[QUOTE=skyon;8906203]
Yes, I can appreciate that.
However, I will take note I find myself introduced to a dog on the block who is supposed to now be IPO/Schutzhund or whatever other Org starts up. Bitework will be a question asked.[/QUOTE]
A question asked? Because this hypothetical person owes you an explanation or requires your permission?
Your attitude is truly baffling to me.
[QUOTE=Cascades;8906214]
A question asked? Because this hypothetical person owes you an explanation or requires your permission?
Your attitude is truly baffling to me.[/QUOTE]
Cascades, your attitude is incredibly defensive to me.
I really do think people owe their close neighbors a warning when their dogs are trained to bite.
But then, there are plenty of people who think it’s hilarious when a meter reader is bitten, or when a dog charges a city worker and they scream and run to their truck. I’ve heard people discussing the annual small dog killing at the off leash park with the attitude that if you have a small dog, they deserve to be prey. “get a real dog.” That’s very community-minded, no? I’ve BEEN the city worker, btw. LOVE those surprise lunges from snarling dogs when MY JOB was to go to your house and perform a service. My brother needed stitches after going to collect money from a client on his paper route. They never managed to pay on time, but man, did they know the ins and outs of animal control. They were FAR more concerned that my parents might report the dog than they were about my brother. This was a “good” neighbourhood, by the way. Even some upper middle class folk keep rotten dogs around and try to stiff the paper boy on monthly payments.
When you live in a city, there are actually a lot of good reasons that people might end up interacting with your dog. Most dogs, by far, are not a problem. As a dog owner though, I don’t think it’s ok for people to keep vicious dogs in urban areas. And that classification of vicious just seems to defy all attempts at reason.
[QUOTE=skyon;8906215]
Cascades, your attitude is incredibly defensive to me.[/QUOTE]
You’re surprised that you’ve raised some hackles?
To me, saying that nobody should be permitted to own a certain breed of dog or participate in a certain sport because some other, less above board people might then also want to own that breed of dog or participate in that sport with less than good intentions, is abhorrent.
This is like saying that people shouldn’t go shoot their guns at a gun club because some other people somewhere might use a gun for something bad.
Punish owners who let their dogs run at large. Contained dogs don’t create problems for other people. But don’t ban a dog or an activity because some people are irresponsible.
We did report the dog, btw. The owners got a warning. They were furious, with us. My brother was not allowed to stop delivering papers to them, under our contact with the newspaper, so we gave up our route.
[QUOTE=rugbygirl;8906220]
I really do think people owe their close neighbors a warning when their dogs are trained to bite.
But then, there are plenty of people who think it’s hilarious when a meter reader is bitten, or when a dog charges a city worker and they scream and run to their truck. [/QUOTE]
My dog isn’t being trained to bite. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of what most bite work is. Your chances of being bitten by one of the dogs at my IPO club are less than zero. Really.
Club day is family day - it has to be, since we’re there for eight hours. There’s usually a dozen or more kids running around while we work the dogs, spouses hanging out drinking beer, horses, goats, pet dogs underfoot…
IPO dogs are not out of control monsters as some on this thread seem to imagine.
And none of them are the dogs biting the meter reader, I promise you.
Amen Cascade.
Do you have a resource that can explain to me what “bite work” is? Because everything I’ve ever seen has a human or human shaped dummy wearing protection, and a dog that runs up, opens their mouths and clamps down on the human. This is done by some sort of command, sometimes audible, sometimes not. The dog is not leashed for this, but when I’ve seen it, it’s been going on in an enclosure of some kind.
I’m really not sure how you can spin that into anything else. It shows a real disconnect that you don’t understand why that would make someone fearful. Most of us companion dog owners train our dogs that biting any human is NOT OK. We start when they are puppies.
And sure, the dogs biting the meter reader might not be from your IPO club, but in one memorable incident, it was a retired K9. So, there’s that. Ever try and get animal control involved with an active police officer? Yeah, that doesn’t go well. We shared yard codes with the meter readers. There was a “dog” code.
Okay…bitework is complex, so I’ll speak about it from the way my club trains it for IPO. Personal protection dogs and K9s are a whole other issue…
Essentially, it’s glorified tug of war. Really. We start puppies with a tug with the helper (decoy). If the puppy barks at the helper, the helper rewards the bark by playing tug with the puppy. Eventually, this graduates up to the sleeve. It’s a game - the dog performs the require demonstrations of control and obedience, and he gets to play tug with the helper.
