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Two is a pair, three is a pack

15/10/2018

The saying ”two is a pair, three is a pack” is used sometimes to describe the difference between owning one or two individual dogs and owning three or more dogs that already start to have certain pack behavior. Obviously all dogs interact together the same way, whether they live live alone or in a group, but pack behavior usually kicks in when there are more than two dogs.

Pack behavior refers to behavioral patterns that are usually met in large groups of dogs. These patterns take act in situations like meeting others dogs, hunting, facing danger or alarming. It is said that a pack of dogs let loose, even if they are pet dogs, is more dangerous than a pair of dogs or just one dog.

In Finland we have a saying ”joukossa tyhmyys tiivistyy”. It means you are never as stupid alone than you are in a group. Group members easily adopt behavior from others in the group, and this leads to certain behaviors becoming easily escalated. If one member of the pack is nervous, that feeling reflects to others more easily than it would if there would be just two dogs. Aggression escalates quickly, and so does the hunting behavior. It takes one of the pack to start hunting, and the rest will follow. This leads to problems if the dogs are loose and they decide instead of playing with a small dog they will now HUNT the small dog. Same happens if the pack escapes and ends up harassing lambs or other farm animals, or even people.

Dogs that live in a pack form a hierarchy based on each individual and their character. No matter certain roles may change depending on the situation, it is interesting to see how each member of the pack will usually follow the role it was set to have and in many cases even chose itself. Genders have different roles in the pack, and age plays a bigger part in interactions. Balanced leaders will act firm and friendly, while those lower in the hierarchy often clown around and get away with such ridiculous behavior more easily than the ones leaders may seem as ”possible future challengers”.

Alarming is one interesting feature I noticed changed significantly when I had a pack. Instead of one or two dogs each barking, a pack now seems to have different roles. When one dog alarms, others will instantly run to the one alarming and try to see the threat. The leader will then decide whether or not the threat is worth noticing. If so, it will take a dominant posture, hold it’s tail up and stare, approaching the threat if it can, while others keep alert, keep barking and follow the leader. If the leader at any point relaxes, others will eventually follow or their attitude will change from nervous and aggressive to curious, playful or indifferent. Lowest in hierarchy might even stay away from the situation, because it trusts the ”higher ups” will care for everything.

When having a pack of dogs, it’s important to focus on leading the pack rather than trying to lead every individual dog. This means you need to know what causes certain behavior, and if you need to command the leading dog or leave that dog be and instead find the ”weak link” that feeds negative behavior of the whole pack. Correcting or controlling the alarming dog will not do anything, if the leading dog keeps on signaling we need to stay alert. On the contrary, if one dog is nervous about a situation, working with that individual dog will solve the whole problem while trying to calm the whole pack down each time it gets nervous makes no difference. In a pack one dog’s behavioral issue is EVERY DOG’S behavioral issue.

Introducing a new family member

Bringing a new dog to the pack can be frightening. What if the dogs don’t accept each other? Let’s say it here in the beginning; it is a possibility. However, you can work with issues, and in most cases that helps. In some other cases you might have to separate the dogs in one way, at least partially and at least sometimes, but even that is not the end of the world. Usually things go smoothly, and sooner or later your new dog will be part of the pack or form a good working pair with the first one.

Introducing a puppy is always way easier than introducing an adult dog. Keep this in mind during all this rescue boom. Rescues can make super pets and form super packs, but there are more risks with adult rescued dogs you might not know a lot about than with puppies. Most well socialized dogs are instinctively more forgiving and gentle with puppies. This is not something to be taken as an opinion against rescue dogs, but a thing to keep in mind. The dog has, in worst case, gone through nasty things. Being prepared for possible problems may save the dog from further bad experience and guarantee a safe start for it.

Know your previous dog/dogs. If you have a nervous dog or an unsocial dog, introducing the newcomer in small steps is usually the best option. Ideal would be to meet the new dog a couple of times before it moves in.

Collect all ”treasures” away. Very important objects might not be up for sharing just yet. After all, your dogs just met.

