Lack of Awareness of Body Languge

[chene]

Not me, but my dog! As a puppy Aed was heavily socialized with all sorts of dogs and was pretty good at being polite and aware of body language, when a dog wanted to play or didn't, being gentler if a dog was scared, etc. But as he's grown I've seen it get gradually worse. He isn't around other dogs a ton, which may be the bulk of the reason, but my only opportunity for him to see other dogs are dog parks and that's not a great learning environment. He will continue to chase and play with a dog that is clearly scared, or a dog that is snapping at him to go away. He's generally a bit of an oblivious jerk about it sometimes. Obviously when that happens I remove him from the situation as soon as I can, but I'm not really sure what else I can do about it. Some ideas would be well appreciated.

[mbc1963]

I don't have much good advice - only can tell you that you are NOT alone. I used to walk reactive Buddy on his leash, and off-leash labs (seemed to always be labs!) would charge at us, and Buddy would snap and tell them IN NO UNCERTAIN TERMS that they'd better get away or risk their health. And those stupid dogs would come back, over and over, even after having been roundly corrected. The owners would be embarrassed, because even to them it was clear what Buddy was saying. ::Shrug::

 

With my new dog, she's small and likes to be chased. But not by giant dogs, and not by packs. I can see her body language is fearful and an attempt to escape, but a lot of the bigger dogs don't read it at all.

[D'Elle]

You are doing pretty much all you can by watching him very closely and getting him away from other dogs if he is ignoring or overlooking signals. If you have a friend with a dog who can teach him some manners, that might help.

 

My Jester, for instance, would be good at that. He gives a little lip lift. Then a little lip lift showing a tooth or two. Then a little lip lift with a very small growl. Then a full-on snarl. Then a full-on snarl combined with a snap not intended to connect. Only if all of those are ignored does he actually go after another dog, and even then he stops immediately if they move away. (Of course, once I learned his language, which only took a couple of weeks, I never let it get past the second or third lip-lift stage). If you know someone with a dog like that, who like Jester would not be likely actually to hurt your dog in the process, and the owner was willing, maybe you could work with that. I have never done this, so maybe others will tell us why it is a bad idea. It's just a thought.

[kingfisher7151]

I personally really appreciate dogs who are great teachers. Keeper is pretty good. He's a little submissive, so he won't really do much to a super confident dog. But my friend brought home a 9 month old border collie with a humping problem. Keeper was very clear that he did not appreciate the behavior, and he finally had a come to jesus meeting with the dog. He nailed him. Not really a bite, but several big snaps and he pinned him to the ground. I'd have loved for it not to get there, but I wasn't about to scold Keeper for communicating, and that dog has never humped since. Keeper also learns better from another dog than from me trying to teach him something.

 

You're absolutely not alone with this problem. I think it's more common in, uh, idiot breeds. Your labs, goldens, hounds, etc.

[chene]

I always knew he was actually just a tri-color lab. Unfortunately I don't really have any friends with dogs to help with this, though maybe as we get more into agility I'll find someone and we can work on it then. It's just so weird, he's so sensitive and observant to the slightest body language when he wants to be, but when it's body language that tells him something he doesn't like...well, I guess that's not really weird at all.

What is absolutely ridiculous (but kind of funny) is how bad he is about it with people, too. He'll climb up on to my lap and stick his face in front of mine like he does when he's about to give it a wash, and I'll very pointedly turn my head as far to one side as I can, and he'll just follow, and I'll try to the other side and generally do everything I can to keep my face away from his tongue, and he'll still end up cornering me and licking me unless I physically stop him.

[GentleLake]

What is absolutely ridiculous (but kind of funny) is how bad he is about it with people, too. He'll climb up on to my lap and stick his face in front of mine like he does when he's about to give it a wash, and I'll very pointedly turn my head as far to one side as I can, and he'll just follow, and I'll try to the other side and generally do everything I can to keep my face away from his tongue, and he'll still end up cornering me and licking me unless I physically stop him.

 

That's actually not as odd as you may think. Dogs avert their faces when they're telling another dog they aren't a threat or don't want to get into it with them. It's a very non-threatening gesture.

 

So that's what you're telling him. In turn, he may be trying to appease you with the licking. It's what young dogs do to their mothers and lower status wolves do to the returning high status wolves.

[chene]

I hadn't thought of it that way. You may just be right.

[Tess's Girl]

How old is he again? Is he neutered? It kind of sounds like he's just being an obnoxious adolescent male. Of course not all males go through that phase but that's where I'm at with Crow right now. He's just completely oblivious to other dogs signs and just wants to do what he wants to do. So I constantly manage and make sure he's not being too pushy and let the dogs sort it out if I know them well, but I never let him annoy a dog who doesn't like it. I think it will pass once he gets over this stage, we shall see.

[chene]

He's 18 months and intact. So I would hope he'd be started to grow out of it by now, but I'm just not seeing it.

[D'Elle]

Maybe it is time to neuter him?

