Civil Dogs and Civil Work - Page 4

no they dont want a dog to work over, or show agression, so as soon as a dog directs at anything else as the sleeve only they will be corrected,

now, if a pup, say 7 or 8 months will get corrected for trying to engage, but directly are retried to focus on helper again, it is very confusing for a dog, also many helpers dont know how to work a dog any other way than in prey

here is pup in that age that was sold for being "nervous " and having bad grips as result,, now I train the dog and reward her for natural shown behaviour and even encourage it, and you see these dogs growing immediately, because everything is clear and makes sense to them now,

https://youtu.be/BjlYJ-WgGFU

I will see if I can find video of another dog that was actually crowling behind owner as soon as sleeve was brought out, such a bad connection was locked in the dogs mind, in connection with sleeve

this dog was trained by female handler in IPO and would shy away as soon as sleeve was presented , turned around real good and had hard crushing grips on a sleeve after we turned his training around

https://youtu.be/baTEm1I5xAM


 

So Duke are you saying you have never met a dog yet that you would reject, because even those apparently nervous or shy can be trained, or re-trained, provided that the Trainer knows what they are doing ?


@Gustav, probably I'd agree there are some puppies in which little or no 'fear stage' shows itself; but the general understanding backed by current behavioural science seems to be that fear stages always exist, (whether made very obvious or not). [?]
My question relates not to those REALLY 'bombproof' [or occasionally catatonic, pups !] which do not show anything but curiosity and a willingness to be 'up for anything' at all age-stages, but the ways in which people assess the general majority of puppies which do show various levels of shyness at some point, since there are undoubtedly more of those about, and some will be introduced to training of one or another sort.

hundmutter, I test a dog and see the responses of the dog and go by that,, have a shy dog in the kennel right now from last sunday that I think will turn around,

also ,two months back I tested/worked a dog that was for sale for same reasons, and after 15 minutes working with her the girl didnot want to sell it anymore, father ot that dog was a novotny dog, would have loved to buy that female for me

I allowed and even adressed the civil agression and the dog grew instantly

Hundmutter

I often say that no one has any business ever interacting with a dog , and for the moment let me say by interacting , to do protection , without ever understanding that dog first . puppies or adults let me say this ; In human terms one should not interact or teach a 4 year old as one would a 16 year old , as a 30 year old. That being said, A knowledgable person in canines can most reliably understand that dog in front of them whether 4 months old or 5 years old when they look at and , not test, but I mean evaluate the dog for Temperament. What many don't know and what they cannot do while evaluating Temperament is to be able to strip away the environment/ learning and the genetics from each other. And that HAS to be done in order to understand the dog and should be done as I wrote even before the interaction. I see truth in what Duke writes about canines today , especially with training .. one shoe fits all. To illustrate, I have seen dogs given up on because they were deemed to have no prey drive , when in fact their prey drive was there but expressed differently . I wrote about this before , different dogs have different styles. So in a young dog , yes we can access the dog to a reliable degree. Hund .. we can get a very good handle on a pup as to it's potential , ti's temperament , mentality .. and where it is heading .. Just my honest experience and opinion. There are ways to interact with the dog to strip the genetics and environment to evaluate temperament . For those that disagree , personally I have been trained and tested to do this and I am sure a number of others on the PDB have been also.


Val .. what do you see as contradictory ? I look at unsound dogs as being totally different. I first establish in my mind if the dog is of sound temperament or not of sound temperament . IMOp , that is the very very first factor to ever to be looked at before anything else we look at about the dog , even way before we ever work a dog , or interact with a dog. After I evaluate temperament THEN , I will categorize a dog , this or that. A person that is clear in the head that can fight . We can and will call that person when he fights a prized fighter, a ' Champion'. If you have a psychotic paranoid person beating up on everyone , do you say , that person can fight, wow , that's a champion , no matter what skills that person displays in fighting ? Of course not .We first call that person a Psychotic nut case . Then why would I want to call a dog that is not sound, a dog that is civil ? Having a sound civil dog to me is like having a Champion.. they are now a day not so common . And I agree in part** with Duke , at an early age they can be ruined , yet again that is not enlightening because any dog .. can be ruined .

So Duke,
Are you saying there is a trend for some young IPO trainers to want their dogs to see the bite work strictly as a game and not to be man focused. In the first video you posted, I didn't see any nerve or grip issues at all.

@Centurian...of course there are folks that can assess genetics and environment at very young age as you say; BUT you can only do that with experience in training and exposure to hundreds of pups/dogs. You have to understand WHAT you are looking at and the differences in character, temperament, drives, from dog to dog . You have to understand how drives channel and are expressed depending on the strengths/weaknesses of the dog. I agree with what you write.
@Hundmutter...this breed is very complex in temperaments and drives, that’s why all or never is not used by me because having seen so many temperaments and drives I find that nothing is absolute. I don’t think that dogs/pups that don’t go through fear stages is an anomaly, but I do think that pups/dogs from certain lines are more apt to experience this.

In reference to topic of civil, I find a dog can be civil in all drives, ( remember the strongest element of defense is flight and a fear biter can be civil), but a civil dog, just like a dog working in defense or prey or hunt are only as good as the nervebase that supports them. With solid nervebase, the civil dog as well as the others can with proper training learn boundaries and discernment to benefit man.

Apple wrote ;In the first video you posted, I didn't see any nerve or grip issues at all

 

that is the point apple, I allow that dog to work over its natural drives,even adress the civil drive,  than there is no problem with such dog,

But my question is, are you seeing a trend among some younger IPO trainers that they don't want their dogs to express their natural drives and only be focused on the sleeve in an effort to get on the podium? I believe it is a pretty well accepted opinion that point dogs often do not possess the traits of a good working dog in the GSD breed. So then it becomes not just selecting for point dogs in breeding, but also training solely for sport performance. For me, the challenge has always been to find a dog with the right genetics to have the desire and capacity to fight a person and then cross train. You can keep the sport training on the nice, flat, grassy field, and do more man work oriented training under a lot of different scenarios totally away from the sport field. Plus, I would never correct a dog during sport training for showing aggression toward the helper, accept for when it is time to teach protection obedience. I also hate to see the helper correct the dog in the blind. Maybe that is the issue. IPO is so far removed from, for example, police dog training. But even in KNPV, titled dogs sold as police dogs need some retraining. I'm just trying to figure out how much the breed is being screwed up by ego and money.

Centurion, just too many different takes on dog's "civility", seems unanimity can't be found.
jeez, how much simpler was life before - there were good dogs or dogs neither, period.
now to this matter approach so much nuanced - easy to be lost in it.

Gustav i agree with Huntmutter about "fear stage" of puppyhood. we used this for very early testing of selfpreservation
threshold in pups and i can assure you it's best test to select future strong dog.

i also agree with duke in regards of sporty usage of dogs. i disagree only on point of "redirection of natural aggression" in sport.
there no redirection. folks, actively involved in sport competition, just avoids the dogs, which do have true aggressiveness in them
for many reasons.