I've spent the last few days watching a couple of new shows I haven't seen before, about dogs with various problems, who gets help. Both series are available on Disney+, if anyone is interested. One of them is Cesar Milan: Better Human, Better Dog, and the other is Mission: Dog (National Geographic) with Matt Beisner.
I do know that surely most of you reading do not like Cesar Milan at all, and it is optional. If I may guess (and I get that, because it's my blog) I would guess you wouldn't like Matt Briesner either.
For once sake, I'm not going to praise anyone at all to the skies, and I'm not going to criticize anyone either. This time I will talk about myself and my own dog.
Overall is Boyo a super nice dog. He is very kind, he is a couch potato deluxe indoors, he is good at dog language and goes well on walks with other dogs, he has a good grasp of our relationship and how we communicate (which we do above all through body language and facial expressions), he takes for granted that the whole world is fantastic, worth investigating, and that everyone loves him as much as he loves them. He's fun that way.
Then he has of course some less fun pages. Partly because he's so damn motherly, so to the mild degree that it can be embarrassing at times. His on button causes him to gain energy very quickly, especially when things happen that he thinks are hilarious (we get visitors, we see hares/rabbits/cats/birds etc outside). Between him and myself, he's got that figured out personal space, and when he doesn't understand, it's enough for me to be clear and he backs off. A glance or a clear throat or possibly a pointing finger in the air may be enough, then he realizes that it is time to back off.
One thing that Boyo really appreciates this life, so is jumping up and leaning against a person – obviously mostly me. He kind of wants to stand there and lean with his front legs hanging over my forearm for support, and so he wants to look at the world from a different perspective for a while. For me personally, this is not a huge problem – I see when he's on his way, so I can cancel it if I don't feel like it at the time.
What I, however think less fun is when he starts jumping on other people. It sometimes happens when we are out and meet people he sees as his best friends, or when one of our day dogs comes/will go home with their people. His problem in those situations is that he gets so excited that he acts without thinking first.
Right now watching me at Cesar Milan in particular, and decided that maybe it's time to start working a little with Boyo specifically when it comes to treating people, and the jumping thing. The idea is spread sproilance new, so I don't have a strategy yet. What I do know is that I will work more with intention and energy, than anything else. For me, it's more of an interaction than anything else.
It is here that makes me follow as many dog people as I do. The possibility of picking the pieces I like and that work for me and my dog feels much better than adopting a whole philosophy that does not at all correspond to who I am. For those wondering; and, I will praise my dog when he does something good, but those of you who have read this blog for a long time know that positive reinforcement is nothing more than a single, Quite a small tool in my toolbox.
I think my step one will be to work on impulse control.
My belief is that when he learns impulse control indoors (which is where we should start), then it will be easier to transfer it to other situations. Another step I think we should work on, is the front door. Dos and don'ts when something happens around the door. This means that we will have to work a lot with the word “stay”.
Another thing we need to do, is to work on that with his rapidly escalating arousal as soon as something he thinks is cool happens. He is nowhere near as intense in his excitement and energy as Ella, but it's still disturbing. I am a great ambassador for an even and calm temperament, so I think I actually both need and should spend some time on it. For some reason I'm stuck on that “he's a couch potato inside”, and been happy with it. But it would be nice to have a dog that doesn't automatically become hysterical in its energy just because.
Then I can in and of itself think that more people should acquire some knowledge and understanding of how to approach a dog, if you don't want to be treated in this rough way that Boyo can show sometimes. In his lifetime, I have met only one person who managed the feat of completely ignoring him, which led to him not caring at all about that person. She is also a person who is allergic to fur and therefore does not have a dog, cat or any other animal.
But to and with people who have dogs and more knowledge than the average person you should sometimes think twice before they start greeting a dog that is overly excited.
Then I don't know if my experience of having German shepherds is “Right”. Some seem to have the experience that German Shepherds can be aloof, but that is not my opinion at all. Both Boyo and Ella are and have been excessively social, so that's sort of my picture of how a German Shepherd looks “will” behave. 😀