From my experience, Labs are protective in nature.

YMMV,
Jeff

I Agree. The DH and myself had two Labs when we were first married. They were
your typical happy go lucky guys, barking when they were supposed to (to alert)
ect. ect. If you had never been to our house before though and basically a
stranger to them....they would of course greet you warmly if Mom or Dad let you
in. BUT....they would calmly position themselves between us (or more often me),
and the "new person." If I moved to a different location....so would
they....again nonchalantly (no menace or anything). Just sort of
"guarding"....making sure that this new person was truly ok. At least that's
the only reason the hubby and I could come up with.

Jan

"Jag795" wrote:

BUT....they would calmly position themselves between us (or more often
me),
and the "new person." If I moved to a different location....so would
they....again nonchalantly (no menace or anything).

Yep. Eli (Labrador that goes out with my dogs) does this- if he sees a dog
or human that he's not sure about approaching, he'll interpose himself
between the possible threat and me. He's very calm and nonchalant about it,
although I suspect he *would* go on the offensive if there were an actual
threat; he's done so when there was what appeared to be a serious threat to
his owner's young daughter.
And I've known *many* Labs over the years who were similarly protective.

"Jag795" wrote:

BUT....they would calmly position themselves between us (or more often
me),
and the "new person." If I moved to a different location....so would
they....again nonchalantly (no menace or anything).

Yep. Eli (Labrador that goes out with my dogs) does this- if he sees a dog
or human that he's not sure about approaching, he'll interpose himself
between the possible threat and me. He's very calm and nonchalant about it,
although I suspect he *would* go on the offensive if there were an actual
threat; he's done so when there was what appeared to be a serious threat to
his owner's young daughter.
And I've known *many* Labs over the years who were similarly protective.

"Jag795" wrote:

BUT....they would calmly position themselves between us (or more often
me),
and the "new person." If I moved to a different location....so would
they....again nonchalantly (no menace or anything).

Yep. Eli (Labrador that goes out with my dogs) does this- if he sees a dog
or human that he's not sure about approaching, he'll interpose himself
between the possible threat and me. He's very calm and nonchalant about it,
although I suspect he *would* go on the offensive if there were an actual
threat; he's done so when there was what appeared to be a serious threat to
his owner's young daughter.
And I've known *many* Labs over the years who were similarly protective.

"Jag795" wrote:

BUT....they would calmly position themselves between us (or more often
me),
and the "new person." If I moved to a different location....so would
they....again nonchalantly (no menace or anything).

Yep. Eli (Labrador that goes out with my dogs) does this- if he sees a dog
or human that he's not sure about approaching, he'll interpose himself
between the possible threat and me. He's very calm and nonchalant about it,
although I suspect he *would* go on the offensive if there were an actual
threat; he's done so when there was what appeared to be a serious threat to
his owner's young daughter.
And I've known *many* Labs over the years who were similarly protective.

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004 09:19:27 -0600, "flick"
wrote:

"Sionnach" wrote in message
...

"flick" wrote:

That sounds to me more like, "Hey, there's a stranger here! Hey, here's
the
stranger!" than actual protective behavior.

Er- that IS protective behaviour; it's alarm/alert barking.

To me, alarm/alert isn't quite the same thing as protective. I don't want
to get all tangled up in semantics here, but alarm/alert is just telling the
pack there's something going on, a stranger there. Trying to hold that
stranger or drive them away or actively protect the rest of the pack would
be protective, I think.

I had the same thought. One of my Greyhounds barks loudly whenever
someone comes to the door. He's a 'recovering' spook, and when he
started the behavior, he'd bark and then run into the bedroom to hide.
He doesn't do that anymore, and will usually greet strangers.
However, although I would describe his current behavior as alarm
barking, it's a behavior that was initially fear-based, and it's
definitely not protective behavior.

Mustang Sally

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004 09:19:27 -0600, "flick"
wrote:

"Sionnach" wrote in message
...

"flick" wrote:

That sounds to me more like, "Hey, there's a stranger here! Hey, here's
the
stranger!" than actual protective behavior.

Er- that IS protective behaviour; it's alarm/alert barking.

To me, alarm/alert isn't quite the same thing as protective. I don't want
to get all tangled up in semantics here, but alarm/alert is just telling the
pack there's something going on, a stranger there. Trying to hold that
stranger or drive them away or actively protect the rest of the pack would
be protective, I think.

I had the same thought. One of my Greyhounds barks loudly whenever
someone comes to the door. He's a 'recovering' spook, and when he
started the behavior, he'd bark and then run into the bedroom to hide.
He doesn't do that anymore, and will usually greet strangers.
However, although I would describe his current behavior as alarm
barking, it's a behavior that was initially fear-based, and it's
definitely not protective behavior.

Mustang Sally

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004 09:19:27 -0600, "flick"
wrote:

"Sionnach" wrote in message
...

"flick" wrote:

That sounds to me more like, "Hey, there's a stranger here! Hey, here's
the
stranger!" than actual protective behavior.

Er- that IS protective behaviour; it's alarm/alert barking.

To me, alarm/alert isn't quite the same thing as protective. I don't want
to get all tangled up in semantics here, but alarm/alert is just telling the
pack there's something going on, a stranger there. Trying to hold that
stranger or drive them away or actively protect the rest of the pack would
be protective, I think.

I had the same thought. One of my Greyhounds barks loudly whenever
someone comes to the door. He's a 'recovering' spook, and when he
started the behavior, he'd bark and then run into the bedroom to hide.
He doesn't do that anymore, and will usually greet strangers.
However, although I would describe his current behavior as alarm
barking, it's a behavior that was initially fear-based, and it's
definitely not protective behavior.

Mustang Sally

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004 09:19:27 -0600, "flick"
wrote:

"Sionnach" wrote in message
...

"flick" wrote:

That sounds to me more like, "Hey, there's a stranger here! Hey, here's
the
stranger!" than actual protective behavior.

Er- that IS protective behaviour; it's alarm/alert barking.

To me, alarm/alert isn't quite the same thing as protective. I don't want
to get all tangled up in semantics here, but alarm/alert is just telling the
pack there's something going on, a stranger there. Trying to hold that
stranger or drive them away or actively protect the rest of the pack would
be protective, I think.

I had the same thought. One of my Greyhounds barks loudly whenever
someone comes to the door. He's a 'recovering' spook, and when he
started the behavior, he'd bark and then run into the bedroom to hide.
He doesn't do that anymore, and will usually greet strangers.
However, although I would describe his current behavior as alarm
barking, it's a behavior that was initially fear-based, and it's
definitely not protective behavior.

Mustang Sally

"sighthounds etc." wrote:


One of my Greyhounds barks loudly whenever
someone comes to the door. He's a 'recovering' spook, and when he
started the behavior, he'd bark and then run into the bedroom to hide.
He doesn't do that anymore, and will usually greet strangers.
However, although I would describe his current behavior as alarm
barking, it's a behavior that was initially fear-based, and it's
definitely not protective behavior.


But that's not really the behaviour we're discussing- we're talking about
dogs who go up and bark at strangers encountered off-leash, away from home,
or who deliberately put themselves between their owners and people they're
not sure of.
And door-barking CAN be protective- just because your dog was acting out
of fear doesn't mean other dogs necessarily are.