Going for a walk together and introducing the dogs on a neutral ground works better than bringing the pup/the dog straight to the other one’s territory. A possibility to give the new dog a safe, calm place to sleep it’s first nights is also beneficial. If others are constantly trying to get to know it, it might stress both them and the new one (and vice versa, if the newcomer doesn’t leave the old dog alone).

What if problems occur?

Don’t let the old dog jump on the eyes of the newcomer, and don’t let the newcomer boss around the old dog. You are the authority making sure everyone feels safe and sound. Old fashioned ”leadership tricks” like rolling the dog on it’s back work only with soft dogs, and they are not based in any scientific or species related information. In the case of independent dogs and dominant dogs things like this can make the situation worse or the dog may even turn on you. The most important thing, however, is that nothing is taught this way. The effect is based on fear, not respect, and it works only with you and the dog, not to improve the situation between dogs. This is seen in many cases where people use rolling the dog on it’s back, for example, to correct it’s dominant behavior. The dog may then act OK with the human, but still bully in the pack. Nothing was taught, the problem and the source for the behavior still remains. One visible side effect was removed, that’s it.

The right way to deal with possible friction between the dogs is to teach and encourage the right kind of pack behavior and to correct the dog behaving badly. How do you correct a dog like that? Well certainly not rolling it on it’s back. Physical corrections should always be used to either get the attention of the dog so you can command it to leave, stay or calm down, or to restrain the dog from harming or harassing another living being. Teaching the right kind of behavior is as important as stopping the unwanted behavior. The problem with ”The Leadership Theory” is that is doesn’t teach the dog anything, it focuses on stopping certain behavioral patterns. Smart dogs might get what you are trying to say, while nervous, aloof, dominant and temperamental dogs usually don’t.

Positive reinforcement and working with the dog’s aggression and insecurities usually lead to a dog that can to certain point work and live in a pack, while some dogs never become pack animals.

Keep your head cool. ”Be the boss of your dogs and all goes well!” is something you will hear if your dogs are not friends at once. While there is half the truth in that, be careful with how you acquire that position of authority, and remember; weak nerve structure will cause problems whether or not you are ”a boss”. Not all dogs are balanced, and aggressive dogs are aggressive dogs. It is dangerous to assume everything depends on how you raise the dog or socialize it. Always go for mentally balanced dogs, or then be prepared to work with those that have more complicated nerve structure.

Don't be too afraid to add another dog to your pack. Knowing your current dogs and your own resources is the key to success. Another thing to ease a troubled mind; most dogs are pack animals. They might not be super social, but most get along at least with the member of opposite gender. For the majority of dogs having another dog in the family is the funniest, most awesome thing they have ever had happening. After all, we are ONLY human. There are some things only other dogs get, ya know.

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Commercial puppy food - a necessity or something to avoid?

4/10/2018

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As long as there have been people feeding commercial foods to their. dogs there has been a debate of whether or not puppy food is good for your puppies. Those in favor say puppy food is a necessity, it has all the needed vitamins and minerals in a perfect, scientifically proven balance. Those against say puppy foods are not only unnecessary but even harmful for your puppies.

First, we need to understand what is puppy food. What makes puppy foods differ from adult foods or foods meant for all life stages? Why were puppy foods developed the first place?

Just like with us people, little puppies need more protein and in general more balanced diet than adults. Big food companies tend to recommend using their puppy formulas, but as one goes through the ingredient list, one big question arises; there is a difference, but it is minimal. Is it really necessary to feed puppy/junior formula, if there is no real difference between the foods?

Let’s take an easy road here and compare RC Adult Maxi Puppy with RD Adult Maxi (as RC has all the % in their PDFs easy to access). This is NOT to be seen as a recommendation OR a critic). You can click yourself into an in-depth site about the foods yourself and have a peek.

http://pro.royalcanin.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Click-here-to-download-the-Maxi-Adult-Pro-Technical-Sheet.pdf

http://pro.royalcanin.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Click-here-to-download-the-Maxi-Junior-Pro-Technical-Sheet.pdf

Let’s see the first paragraph. There is no significant important difference. Omegas are a bit higher in adult food.

