.... and it ain't much fun.

Has anyone seen something like this?

(Scene setting)

Teena, 4yo, high-drive, dominant, fear-agressive, poorly socialized
(before we got her at 14mo) Springer. Has responded well to very focused
competition obedience training, mostly clicker-based, although we may
never put her in the ring. Is trained through CDX and settled down at
home with a NILF campaign that puts her through those paces before pats,
dinner, etc. She was retired to the sofa instead of the competition ring
because we don't trust her completely around strange men or strange dogs,
even if she is OK 95% of the time. She has shown some resource-guarding
issues around people who approach me, and can get insanely jealous
(barking, howling) if I train Storm without her.

Storm, 2yo, goofy FCR, will submit to a tree if it looks at her funny,
very cautious. (Prone to zoomies in agility trials, and baulking at
strange water weeds in hunt tests, but that's another post)

They generally get along well, zooming around happily, play-fighting, and
just hanging out. Teena's most obnoxious behaviour around Storm usually
involves chasing and rear-leg-biting and barking when they're running
around. But:

More and more frequently, one of us will look up and realize that Storm
has been standing, frozen, in the same spot for over ten minutes. Ears
back, head hanging, tail not tucked but straight down. Looks simply
miserable. Teena is within about six feet of her and not making
obviously threating noises or gestures, but Storm is clearly petrified.
Teena gets up from time to time and moves, fixing Storm with a hard
stare. I recently stopped one of these scenes by calling Storm to me,
past Teena. Storm made as wide a circle around Teena as possible and
cringed as she went by.

What the heck is going on? Is this to be resolved by yelling at Teena?
Patting Storm? Letting them just do their doggy thing? Is this bullying
on Teena's part?

At a gut level, I really don't like this at all. I like it less, becuase
other behaviour issues that I thought were behind us a year ago are
returning. Any thoughts?

Kate

KWBrown wrote:

More and more frequently, one of us will look up and realize that Storm
has been standing, frozen, in the same spot for over ten minutes. Ears
back, head hanging, tail not tucked but straight down. Looks simply
miserable. Teena is within about six feet of her and not making
obviously threating noises or gestures, but Storm is clearly petrified.
Teena gets up from time to time and moves, fixing Storm with a hard
stare. I recently stopped one of these scenes by calling Storm to me,
past Teena. Storm made as wide a circle around Teena as possible and
cringed as she went by.

Wow! I've seen this between two female dogs I like a whole lot, Pan and
Izzy. Pan will be off to a side, just eying her, and Izzy will respond
much as you have described, just not wanting to start anything, and
clearly unhappy (just for the record, she is NOT easily intimidated).
Since these two don't have to live with each other, we don't have to do
anything other than making sure that this doesn't escalate into
conflict. Calling off Pan takes care of that, but your situation
requires some sort of intervention, I would think. We did try the
'Let's see if they can work it out' approach, and what happened was that
Pan escalated to blocking her way when Izzy tried to walk away from the
situation, which was clearly not acceptable.


What the heck is going on? Is this to be resolved by yelling at Teena?

Well, we know that's not gonna solve anything. I was thinking maybe to
use a 'Place', where she has to go to an out of the way location and
chill until you call her? If you're the prize that she's competing
over, making her remove herself from your presence for being ill
mannered would be punishment enough? I wish I had something more to offer.

Suja

Suja wrote in :

What the heck is going on? Is this to be resolved by yelling at
Teena?

Well, we know that's not gonna solve anything. I was thinking maybe
to use a 'Place', where she has to go to an out of the way location
and chill until you call her? If you're the prize that she's
competing over, making her remove herself from your presence for being
ill mannered would be punishment enough?

Good thinking with the "place" command. She already has it, and that place
(the stair landing) would be a good place to put her, so long as it isn't
near where the freeze is taking place. After that, it's probably best to
ignore Storm, isn't it? Obvious-Storm-Patting isn't likely to improve
Teena's mood in the slightest.

Kate

KWBrown said in rec.pets.dogs.behavior:

Good thinking with the "place" command. She already has
it, and that place (the stair landing) would be a good
place to put her, so long as it isn't near where the freeze
is taking place. After that, it's probably best to ignore
Storm, isn't it? Obvious-Storm-Patting isn't likely to
improve Teena's mood in the slightest.

I've never dealt with two bitches before but, if I were you, I
put myself as head bitch at these times. Put both in a "place"
for a time out.

Who knows? Storm may be sending signals that she's vulnerable.
Teena may be taking advantage. Back chaining Storm into a
comfortable situation may instill some confidence.

--
--Matt. Rocky's a Dog.

Rocky wrote in
news:Xns93CFD5987CDE9australianshepherdca@IP:


I've never dealt with two bitches before but, if I were you, I
put myself as head bitch at these times.

Oh - *that* should prove to be no problem :-)

Put both in a "place" for a time out.

Good plan. Will put into effect next time I see it starting. I think I
should put them out of sight of each other. I'm still wondering whether
the times I've seen this behaviour are the only times it has happened. Is
a human presence a required ingredient? Does Storm spend hours standing in
place when we're away?

doG knows.

I'm definitely worried about this escalating.

Kate

I've seen this behavior too - at my breeder's house.

