Schutzhund Training makes dogs more aggresive? - Page 7

Although I don't work 'ol Nelson in sport, apart from a bit of tracking every week or so & standard daily obediance in public, I'm always interested in informative threads on working & drives & this one is a cracker with some excellent posts from which I've learnt a lot. Thanks all!

But could we go back to defensive drive for a moment with a couple of examples from my experience? The first is when playing tug-o-war in which the hound is (I'm assuming) all prey until a point when my (light) body hits and attempts to grab his legs etc will get him worked up into a 'zone' where I believe defense starts to come out & I can feel & see the difference in his demeanour.

The second is when we were round a friends house that was being gutted and refurbished and he started to scent  mark on a couple of cement bags - why not he thought it looks like a building site! My mate, who does have a lot of 'presence' jumped up shouting and striding toward him to which the hound turned tail.

Now, I would have been totally surprised if he had engaged but can defense be 'coaxed' out by training such as in the first example to then be used when the pressure is more extreme. Or will a dog always have a limit to his level & use of defense drive?

Cheers,

Andy B

Slamdunc,

Totally agree with your recent post. My current working Dog (Bitch) is 7 yrs old, from a mixture of Sch/Police breeding, she would not be able to be controlled by a novice/pet owner, her drives are balanced 50/50, just how I like.

I am certain that if this bitch had been picked for a pet home she would have sometime gone to one of the many overcrowded rescue centres or worse still have been PTS, she is very high drive and my other half cant control her she needs to work. When at work she is the first to be called to a serious Public Disorder Situation, over the last 30 yrs of working only GSD`S she is up there with the best Ive had.

deleted - didn't realize this was the same thread from a while back!

Schutzhund training doesn't inherently make a dog aggressive if he doesn't have that aspect to begin with. But for some that naturally have an aggressive streak, training them in Schutzhund can bring that out. Training an unstable dog can make it dangerous.

I think it also depends on what you want. I work different dogs differently, depending on my ultimate goals for them.



The dogs I'm currently working, Taiga (vom Nordosten Haus) and Raven (vom Nordosten Haus) , are being worked differently. Xtian (vom Nordosten Haus) will be started soon, ideally.

Taiga is a showline bitch who I am hoping to take to national level. Obviously I want her to earn at least a Schutzhund2. She's being worked mostly in prey since she's still green, but we're adding a bit of defense as well. She has a very high prey drive. Eventually, I want her to take it seriously. I don't need her to view it as a matter of life-and-death, but I want her to be able to put pressure back on the decoy. She needs to be civil enough to respond to any decoy on any field as a target, and confident enough to engage.

Raven, on the other hand, is mostly a pet that I'm working for fun. I'd never planned to work him in Sch, I'd kept him and considered therapy work. He has no fear, and he's the most calm and stable dog I know. In Sch, he works for the sheer joy of it. He smiles at the helper, he dances when he gets the sleeve, he's just a happy-go-lucky boy. I wouldn't want to put him into defense drive, much less civil. There's no need. He's so gentle and resilent that the amount of work it would take to make him reactionary would be almost abusive IMO; and I like my dear sweet guy just the way he is.

Xtian is a workingline bitch, and I want to develope her for working competitions. She'll never place as high as a showline in conformation, and she has a naturally serious nature. I want to develope that focus into defense and civil, to the point where she will engage a hidden sleeve, teach her that the target is the helper NOT his arm.




Raven's father, Xtian's grandfather, was a former military dog. He is -very!- civil when working, but completely trustworthy elsewise. When targeting the decoy, he goes for armpit, groin, or throat. He couldn't care less about sleeves. It doesn't matter if someone has a gun, or a banana: if Cezar is targetted on them, he will engage. But he doesn't engage randomly.

A well-trained, clear-headed dog should NOT get aggressive as a result of Schutzhund training.

The only changes I notice are some dogs get more prey-drivey, and in general most dogs become more confident.

Good point, Mary!

Especially since a lot of folk seem to believe the misconception that a dog needs to be aggressive to be a Schutzhund dog... and folk who don't know that a sport dog and PPD are not the same thing. Then there's the people who buy a sleeve, watch some videos, and think they're a qualified helper and start advertising their services...

... Yes. Very good point.

No, the more training (including obedience) your dog has, the better behaved he or she will be.  Schutzhund is using a dogs natural drives, not making them "aggressive".  There is a time and place for aggression to be used, but it's already inside your dog, just has to be brought out and also controlled.  It's a dog doing work they were bred to do, what can be wrong with that.