[smiles604]

I'm a bit hesitant to offer advice because there are so many people here who have so much more experience than me, but for what it's worth, here's my 2 cents.

 

My dog, Ivy, is also young, but is a spayed female, and definitely has some of the same behavior. So I think at least some of it is just due to being young, and hopefully will improve with age. I do take her to the dog park, although I know it's not ideal, as it's one of the only places nearby where she can run off leash. I've found two things that have really helped with this behavior - first, only spending shorter times in the dog park. For me, this means around thirty minutes max in the park, though obviously she's not directly engaging with other dogs that entire time. In direct play, it would be much shorter than that, maybe 2-3 minutes (or sometimes even less, depending on her mood) before I would interrupt it. I find that usually her behavior starts out fine, but as she gets more and more excited her ability to listen to other dogs (and me!) takes a nosedive. To me, this is just like a little kid at a birthday party. She starts out having fun, but with too much stimuli she gets overwhelmed and has trouble controlling her responses, leading to a meltdown. So I try to leave before it gets to that point.

 

The other thing I do is work on a lot of recalls, with extra good rewards. I know better than to call her if she is already super engaged with another dog, but I do try to call her a fair amount at other times while at the park. She also has a particularly intense way of looking at another dog that I've found usually precedes impolite play behavior, and if I do a recall at that time it usually acts as a reset, as she loses interest in that dog after she's come back to me and I can redirect her onto something else.

 

So, basically just management, but those are the specific things that work for me. I have definitely noticed an improvement in her behavior - she doesn't get overexcited and rude as often as she used to, and I don't have to be as vigilant in preventing problems as I used to. I hope that helps a little.

[kingfisher7151]

Keeper was quite obnoxious for a time, and now at 23 months he's really started to mellow out. I wouldn't chop him just yet.

[Maralynn]

Kolt is currently rather obnoxious with Kenzi - lots of butt sniffing and pushiness. No humping - he's thought about it once or twice and she spun around and told him off. I correct and redirect. It's only been the last month or so with him. I mean, he had a hormone surge at 10-12 m/o and needed some direction but hasn't been obnoxious after that until the last month or so.

 

I'm hoping it evens out in the next month or two...

[highway61]

I have a neutered male that doesn't like when dogs he doesn't know come right up to him and try to initiate play. He will start snarling and if that is not effective he will snap as the dog runs in and out of his space. None of his snaps have ever landed but I'm not so sure that's the intent. Usually the problem dog takes this as if they've found a new playmate but in reality, far from it. I have another older dog the same size and although the old guy isn't too fond of the youngster, he will chase the annoying dog off of my sensitive dog with loud barks. This usually will keep the problem dog away, more effective than getting snapped at (go figure).

 

So I'm always amazed when the playful, strange dog invades my dog's space, gets growled, snarled and snapped at and thinks "this is fun!" I know the offending dog means no harm and just wants to play but I get terrified when I see my dog flashing his fangs! Apparently I see something quite different from the other dogs trying to initiate play.

[kingfisher7151]

That's such a lab thing. "You're lunging at me, that means you want to play!" And then the awful owners who 1. Tell their dog "Now Leonard, he doesn't want to play with you!" with a smile, or 2. Think it's such a fun way for their dog to get some exercise.

[Pam Wolf]

Aussies like to body slam. I've seen this many times and it causes many problems. I kept 2 Aussies for a friend while he was deployed. It took about 3 months for these Aussies to learn running screaming at another dog and body slamming into them warranted sever correction from my dogs. By the time he got home from Afghanistan, the dogs were much calmer and far more polite with other dogs

 

Over the years I've seen a few BC's with extremely little self recognition of how their body language affected other dogs. The first was a rescue who would constantly put her tail into the air when she saw another dog-she was not a dominant dog, yet her body language indicated she was doing something unacceptable by other dogs. she had spent much time with Rottweilers, so maybe their lack of tail had something to do with it.

 

Most of the BC's seem to have excellent doggy manners-if allowed to interact with other dogs,however owners often allow them to stare at other dogs-poor doggy manners! The thing is, dogs have a wonderful 'language' and if allowed to interact with others from a young age they learn the various 'dialects'.

[alligande]

Maybe it is time to neuter him?

As I now live in a country where most of the dogs are not neutered I don't think that it has any bearing on this, it is just the individual dogs personality. Living in the New England it was unusual to have an intact dog, as mine is rather fluffy no one ever noticed and I used to watch people get uptight when an obviously intact male joined a group of dogs if we were at a park, here it is not even a consideration.

[chrisandgabe]

however owners often allow them to stare at other dogs-poor doggy manners!

 

Whoever had Gabe before us totally let him stare at everyone. We've just about broken that habit, but it was a real problem. He has some leash reactivity issues too. Off leash with other dogs he actually does okay, but it's hard to even find dogs for him to practice interacting with because he can be so rude. I was very pleased when my husband realized how much trouble it caused when we let Gabe stare and got on board with redirecting him when he does that.