Second paragraph lists minerals. As puppy foods are often said to have more calcium than adult foods and a different calcium-phosphorus ratio, it is pretty surprising to see there is absolutely no difference in calcium and not any kind of significant difference in calcium-phosphorus ratio. As we go lower on the list, we’ll see pretty much the same list on both sides, with a slight raise in iodine and iron in the puppy food.

Next paragraph of vitamins shows no surprise; almost the exact copy. Vitamin A is slightly higher in puppy formula, and even there we don’t really speak about anything major.

There is one ingredient in the whole list of ingredients that appears only in puppy formula; lutein. Lutein is an antioxidant found in spinach, broccoli and eggs, for example, and it affects eyes and skin. RC Maxi Junior has 5mgs of lutein per kg, so 0,5 mgs per 100 g (just to give you a general idea of the amount, one egg contains 0.1 to 0.3 milligrams of lutein).

At least in the case with RC Maxi Adult and RC Maxi Junior the difference between formulas is so insignificant it breaks a question; does a puppy really benefit significantly of puppy food? For research purposes, I compared yet another two common foods that offer both puppy and adult formulas. Hill’s Junior Large breed differed the most from Hill’s Adult Large breed, but the changes were still very minor. Most changes were with minerals such as copper and in the increased (slightly) amount of vitamin A, while calcium-phosphorus ratio remained the same and protein and fat levels were not that far from each other. Other vitamins than the mentioned A are about if not exactly the same.

In Acana Puppy Large and Acana Adult Large the difference is ridiculously small. It is in fact so small the ingredients lists are almost completely exactly the same, and the changes in them, while they appear are hardly noticeable.

So, all in all, we can right here in the beginning come into conclusion that puppy formula is so close to adult formula feeding adult formula to puppies MOST LIKELY doesn’t affect them negatively. But, once again, I am no nutritional expert nor do I recommend using this blog as an ultimate truth. Research, talk to people, make your own decisions.

Is puppy food harmful to the puppies?

This question raises up specially among large breed owners and breeders. The issue is, there are people saying feeding puppy formula to their puppies made the puppies grow too fast, causing abnormalities in bone structure. Some people and even vets say the exact opposite; that feeding adult formula will cause bone growth issues.

First suggested reason to puppy food causing problems with growth is that puppy food has too much calcium. At least in large food formulas I researched, this was not true. There was no more calcium in puppy foods or in adult foods and the ratio between calcium and phosphorus remained the same.

Another possible reason is too much protein. Once more, I did not see a significant raise in protein, however puppy foods do tend to have slightly more protein. This is because puppies need protein to grow.

I asked a question in a raw food group I am in, wanting to know if giant breed owners or breeders have or have not fed puppy formulas, if they have used kibble or raw, and if they have noticed abnormalities. Out of 6 people answering, one person said two puppies fed with raw food (the breeder did not identify whether the food was constructed by the owner or if it was store bought complete raw food) had developed abnormalities in bones. Four people said they had fed their puppies mostly with raw, some self constructed and some with MUSH Vaisto Puppy, and they had not met problems. One person said she had fed her puppies with both raw and kibble (she identified the kibble as puppy formula) and the puppies had grown up OK.

This leads me to think, if the problem with fast growth is both genetic and caused by feeding errors. You can make a difference in general to the dog’s life with a good diet, but there are things you can’t control. You can also break a perfectly healthy dog with a poor diet. So, it is very difficult to say whether or not, in cases where abnormalities form, the main cause is genetic, wrong kind of exercise, accident or feeding. One thing to note is that abnormalities are usually met with very large/giant breeds. This leads to another possible situation; large dogs may just be so big they are getting too big for their own structure.

One thing one can possibly say quite safely is that excessive/too little calcium and poorly constructed diet cause problems with growth. Puppies are much less forgiving with feeding than adults. When you feed your pup with raw food, make sure you really meet all the requirements. If you choose to go with kibble or 50 / 50, always go for a good quality kibble. If it is puppy formula or adult formula most likely does not matter.

