It’s not surprising that two-year-old Moose suffers from lack of confidence around people. Considering his background as a puppy born on the streets of Romania, he’s doing great. They didn’t have him until he was sixteen weeks old.
No socialisation will have taken place during the crucial early weeks and what encounters he did have with people were very likely scary ones and now hard-wired into his brain. Continue reading…
Imagine, how a Romanian puppy of about four months old must feel, being flown across Europe in a crate. Then, after a long drive in a car, the puppy enters an alien environment, a home.
The family, first-time dog owners, has done very well indeed with Cody who is now 18-months old. Most of the time he is affectionate, playful and friendly. He is great with people and dogs when out and off lead, so walks are enjoyable.
Near home he’s more insecure. At home he has a few problems.
They can’t give him anything of value to chew, just the kind of thing he really needs to keep him occupied and calm, because it triggers resource guarding behaviour. In the past, growling, guarding behaviour has elicited scolding.
Instead of stopping the aggression, this confrontational approach made Cody angry. Continue reading…
Delilah was in another room behind a gate when arrived, barking but not for long. Her lead was already attached to her harness. When the gate was opened she didn’t join us for several minutes. When she did, she was fine. I had laced the floor between the doorway and myself with food so she immediately picked up ‘nice smell’ on entering my presence.
She sniffed me, wandered about and settled between myself and the lady where we sat at the dining table. She looked just like a Corgi but DNA testing revealed a mix of German Shepherd, Malamute and Miniature Poodle!
I knew that she could bark, snarl and snap at people’s legs or shoes but only in her own house or garden. She is worse with men which isn’t uncommon and she has a particular fear of boots.
As she lay beside us I was looking for signs of timidity and saw none. However, the whole time I was there she was either in front of me facing outwards – it felt like she was blocking me in – or between myself and the lady. At one stage I needed to go to the toilet so asked the lady to pick up her lead and take her out of the room to avoid stressing her until I was sitting again. She returned to the same place – in the picture the lady is on the chair to my right.
Delilah was a Romanian street dog and for the first months of her life completely unrestricted. She then was in a shelter for nine months, loose with lots of other dogs, followed by a few months in a foster home where again there were lots of dogs and much coming and going of people.
Now she is a single dog living in a quiet cottage with only the lady. For the first two months she was the model dog, happy to see people coming into the house. Fine with other dogs when on lead.
As so often happens with dogs fitting into a completely different world, gradually this began to change.
Although I felt I should be careful indoors, Delilah was very friendly and accepting of me outside the house when we went for a short walk, happily letting me hold the lead and demonstrate loose lead walking with her.
Where indoors she may be reactive to people but not when she’s out, when outside her aggressive behaviour is towards dogs – but only when she is restrained on lead. She may may bark and lunge (not always). Off lead, however, she loves to run about, playing with any dog who is interested – as I saw for myself. She is bold and fearless.
The lady has been exposing Delilah to as many people and dogs as possible. She takes her to some nice training classes. She has friends coming to see her at home.
Worried about her increasing aggressive behaviour to people in the house, the lady has had a trainer visit who advocated spraying the dog with water when she showed aggression.
This tactic of spraying water sums up the very opposite of what I would do to a dog displaying fear or territorial possessiveness or even anger. The way to stop the behaviour (which is a symptom only) is to stop the emotions that cause it.
How will punishment or even a short, sharp interruptor, change emotions permanently for the better?
Okay, it may stop the actual symptom in the moment, but what then? The emotion won’t change and will probably become worse. It will fester and break out somewhere, in some way, for sure.
The dog is feeling deeply uncomfortable about something and then gets sprayed with water, which she won’t like, by the very person she should trust, who has been advised to do this rather than try to understand and help her out!
Fortunately the lady refused to do it.
We have several things to work on and it could take time. We are working on getting Delilah to happily accept people coming into the house with desensitisation work around the front door in particular. It’s like now she has a permanent home which is hers, she is becoming increasingly territorial. Walking legs and particularly feet with boots being a target for her aggressive behaviour which could well be influenced by a herding element in here genes, we will work on boots away from feet first, then boots on the feet of sitting people, and then people walking in boots.
