# Suspicion - how much?



## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

Just curious:

How much suspicion do you like to see in your working/IPO dogs? And why?


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## Jax08 (Feb 13, 2009)

How much? I want to see balanced drives. Are the nerves there to handle the suspicion? 

I don't think there is a clear answer without setting other criteria.


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## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

@Jax08 Yes you are right. It was a sort of vague question.

ONE example: During training, practicing a restrained recall. The dog realizes someone other than the handler is restraining the dog. Dog turns around and bites the guy.

Acceptable or not?


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

gsdluvr said:


> @Jax08 Yes you are right. It was a sort of vague question.
> 
> ONE example: During training, practicing a restrained recall. The dog realizes someone other than the handler is restraining the dog. Dog turns around and bites the guy.
> 
> Acceptable or not?


Its understandable. I don't know that I'd link that to suspicion at all though. Frustration, tolerance or acceptance on the dogs part. Suspicion I'd think would be not letting the guy go behind him. Suspicion as far as awareness, alert, and remaining confident, I don't mind that, but like Jax mentioned, if the nerves can't handle it and they view every stupid thing as a threat, I don't want that.


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## wolfy dog (Aug 1, 2012)

How about this one from yesterday: my hubby removed the orange plastic fencing from the patio for a party in few days. Later I came outside with Griff by himself and he barked at the new scenario, hackles up. I told him, "let's go see" (he was quiet then) and he went along, holding on to his ball, hackles came down and he was fine and happily played there with me, completely relaxed.
Is this an example of caution or fear? In other situations I have seen him respond similarly. If Deja is present he doesn't look at her for guidance; good or not so good?


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## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

Steve Strom said:


> Its understandable. I don't know that I'd link that to suspicion at all though. Frustration, tolerance or acceptance on the dogs part. Suspicion I'd think would be not letting the guy go behind him. Suspicion as far as awareness, alert, and remaining confident, I don't mind that, but like Jax mentioned, if the nerves can't handle it and they view every stupid thing as a threat, I don't want that.


Ok. "Frustration, tolerance, acceptance". Maybe it is "understandable". Is it acceptable? Or, is that a personal preference?


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## car2ner (Apr 9, 2014)

wolfy dog said:


> How about this one from yesterday: my hubby removed the orange plastic fencing from the patio for a party in few days. Later I came outside with Griff by himself and he barked at the new scenario, hackles up. I told him, "let's go see" (he was quiet then) and he went along, holding on to his ball, hackles came down and he was fine and happily played there with me, completely relaxed.
> Is this an example of caution or fear? In other situations I have seen him respond similarly. If Deja is present he doesn't look at her for guidance; good or not so good?


It is hard to guess what is going through our dog's minds, especially someone else's dog. With my big-boy he would alert of us anomalies. "hey! Something is really different. Do we want to go check it out?" He would proceed with caution, give it a few test barks and be fine. I actually saw this more as confidence and good situational awareness. There was no hiding behind me, just carefully slow approaching to the new thing.

With people, if were we cool with someone so is our boy. He can read our reaction to strangers very quickly. My gal-dog, not so much. She is not a good candidate for IPO or protection work. She needs too much time to size up a stranger.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

gsdluvr said:


> Ok. "Frustration, tolerance, acceptance". Maybe it is "understandable". Is it acceptable? Or, is that a personal preference?


Since its not what I would consider anything wrong, I'd say its acceptable. If its not someones preference, that's kinda too bad. That's what he is. That's not a dog for doing restrained recalls. Was it your dog?


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

For your example, gsdluvr, having a stranger handle a dog in a high state of drive is not really a good test of temperament. Some dogs are okay with it, some, as you have seen, not. As experienced dog handlers, most of us know to ask before grabbing another dog's leash, if the dog is okay with strangers handling the leash, or if they re-direct frustration and aggression to the handler. 

As mentioned, not really a behaviour that is linked to suspicion.


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## Ken Clean-Air System (Feb 27, 2012)

wolfy dog said:


> How about this one from yesterday: my hubby removed the orange plastic fencing from the patio for a party in few days. Later I came outside with Griff by himself and he barked at the new scenario, hackles up. I told him, "let's go see" (he was quiet then) and he went along, holding on to his ball, hackles came down and he was fine and happily played there with me, completely relaxed.
> Is this an example of caution or fear? In other situations I have seen him respond similarly. If Deja is present he doesn't look at her for guidance; good or not so good?


Hackles up is excitement, and could have been fear, caution, suspicion ... all of the above. All are 100% natural reflexes that all animals have, and showing them in a new situation isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's how the dog responds to it, and how quick and eager they are to explore/face the new situation that separates good nerves from not so good ... in my opinion anyway.


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## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

Castlemaid said:


> For your example, gsdluvr, having a stranger handle a dog in a high state of drive is not really a good test of temperament. Some dogs are okay with it, some, as you have seen, not. As experienced dog handlers, most of us know to ask before grabbing another dog's leash, if the dog is okay with strangers handling the leash, or if they re-direct frustration and aggression to the handler.
> 
> As mentioned, not really a behaviour that is linked to suspicion.


