
t well over 100 lbs in weight, the dogs were big. In comparison, the diminutive Miss Artley weighed no more than seven stone. She could barely control Ben and Danny at the end of their leads, and picking them up was certainly not an available option. As a result, she had become increasingly helpless to stop the attacks.
By the time the owner called me, matters had deteriorated so much that the poor lady had resorted to walking the dogs at the most unseemly hours of the day. She told me she was going out at midnight and then again at five in the morning, so as to avoid any more upsetting confrontations. I am sure, like many people, she had her reservations about my abilities before I met her. I can understand that perfectly. Fortunately I converted her within five minutes.
Miss Artley kept her dogs in the garden because they were too boisterous. Her home was impeccable and their exuberant charging around was forever sending her prized possessions flying. Within five minutes of arriving, I had succeeded in calming them down. As ever, I had entered the house starting as I meant to go on, sending out strong signals that I was the leader and my authority was absolute. The two dogs were soon lying contentedly in the living room for the first time in their six years with their owner.
The owner’s major problem, however, was the walk. My solution here was simple. My goal was to ensure she would avoid situations where the dogs would confront other animals. To this end, I asked her to use food rewards to get the dogs used to moving away whenever they came into contact with other dogs. So, for instance, if the owner was walking down the street and saw another dog approaching, I asked her to avoid a face-off by crossing the road. Once safely across, I asked her to reward the two dogs with a tidbit. This simple action not only removed the negative possibility of a confrontation, but also showed the dogs that the owner had taken the decision to lead in the defence of the pack. At the same time, I stressed to Miss Artley the importance of her remaining calm throughout this type of situation.