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Over excitement and how to deal with it

1/10/2018

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Different hobbies that require lots of energy and high drive have increased in popularity. This has led to some breeds being very hyper, aiming to produce top dogs for those certain hobbies that require exploding action. Unfortunately this also leads to certain problems with dogs of these breeds that end up just pets. How to deal with hyper breeds and/or hyper dogs, so that everyone can enjoy their life equally?

I recently had a client that owns a born deaf young boxer bitch. The dog was friendly and happy, but the client said she had continuous problems with the dog’s high energy. The dog was unable to sleep at night, it had a habit of running from window to window constantly and it kept on breaking stuff and stealing garbage bags and food when the client or her family was not home. The client said they were hoping to have another pup, but she was afraid the over the top behavior of their previous dog would pass on to the pup.

There are certain triggers I search for when listening to a case. In this particular case there were many trigger words; doesn’t sleep, barks at windows, young, deaf, boxer. I asked some more and learned the family was very active. They had their dog with them in many great activities, and when they felt the dog was bored, they came up with new plays and exercises. In other words, they were super owners, trying everything in their power to make their dog happy and answer to it’s growing need of exercise.

In cases like this many people, me in the past included, fall in the trap of ”trying more”. The dog seems bored, we give it more to do. The dog seems bored still, we will give it EVEN MORE to do. This goes on and on, until it feels like there is nothing in life but trying to tire the pupper down, and it just DOES. NOT. CALM. DOWN.

Of course it does not. In the past, when I learnt the truth, I was hesitant and doubtful at first. There I was, with an active dog, and I was told the real way to deal with the situation is to NOT do so much with the dog. What? Indeed; the right way to help a hyper, active dog is to give it enough exercise and teach it to calm down.

Stress Hormone

Hyper dogs tend to get stressed. Continuously building up one’s tension and being alert affects sleeping routines and just general ability to chill every once in a while. Often, when these dogs are then exercised even more by their owners, their stress level increase until physical symptoms start. Most common is weight loss; hyper dogs are often very skinny. They can also develop digestion problems, even rash or cause injuries to themselves when breaking stuff and eating things they shouldn’t.

The physical injuries caused by the dog itself are nasty, but visible. The REAL enemy to a stressed, hyper dog is a hormone called cortisole.

Cortisole, often called stress hormone, can have long lasting effects in the body. It can affect everything from immune system to mental stability. It can ever cause harm in cellural level, making it important to reduce long lasting stress at all causes. Since it is a hormone, once it is released, it will be there. Cortisole has it’s benefits, too, and every animal needs certain amount of cortisole. It is the increased, long lasting effect that turns cortisole from a friend to an enemy.

Lowering the amounts of cortisole in dog’s body is essential in the process of rehabilitating. Increased amounts of cortisole have been suggested to have a negative effect in learning, and that’s why results don’t happen in the first days. It is important to carry on, because the first real results start to be visible in a week or two.

What is enough exercise?

The amount of needed exercise depends on the dog, but it is pretty safe to assume most dogs should be happy with two hours of exercise a day. This does not mean the dog sleeps the rest of the day, but for a normal pet dog two hours of exercise should be enough for a regular day. Some dogs might need less, especially after their stress levels decrease and they learn to take things easy. Also keep in mind that certain breeds may require certain types of exercise. You need to know the needs of your breed / breed mix in order to answer to them

Some breeds are, unfortunately, often bred towards hyper activity. This is common in breeds that are hoped to compete in hobbies that require exploding reactions and high drive. While it is important that dogs in these hobbies HAVE that drive, breeding hyper activity is breeding unhealthy temperament. Even so, even the best specimen of certain active breeds can have a tendency to become hyper active if their ever growing will to exercise is always answered and topped, time after time. This is exactly what happens with many hyper young dogs. They enjoy exercise, so their responsible owners try to answer to their need for speed. This, in return, raises the demands even higher.

How hyper dogs SHOULD be exercised?

Hyper dogs, energetic dogs and high drive dogs tend to enjoy sporty things that make them move. These games tend to heat the dogs up, and they are often used for that before competitions of certain sorts, and with hyper dogs what you need to achieve is quite the opposite.

