Are civil dogs often hardheaded and unsuitable for Law enforcement? - Page 9

"Hardness, courage, fighting drive" - the elder handlers will remember these terms...
Duke is right, there is no difference between a civil dog without courage and a prey dog without courage...
both are useless.

The term "civil" in itself for me only describes the genetic will to bite a human/opponent, but we had this discussion before... :(

Defensiv/aggressiv, stable/unstable, courageous/anxious, social/unsocial ....those are the "interesting" traits, and at that point it doesn´t matter if the dog bites out of prey or out of civil drive.

Nerve wether it a prey dog civil dog if it's missing you have got nothing. I have found it is much easier to work a prey dog you can start young a game a bit of ragging protect the sleeve that sort of stuff later turns real. A civil dog I tend to work when he is a little older and more mature so he is able to handle a bit of pressure. It can be a tin line between breaking the dog and just enough to bring the dog on. My pup that I'm working now at the moment is low in prey drive but has tones of nerve. Will stand his ground since he was about 5 months. But I sill have to watch the pressure as he is still far to young. So as pointed out before on the thread it is so important to be able to read your dog a lot of good dogs have been ruined because of rushing.

Interesting concept of non classical prey by apple. I heard a trainer refer to large object prey. But no one commented on it

If a dog is seeing a sleeve just as a sees a moving ball. Why should the dog take either of the serious ly ?

i guess the concept of balanced drives eludes most people. It's got to be either one or the other but that dogs can actually transition in drives... naaaaaah... it's either one or the other... transitioning and keeping them in prey is for pussies...

I remember when he was 10 months old and he'd spit that sleeve to go after the helper instead and my Dad said "Keep him in prey, otherwise he'll be so strong that you won't be able to handle him anymore." and that's what I did. We kept him in prey. No need for defense, no need to bring his civil side out. It's all there. The helper doesn't have to activate the dog. The dog activates the helper. And yet, he's social with an excellent temperament. But because he's not defensive and has full grips on a sleeve and drives in on a suit, and hasn't killed me yet, he ain't a real dog I guess.

Everywhere I look, young dogs are started out as defensive as possible rather than in prey. I don't get it. I don't understand whats so terrible about keeping a dog in prey. Doesn't make the dog less of a dog when it's all there. It simply makes it easier to train them. Especially a dog that has learned to bite for real it's so much safer to keep them in a different mindset and not thinking about bitework.  But there seems to be that notion that whenever a dog is worked with a clicker, he's made. Whenever a dog is well trained, he can't be real, and whenever a dog is handled by a 125 pound Lady, it can't be a strong dog or when a dog is versatile and actually exactly what the breed should be, it's still not a good enough dog because he ain't foaming out of his mouth trying to attack everyone.

 

Here he is doing a Civil bite

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR-kyQw6g_A
 

BE, I really don't see any real power or aggression in that dog. but if you are happy that all that matters you have to live with him.

Yogi

Unbelievable... you are unbelievable... you seriously don't know a good dog when you see one.

Dude, he wasn't put into aggression. That was not the point of the entire exercise. The helper was passively sitting in a chair. There was no need for aggression. The dog is being led in and basically goes onto the bite. That's as civil as it gets.

Civil literally means that the dog is willing to engage a person without any tools, no sleeve or suit. That's exactly what he did. There was no need to activate him.

And if you can't see the power in this dog you are willfully ignorant!

 

Please, show me a dog that is powerful with active aggression. Post a Video example of a dog with what you would consider a powerful dog. I seriously need to see what your standard is and what you consider a powerful dog.

that is a prey bite all the way, nothing civil about it

allways amazes me to see videos of "hidden " equipment and suddenly its a civil bite

Totally agree Duke. The decoy is able to walk the dog anywhere he wants with absolutely no fight no pulling. The bark is week and In prey its not a passive bite as the dog jus bit this decoy 10 second before he sat down. so he is already i use the word fired up lightly. And believe civil and aggression does not show this way. By the way ti's is only one video.