The lady will do her best to show Delilah in every way she can that she doesn’t need protecting and that it’s her own job to protect their territory. The lady herself is in charge of comings and goings. We have a couple of strategies for when people come into the house including more simple management.
On walks Delilah will unfortunately need to lose some of her precious freedom and to be restricted to a long line for a while the lady works on her recall. She is so used to freelancing that she will only come when she is ready. When we were out together I held my breath as she ran off, assured she couldn’t get out of the field. I fear it’s a crisis waiting to happen. Here is a great little video from Steve Mann: ‘A Recall is a Recall‘.
On a long line she shouldn’t feel trapped when she meets other dogs. If she wants to play it can be dropped. The lady will work on her on-lead reactivity to certain other dogs.
From a noisy life where she has been one of many to a quiet life where she is the only one, Delilah is still having big adjustments to make after only three months still.
I have since been unable to get My My My Delilah out of my brain (thanks Tom Jones!).
Beautiful crossbreed Becca – with Labrador and Husky in the mix – started life as a puppy on the streets in Romania. At just a few weeks old she lost her mother and then she and her siblings caught Parvo. At just a few weeks old she spent too long alone in a cage at the vets.
Three puppies survived.
Their next big adjustment was to life in a Romanian shelter where she lived from seven weeks to seven months with her remaining siblings and other dogs..
Becca with her brother and sister
At seven months of age the three survivors were shipped over to a wonderful lady here in the UK who has a house full of dogs she’s helping.
This was another big adjustment at a sensitive stage of their lives. Becca lived there with her remaining siblings for two and a half years. It was her home.
Ten days ago, three-year-old Becca started what I’m sure will be her final big adjustment.
This has been the biggest adjustment of all. Never since when she was tiny and very ill with Parvo has she been without the company of several other dogs to back her up, including her brother and sister.
The lady had carefully prepared her for the big change, with several visits to the new house.
Becca initially raced around the garden boundary looking to get out and found a way of opening the door into the porch.
She won’t eat.
She won’t toilet in the garden.
She’s waiting.
I would say she’s still waiting for the lady to return and take her back home to the other dogs. The several visits to wean her into her new life may have backfired a little because each had ended with her going back home.
Becca mostly lies quite still and quiet. It’s like she is being very careful. She only moves to follow someone – she doesn’t like to be alone. After all, she never has been alone. There’s always been all the other dogs.
She is more wary of the man.
When he stood up and moved about she was jumpy, tail between her legs but I could see she’d be friends if she dared. If the lady’s not at home she will follow him around. When he’s sitting still she relaxes with him.
Becca
I have given him some tips about his own body language that should help.
To date Becca has been walked around the garden on a retractable lead (they don’t trust the fence) and on a short lead when out.
To help her relax Becca needs to feel some freedom when she’s outside. The retractable being on a spring means she will always feel restricted.
I have shown them how to use a 30-foot long line without getting it all tangled. We walked around the garden and for a while Becca sniffed quite happily and ate some grass – doing relaxed doggy things.
Out on walks, being on a long line will mean she can have thirty or forty feet of freedom..
The couple will approach food differently now. As with an anorexic, pressure and persuasion can only make the matter worse.
I hope that after my visit they will now stop worrying so much. They will leave her be – to do things in her own good time.
She will come round, I’m sure.
I quote a colleague who works at a shelter: ‘On the first day it’s like they are running on adrenaline and then seem to crash. We give them their own space such as a crate, covered in a blanket, and let them do things in their own time…..Obviously if dogs are in urgent medical need we get them to the vet but everything else is left for a good week to two weeks until they start to unwind. We always say that they are either very good or at the other end of the scale shut down for 2-3 weeks, then you get all the unwanted behaviours appearing, then after that they start to adjust and this can take months or even years’.
From her past history I don’t believe there are any ‘unwanted behaviours’ to appear with Becca. I also think it will probably take just weeks rather than months for her to make the adjustment. She is a lot less fearful than Romanian street dog Adi I went to a while ago.
Soon Becca will be eating her food. Soon she will be sufficiently relaxed to do her business in the garden. She will have lovely long walks on the Heath.