No one "grabbed" (as you said) the leash,LOL! The handler asked if someone would hold him. 

I don't ever handle anyone else's dog, and I don't want anyone else handling mine.

But after that, came the blame game. I guess it was the handler's fault.


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## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

Steve Strom said:


> Since its not what I would consider anything wrong, I'd say its acceptable. If its not someones preference, that's kinda too bad. That's what he is. That's not a dog for doing restrained recalls. Was it your dog?


Nope, not mine.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

gsdluvr said:


> No one "grabbed" (as you said) the leash,LOL! The handler asked if someone would hold him.
> 
> I don't ever handle anyone else's dog, and I don't want anyone else handling mine.
> 
> But after that, came the blame game. I guess it was the handler's fault.


I don't know about blame. You may be able to make the point the handler should know their dog and whether it would be ok with it, but I've worked the line for people, other's have worked the line on my dog,sometimes things can happen without it being someones fault.


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## Apex1 (May 19, 2017)

Wouldn't part of restrainted recalls be something your teaching earlier on for the dog and also be a part of you learning about a dogs threshold for frustration? Maybe the dog was pushed to far for his threshold for frustration, I would think even the nicest dog would bite pushed far enough even more so when there is no escape. Perhaps the person didn't know at what point or how the dog would react pushed to that point. I know a whole lot of maybes in there. 
I often wonder about those things with my dog. How would and what would he do. Just being a pet I never see him pushed very far. Sorry to jump in when I know next to nothing about dogs. I think the topic is interesting. 
My dog has just recently shown what I think is suspicion, I'm not talking about environmental changes with inanimate objects. Not saying he doesn't react and point out environmental changes.


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## gsdluvr (Jun 26, 2012)

The reason I used the word suspicion my title, is that I have noticed this dog is extra watchful in regards to strangers close by. Not nervy tho. More unaccepting.


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

gsdluvr said:


> @Jax08 Yes you are right. It was a sort of vague question.
> 
> ONE example: During training, practicing a restrained recall. The dog realizes someone other than the handler is restraining the dog. Dog turns around and bites the guy.
> 
> Acceptable or not?


I don’t have a problem with it. You are restraining another person’s dog against its will, the dog doesn’t rationalize like people, in some dog’s mind in this breed you( non owner) have no right to restrain them. Not all dogs will react like this, but within proper breed temperament I see no problem with it.


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

A little story, a couple of years ago I was decoying for a handler working on an exercise called a revier. In this exercise the dog must come into the blind and bark at the decoy continuously but not touch the decoy or sleeve. I had my obedience class there which is about 8 people training for obedience and mostly pet people. Now this is a dog that was 18 months and had his BH degree and had been working with me from 8 weeks to that point. He also is a dog that has been taken to concourse of Phila Flyers game with thousands of people around and sound as a fiddle. 
Anyway, for those that do IPO, sometimes with strong dogs they have to be popped by leash just before they reach decoy to remind them to stop and bark instead of going after sleeve. With this the timing is very important by the handler. Anyway, the handler kept giving the correction a shade too slow, so I asked another person to stand in the blind and I went back to handler to take leash after he sent the dog so that I could administer the proper correction.( he is on twenty foot leash) So the handler sent Ranger and I immediately took the leash and when he reached the decoy I gave him two quick corrections.....he immediately turn around and came back and bit me. I could see the shock on some of my students faces, because they had been with Ranger from beginning and he is really so sound that they all have played with, but he was not tolerating me correcting him. I laughed and told the class that there was nothing wrong with what he did, I was not his owner, did not have his permission to correct him( haha) and I respect him for his actions. 
My point is that many times over the years I have assumed the leash to help an handler administer a correct or proper timed correction....but this was one of those dogs that won’t accept it and it was find with me. He is a super dog that is always a perfect gentleman in public, but he is not going to accept corrections from someone outside of his pack. Btw, he lives in house in an affluent area and all his neighbors love him.


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

How about a sarcastic "Thanks a lot" to the helper? Lol.


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

Steve Strom said:


> How about a sarcastic "Thanks a lot" to the helper? Lol.


Steve, with leash in my hands, the helper was fine....lol.


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## CometDog (Aug 22, 2017)

Yeah, sounds like Valor. He is fine with strangers..in fact he stayed neutral this weekend during a potentially serious situation. He will go with another handler to do things he knows to do, but goes up the lead at them if they give a hard correction. He gives a correction back lol Never does it to me. ((shrugs)) I would categorize him as suspicious. As he matures nobody I train with sees a nerve issue. The suspicion is there though, you can see him calculating and assessing people and new things. This past weekends incident involved a dog dropping his scent glands further down a trail. Valor doesn't usually spook but he was startled by that smell and so was my other dog. I'll be doing another post about all of that lol


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## Steve Strom (Oct 26, 2013)

cliffson1 said:


> Steve, with leash in my hands, the helper was fine....lol.


I was thinking more of him helping you.


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

Steve Strom said:


> I was thinking more of him helping you.


Sorry Steve, I misunderstood you. Yeah, you’re right, but he was very green helper so he didn’t react like a good helper would by attracting the dog back. You are 100% right!


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