Reckless Aggression , where does it comme from, and which lines are known to pass it down? - Page 4

Valk, check your PM.

GK1
At the expense of humanizing canine drives for the sake of discussion, are “hussar dogs” mostly born or made? Or both to some degree? Seems high prey/hunt traits (somehow displayed in so-called recklessness) could be sustained in a given line with fair consistency.  But theoretically would “hussar drive” be more elusive since it is an unnatural, counter-productive to survival trait?

nothing here in reference to "humanizing canine".
after all it's just comparison of dog's recklessness to similar behavior of human warriors.
you can't cultivate such peculiarity nor by training, neither by mating selection. it's innate and as i said - occur very rarely.
i agree that such trait unnatural and from point of nature of survival is counterproductive. but humans did took over care about the dogs from hands of mother nature for many millennia. i guess there are left just handful of breeds, able to survive without human's involvement.
prey/hunt drive have nothing to do with this trait. more over, prey have nothing in common with protection fight. it's just widely been adapted and utilized today due to absence of protection instinct in majority of dogs in present breeding stock.

Good post, Valk. Right on the money.

K9L1
Pertaining to your question : has anyone seen this " about how a dog holds itself . YES ! I have . 25 years ago I owned a GS just as you decribed. Even though a dog does  not look upon a dog and a person in the same way , I had a GS that not only people repsonded to but  also dogs in regards to  how he presented himself . My GS just by looking and how it held / projected himself was what you observed. . The only breed dog that did not repsond to him the way that you described in your post was my friend's 160 lb male Akita . I often found this interesting about him : while he walked , always ,,, always this occured ,  as if he was royalty , people and dogs just opened a path for him like he was walking down a royal carpet ! The dog has what I called ' prescence ' !

Another GS  I owned  was simliar .  I know this is not common but also this other dog  also had shown this  in the Show Ring too . When he was in the show ring , and this is difficult to express in words , he projected himself through a physical presentation and he projected " Attitude '. Even as he lloked at other people and dogs , you could see in hs head he was stating " I am all that ". Even when he gaited/trottred - this attitude was exemplified.

BTW for those that are not aware : dogs do most definately smell fear. When a person is fearful ,that person's  physiological chemistry does change and that change in the chemicals associated with fear permeates the  skin .. Dogs definately smell fear and their olfactory capabilities are more than impressive. Do not let down your guard and think that you fool dogs so easily :-) . Ditto for the ' smell of death '.

As Apple referenced in other posts andas Yogi once referenced: You can tell a lot , not just something , I emphasize a lot, by observing the dog's eyes. IMOp , that is one primary key to understanding and labeling ' Reckless Aggression' as opposed to Healthy strong Natural Normal Aggression . BTW I have seen dogs with Reckless Aggression and I would say that some of those dogs you could see their eyes literally roll back in their head-  you saw the whites of their eyes , literally ...... Violent and reckless aggression they displayed .

https://www.dropbox.com/sc/0egzs2dy47iymxt/AADTFXy-Hog6OCMFCvjUMd9aa

See the eys on my male 

1 normal and settled 

2 recognised the threat 

3 dealing with threat

Look at the changes in the eyes

Centurion you are correct , fear does alter our physiology and the molecular products reaching the skin/ air interface.
It makes sense that certain complex behaviors in a few individuals of a species that tend to form packs can have an evolutionary advantage. An animal being able to keep order in the pack by subordinating the others through fear is one such behavior.

I see dogs with "learned aggression" at least once every two months. The youngest dog I've had that had learned that he can control his owners through aggression was a 4 to 5 month old Labrador puppy (not kidding).
Dogs figure it out real quick when they get away with showing aggression and don't have to do something they don't want to do when they exhibit a certain behavior.

In case of the puppy it was walking on a leash. It's not humanizing a dog. It's actually a real thing that dogs can and will learn how to use aggression in order to manipulate their owners and environment. Usually, the type of owner that comes in with dogs that learned aggression are extremely permissive and the soft type.

most dogs, and children for that matter, that grow out of control are the result of bad parenting,just look at any ceasar milan episode

however, that is shaped or trained behaviour, not genetic , or natural trait, many times its even weak dogs that found out(pavlov) what works for them

IMO some people over analyse things

Duke and Bareng all respect to your knowledge and experience;but consider this. We all have no problem asserting that a dog without the genetics cannot be trained up to the BSP or WUSV level. Consider the same argument applied to a different context. 

If “ weak owners “ was the only cause we would see nearly all dogs with weak or no training turn out like this; the fact is many many dogs with weak owners and no training turn out to be quite social and treat loving . It seems that the dogs that turn out this way may also be genetically predisposed to do this and weak or non training allowed it to surface. 

And it seems like on a fewer occasions nature can prefer this behavior as it may be a self sufficient way to maintain control  in a pack.

Centaurian said: The dog has what I called ' presence ' !

 

Back in the late 60's and early 70's a friend had a male who had a aura about him. No aggression unless provoked. He would make people's heads turn. In those days some people tied their dog to stakes around the protection field so that their dogs could witness other dogs being worked. When this dog walked onto the field everything calmed down, almost completely silent. The tied up dogs sort of lost interest in the helper. When the other dogs were being worked he completely ignored what was going on, just laid quietly next to his owner but when he went onto the field he completely dominated the helper. We use to call this dog a "sovereign" dog. I have only seen one like this in over 50 years of GSD and hunting dogs.