She calls it "Parking" as in "Oh my, Ari (lead canine female) has
parked Twinky over there for 20 minutes."

Her response is: "Ari, that's enough, Twinky has the right
to be here, too." And Ari backs down. And Twinky shakes
and trots off and does her thing.

And in that household typically with 4-6 dogs, Ms. breeder is
very much always alpha.

(It has always impressed me that she just talks to her dogs
in whole sentences, telling them exactly what she wants,
and expecting them to understand and obey. And they do.
I can't figure out if it is training or telepathy.)

Laura,
Oslo

"KWBrown" wrote in message
. 1.4...
... and it ain't much fun.

Has anyone seen something like this?

(Scene setting)

Teena, 4yo, high-drive, dominant, fear-agressive, poorly socialized
(before we got her at 14mo) Springer. Has responded well to very focused
competition obedience training, mostly clicker-based, although we may
never put her in the ring. Is trained through CDX and settled down at
home with a NILF campaign that puts her through those paces before pats,
dinner, etc. She was retired to the sofa instead of the competition ring
because we don't trust her completely around strange men or strange dogs,
even if she is OK 95% of the time. She has shown some resource-guarding
issues around people who approach me, and can get insanely jealous
(barking, howling) if I train Storm without her.

Storm, 2yo, goofy FCR, will submit to a tree if it looks at her funny,
very cautious. (Prone to zoomies in agility trials, and baulking at
strange water weeds in hunt tests, but that's another post)

They generally get along well, zooming around happily, play-fighting, and
just hanging out. Teena's most obnoxious behaviour around Storm usually
involves chasing and rear-leg-biting and barking when they're running
around. But:

More and more frequently, one of us will look up and realize that Storm
has been standing, frozen, in the same spot for over ten minutes. Ears
back, head hanging, tail not tucked but straight down. Looks simply
miserable. Teena is within about six feet of her and not making
obviously threating noises or gestures, but Storm is clearly petrified.
Teena gets up from time to time and moves, fixing Storm with a hard
stare. I recently stopped one of these scenes by calling Storm to me,
past Teena. Storm made as wide a circle around Teena as possible and
cringed as she went by.

What the heck is going on? Is this to be resolved by yelling at Teena?
Patting Storm? Letting them just do their doggy thing? Is this bullying
on Teena's part?

At a gut level, I really don't like this at all. I like it less, becuase
other behaviour issues that I thought were behind us a year ago are
returning. Any thoughts?

Kate

Sounds like what happened around here when I first brought Foxy home.
Sometimes it was over something that was near neither dog, but Dax was
asserting that it (usually a rawhide) was hers, wherever it was. The dogs
could be in different rooms with the rawhide square in the middle, and the
tension would come. It took me quite a while to figure out that the rawhides
were the issue, because they wouldn't try to take them from each other,
they'd move apart and chew on them and it all seemed fine. The problem was
when no one had clear possession. Then there was an issue.

I banned rawhides, since that was the majority of the problem, and we've
worked the rest out. I could probably bring rawhides back in, now, but
nobody really misses them, so I don't really care to try.

"Laura Arlov" wrote in message
news:8SkYa.21530$KF1.308871@amstwist00...
I've seen this behavior too - at my breeder's house.

She calls it "Parking" as in "Oh my, Ari (lead canine female) has
parked Twinky over there for 20 minutes."

Her response is: "Ari, that's enough, Twinky has the right
to be here, too." And Ari backs down. And Twinky shakes
and trots off and does her thing.


Same thing used to happen here every once in a while, but we called it
"Kiska's being a bossy bitch again". I always handled it in the same way
you describe, "Kiska that's enough, Loki's a good girl." It worked for
us. I think just my voice changing their focus for an instant was enough
to break the spell.

-Jenn

"D.Currie" wrote in
:

Sounds like what happened around here when I first brought Foxy home.
Sometimes it was over something that was near neither dog, but Dax was
asserting that it (usually a rawhide) was hers, wherever it was. The
dogs could be in different rooms with the rawhide square in the
middle, and the tension would come. It took me quite a while to figure
out that the rawhides were the issue, because they wouldn't try to
take them from each other, they'd move apart and chew on them and it
all seemed fine. The problem was when no one had clear possession.
Then there was an issue.

That's very, very interesting. Teena is extremely food driven - we don't
have any rawhides around, but I'll watch the next few episodes and look for
a common ingredient. (It isn't me - DH just had a "Oh, yeah!" moment and
realized that he broke up a "parking" episode last week while I was out.)

"Laura Arlov" wrote in
news:8SkYa.21530$KF1.308871@amstwist00:

I've seen this behavior too - at my breeder's house.

She calls it "Parking" as in "Oh my, Ari (lead canine female) has
parked Twinky over there for 20 minutes."

Her response is: "Ari, that's enough, Twinky has the right
to be here, too." And Ari backs down. And Twinky shakes
and trots off and does her thing.

And in that household typically with 4-6 dogs, Ms. breeder is
very much always alpha.

Laura - I think "Parking" is a wonderful word for it. I'm hearing from
several people with multiple-bitch situations saying this happens, so I'm
fretting a little less.

Incidentally - is that low-status bitch really named "Twinky," or did you
just come up with the perfect name for a dog in that situation? Your
breeder's comment had me in stitches.

Kate