It’s about harnessing the dogs’ natural drives. IPO is all about harnessing natural drives and obedience obedience obedience.
This is IPO:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUZMqWKmKSI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTKO-f4EsbQ
Both videos are the same dog. I won’t post a tracking video because BORING, but the dogs have to track, too.
IPO is not training a dog to “attack”.
[QUOTE=Cascades;8906225]
You’re surprised that you’ve raised some hackles?
.[/QUOTE]
Seriously ???
Right Back At You.
You can have club day. Deal with questions. Don’t claim obedience when something goes wrong.
I’m not a dog who is going to roll over because you think you are raising hackles, lmao.
OK, serious question.
I’m following the tug of war, and reward. What happens with the dogs who sort of shut down in tug of war? Do you advise the owners not to pursue this kind of work, or is it something that can be worked through with all dogs? I’m thinking of my cousin’s old bulldog. He was actually a very nicely trained dog…but there was a hard and fast rule with him, of NO PULLING GAMES. He kind of went a bit “wild” as soon as he clamped down on something, and his owner told me that was sort of a breed characteristic. They just really engage in the pulling, and it was very hard to get the dog’s attention back.
As a beginner level dog owner, I felt this showed respect for the dog’s limitations, and an owner who was realistic and looking out for other people. It was also something relatively easy to control. In day to day interactions, you don’t expect someone to play tug of war with your dog.
I could be out to lunch. But I am curious how that stuff works with bite training, and curious what a responsible club does when presented with a dog who might be unsuitable.
I appreciate your explanation. It’s a much better one than I got from the last person I asked, but it also sounds like they do things differently.
[QUOTE=ASBJumper;8898933]
It was not insane. You had your dog running off leash in the neighbourhood - this was YOUR BAD. You clearly tried to skew your story to make the animal-hater out to be the bad guy, but the way I see it, you had your dog off leash. And something happened. And there were consequences.
This is EXACTLY why you can’t enforce existing laws - every freaking dog owner makes excuses for stupid behaviour, until it escalates, and someone’s dog is maimed, killed, someone’s CHILD is maimed, killed. The idea is not to enforce laws AFTER a victim gets attacked, the idea is to prevent attacks from ever happening in the first place. Putting someone in jail AFTER their dog attacks and kills something/someone doesn’t bring the victim back to life, now does it?
Um, where did I say my dog was off leash? You just assumed it was that way. He was leashed. We were at the end of our run so walking the last half block. Literally her driveway was across the street. I usually crossed the street before her house but there had been a car so I made the decision to keep on walking and cross after the car passed. He was in heel position, when she took a swing at him with her empty trash cart. He stopped and barked at her. I said, “come” and he came. No need to jerk his leash, raise my voice, or do anything else. After that he couldn’t go on walks either. He was not allowed to leave the property unless it was in a car and he was muzzled. So yes, that was insane. And yes, that neighbor was over the top. She called about another neighbor’s little fluffy dog for barking at her. Dog was in the owner’s back yard. I was, however, grateful when a stray cat claimed her heart. She finally got to feel love and affection from an animal. That and all the calls to AC stopped and she apologized to us and a lot of other neighbors she had called about. And as mush as I hated it then and now and complain about it, we complied 100% with the restrictions.
Are you sh*tting me right now? THREE strikes? What if my toddler was the “first” strike? Are you saying that dog gets another free pass after disfiguring my kid? Wow, just wow… I.can’t.even…
If I had a nickel for every time I read a story about a dog attack in which the owner claimed “golly gee whiz, he/she’s NEVER done ANYthing like this before, i’m so shocked!” i’d be filthy rich.
Every dog owner claims to be responsible. Virtually every dog owner (with the exception of the ones who live on rural properties with known offenders, apparently) thinks their dogs are safe, and well-trained and would never attack. Until they do, and everyone is shocked.
I should have clarified that a little bit more than I did. The same dog should not get 3 strikes you are out. I was referring to the owner continuing to own dangerous dogs. And I can completely understand how that got misconstrued and that is all my fault. If a dog attacks and disfigures it should be destroyed with a very few exceptions (protecting owner’s house or owner in situations of burglary, B&E, physical attack on owner, and the case of the stray pit bull mix that attacked a man attempting to harm a woman). Even in those exceptions, I would advocate destruction of the animal if it went overboard. And that would be a judgement call someone would need to make and that opens up a grey area with potential loopholes. I’m not sure how to prevent that grey area but I don’t think destroying the dog that protected your kid from a kidnapper should be destroyed.