Smelling and sniffing is proven to calm the dogs down, so anything that encourages them to sniff around helps them to calm down. Smell is the strongest sense dogs have and they can find out more from one sniff we could ever analyze with a hundred. There is no need to think offering the dog some slow sniffing tasks would be boring or would make you a bad owner. The dog is experiencing a ton of things, and many of those can be bright new because it never had the time to really think about what it just smelled.

Ball crazy dogs love to chase the ball, but chasing the ball hypes the dog up. Instead of throwing the ball for the dog to chase, throw it for the dog to catch. This requires more concentrating, and many dogs end up liking the game as much as they love chasing the ball. It’s just a little less stressful.

Teaching tricks has become more popular these days than iit was a few years earlier. I remember back in the start of the 21st century trick training was suffering from bad reputation. Some people spread the belief training tricks for your dog makes it perform worse in other areas. Some people took trick training as something only inexperienced, skill-less trainers did, because they could not do anything “more difficult and useful”. Luckily, those days of false advertisement are over and more and more dogs enjoy the joy of learning small tricks to please their masters. This is nothing but positive; concentrating and focusing is good mental stimulation for the dog, but it is also something highly useful for hyper dogs. Learning to listen and try builds up patience they lack.

Last but definitely not least, good ol’fashioned walks have their time and place. A peaceful walk around the block, or a longer walk to experience all the smells and messages left by other dogs, other animals and people may at their very best help to lower stress levels. This however means the dog should not see anything too exciting or scary during the walk. If the dog is very reactive and alert, choose a secluded place where you can really enjoy peace and quiet.

Fabulous, but we do need to leave the house sometimes. What about then?

Unfortunately hyper dogs are very good at building up some steam by themselves. When the owners leave, hyper dogs may start running from window to window, breaking and stealing stuff, barking, howling, entertaining themselves in any way they can before their owners return. Actually, before diagnosing your dog has separation anxiety, be sure it is not just bored. That is a thing - and sometimes a lot harder to fix than separation anxiety since you can’t really teach the dog NOT to get bored. Sometimes leaving in toys and bones help, and yet sometimes those same toys and bones may act as an excitement, working against us.

In the case of the boxer I mentioned earlier, I asked the owners to delimit a small, calm space for the dog. They happened to have a nice basement, one of those living room/movie studio things, where the dog liked to hang out with people. They bought a dog gate and restricted the dogs access to any other part of the house. They left water, some nice bed and a toy, and they made sure the dog could look out of the window opening up towards the calmer side of the house.

After the first week the owner reported me they had found the dog sleeping. Never before had it calmed down during their absence, but now it was sleeping peacefully. From that day forward the dog knew to go to the basement and lay down whenever they prepared to leave for work, and it acted calm and happy when they returned.

Marking a small nice area for your hyper dog often helps it to calm down. When there is nothing much to do, eventually the dog (should it be the stress levels are actively lowered with some of the above ways) will lay down and sleep. Many owners report once their dog starts sleeping, it will sleep abnormally much for the first weeks. This is because it has been over the edge for a long time. It is tired, it needs rest, but it has been unable to answer to that need because of being so stressed and hyped.

Chill

The boxer owner very happily informed me that things are going well these days. The dog has remembered some of the old sign commands now that it can focus in things again, and it seems to be a lot happier. It is still active and it likes to exercise, walk, sniff and experience, but when they are home, it knows how to calm down. In other words, it isn’t stressed anymore.

Living with a dog should not feel unbearable. Depending on what kind of dogs you own and how many you have, there will be less or more work load, but in general enjoying owning dogs is kind of why we tend to own them. If every day is a struggle, stop and think the situation for a moment. If it happens to be you find yourself in a situation where you own a hyper dog, there ARE ways to help both the dog and you. Active dogs can be a blast, but there is a time and place for some rest, too, both for the dog and for you.

Make sure to sit back and calm down with your canine friend, sometimes. We don’t always have to double gallop through the days.