The lady who took her in as a pup and where she has lived since, does a great job. She has trained a well-mannered dog that walks nicely on lead, doesn’t bark excessively, is never aggressive, will sit when asked and much more
Becca will be a great companion for her new humans. I have mainly backed up what the lady has already advised and given them added confidence that they just need patience, to ease off a bit – and to relax.
Adi was shaking with fear
The dog was shaking with fear just because I had walked into the room where he lay.
Usually he runs out of the room and hides. Possibly my asking the man to walk into the room ahead of me may have helped just a little as did the fact I didn’t even let him see me look at him. I moved slowly and I left him be.
The couple doesn’t know the eight-year-old Adi’s history, apart from his being a Romanian rescue. They have had him for a year now. It took him some weeks to get used to them and they are still the only people he feels comfortable with. He didn’t move the whole time I was there – nearly three hours, and he was shaking on and off.
During this year Adi hasn’t been anywhere at all but their bungalow and small garden. They did try but it freaked him out.
He has never even been to the vet (who I shall be phoning).
A while ago they did manage to get a collar onto him. It shows how far they have come with their caring and understanding treatment that he had began to allow the man to groom him. Unfortunately, he then tried to attach a lead while he was brushing which sent Adi running and that now has now ‘infected’ the grooming with fear.
Their aim in calling me is simply to be able to take a willing and happy Adi out. It sounds reasonable, doesn’t it They had reckoned with how long this may take.
It’s a strange relationship they have with their dog. They do all they know to help him but they get little back. They feed him on the very best food available. As you can see he has luxuriously comfortable bed. Apart from wandering around the garden and eating his meals he does nothing much. He lies around. He’s not interested in playing though will come over from time to time for a short fuss. He has a little burst of energy first thing in the morning when he runs from room to room, probably when he has had the night to de-stress, but that is all.
How can they spice up his life a little without stressing or scaring him?
They dearly want to take him out and about with them as they did their other dogs.
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Something needs to be done about his extreme fear of people. He is a very quiet dog. I suspect he doesn’t dare to bark and his way of keeping safe is to lie low.
The man erected a strip of trellis in the garden for him hoping he would want to see through to the world outside. They can accompany him to the trellis at busier times of day and associate everything that happens beyond it with food, to actively de-sensitise him and acclimatise him so he can eventually, when he has accepted harness and lead, pass through the trellis.
Each time, at the trellis, he sees a passing car they will give him food; any person walking past – give him food; hearing a dog bark – give him food; a slamming door – food. Perhaps sprinkle it on the ground. They may later be able to move the trellis forward and continue the work nearer to the road.
Meanwhile, they need a harness because they must keep away from his neck. The collar has already been ‘infected’ when the lead was attached and very likely he was originally caught with a catch-pole accounting for his terror of humans. A soft and comfortable Perfect Fit harness is the answer. They then have the option of attaching the lead to the top of his back or at his chest – or both – and well away from his neck.
Adi won’t know what the harness is so they will build on that. I have broken the process down into tiny increments and devised a step-by-step plan where they spend several days on each step, beginning by leaving the harness in various corners of the house with food hidden in it for him to discover. Nobody should be seen to hold it so he gets no suspicion that it might be a trap.
Adi stopped shaking but was very still
Through various other steps the harness can eventually be put down with his food while he eats. This will lead, through more stages, to when he comes for a fuss, touching or stroking him with the harness whilst treating him. Bit by bit the harness can be rested briefly on top of him, then just his nose through it for food.
In case he doesn’t like the sound of the clips, they can be repeatedly done up and undone again, initially at a distance, while the other person gives him food.
It is a long-winded confidence-building process. We may use a clicker at later date but he was far too scared of me and all he felt safe doing was to lie still.
Once the harness is on, the process needs to be repeated with the lead.
I hope that after a couple of months of hard work Adi will be wearing the harness and accepting the lead. It could take a lot longer. He may also be relaxed with things just immediately outside his gate.
Getting to this point will be a big achievement. We can then walk him on lead around the house and the garden. Then take a step through the trellis, stand still and see what happens, giving him full length of the lead and the option to run back in.
Now the outside world!
Apart from knowing he’s terrified of people to the extent that he shakes, they don’t know how he is with day-to-day things like other dogs, wheelie bins, bikes, traffic….and cats.
There will be no normal ‘going for a walk’ for a long while, I fear.