So… sorry, but the whole “have dangerous dog laws in place because they wouldn’t apply to me” statement is worthless, especially to all of us who have seen/known previously reliable family dogs suddenly attack with no prior history of biting or aggression. The idea is not to punish owners AFTER those attacks, but to PREVENT them.[/QUOTE]
So how do you prevent the reliable family dog from suddenly attacking? Get rid of all dogs? Honest questions there. I know I put down two healthy puppies (6 months and 9 months) because their aggression level was too high and too easily obtained. They had not bitten any one, but had attacked each other and my other dog (the 9 month old was put down after that one attack). I could not trust them. They never bite anyone but I felt they were ticking time bombs. I didn’t want them to be headlines. So I did the responsible thing and took them in to be put down at my vet’s office. Thankfully, my vet understand it and did it.
rugbygirl -
In our club, at least, if a dog doesn’t have the correct temperament and drives to safely pursue IPO, our TD will usually sit down with the owner over coffee and gently explain it to them. They are never permitted to continue in protection training.
Our TD will also send dogs she receives for training back to the owner if she feels that the dog cannot safely proceed in protection.
Most owners in that situation will opt to continue pursuing strictly obedience and tracking titles within IPO. Not every dog is cut out for all three phases, and it’s no fun for anyone to force a square peg into a round hole.
[QUOTE=skyon;8906264]
Seriously ???
Right Back At You.
You can have club day. Deal with questions. Don’t claim obedience when something goes wrong.
I’m not a dog who is going to roll over because you think you are raising hackles, lmao.[/QUOTE]
It is obedience. Seriously. Tracking, obedience, protection. But it’s all obedience.
You’re coming across as slightly unhinged. Really.
[QUOTE=Cascades;8906279]
rugbygirl -
In our club, at least, if a dog doesn’t have the correct temperament and drives to safely pursue IPO, our TD will usually sit down with the owner over coffee and gently explain it to them. They are never permitted to continue in protection training.
Our TD will also send dogs she receives for training back to the owner if she feels that the dog cannot safely proceed in protection.
Most owners in that situation will opt to continue pursuing strictly obedience and tracking titles within IPO. Not every dog is cut out for all three phases, and it’s no fun for anyone to force a square peg into a round hole.[/QUOTE]
That sounds like a very reasonable thing to do. Your TD sounds like a very responsible dog advocate. 
There’s a video…I wish I could find it but I’m having no luck…it’s in a competition and the dog hits the sleeve just right to slide it off the helper’s arm (this isn’t supposed to happen outside of training). The dog is so thrilled with himself as he goes prancing back to his handler with the sleeve, completely ignoring the now “disarmed” helper.
Attack dog, indeed. :lol:
I can chime in on tug, I have and still work with one pit bull type, had another former bait dog foster. These dogs love to tug. In correct training you teach the dog an off switch. So you ramp the dog up with tugging, lots of high energy and play and then stop, or dead toy. Teach the dog to release when you stop tugging. I tell them out as in spit it out and the treat when they drop the tug. The bait dog I had to initially lure into releasing, she did NOT want to let go. But once learned I played tug a lot with this dog until the out command was solid. My foster now is not quite as committed and learned quite quickly that dead toy means out. I do not even have to command her to spit the toy out anymore. Teaching the dog and appropriate command and being able to ramp the dog up and then switch them off. I also get the dogs ramped up in play and then go to sit or down. Pit bulls are fun to work with, they are so smart and usually very easy to train.
[QUOTE=rugbygirl;8906297]
That sounds like a very reasonable thing to do. Your TD sounds like a very responsible dog advocate. :)[/QUOTE]
Our TD is amazing. We’re very fortunate to have her.
We wouldn’t have minded if our dogs had come with SLIGHTLY less instinct to cuddle all the humans…so far their only real contribution to protecting the home was to SAVAGELY bark at a filing cabinet that was waiting near the porch to be moved inside.
Strangers? All cuddles.
I’d rather have that problem though, than the alternative 
[QUOTE=rugbygirl;8906305]
We wouldn’t have minded if our dogs had come with SLIGHTLY less instinct to cuddle all the humans…so far their only real contribution to protecting the home was to SAVAGELY bark at a filing cabinet that was waiting near the porch to be moved inside.
Strangers? All cuddles.
I’d rather have that problem though, than the alternative :D[/QUOTE]
Believe it or not, my dog is the exact same way. LOVES people. And dogs. All of them. Loves to snuggle with total strangers. Just melts into a wiggling, tail wagging, kissing puddle.
It’s a little embarrassing. :lol:
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