Alternative behaviour

 

Family Dynamics

How hierarchy is established in young dogs

A group of young dogs need to have some form of order. If they don’t they run the risk of putting themselves in danger. This may seem strange but, even born into and living in, a domestic environment, their instinct will to a certain extend influence their behaviour, especially in working breeds.

A puppy ‘chooses’ someone, and maybe it does, but when that puppy is removed another one will step up and take its place as the ‘one that steps forward’. That puppy may then ‘choose’ the next person who comes along. There’s always a strong one, one waiting to step up, one at the back watching and weighing everyone up, and the ones on the middle waiting to see where they can fit in.

If they were living life as a pack each one would have a position according to their skills, there would be no arguing, for although in a different skill set, they all play an important part in the unit. If we take this into the working life of a border collie, they will have a skill they excel at. One may be a good gathering dog, one a good driving dog and one may be brilliant at ‘holding’ a sheep with its gaze. With a large flock of sheep a shepherd may have several dogs, but if they all excelled at the same skill it would be similar to a bus company hiring a lot of drivers and no mechanics. They either need someone for each position, or someone who can do a bit of everything. The shepherd with a small flock will seek a dog that can be a ‘Jack of all trades’, it doesn’t need to excel at one as long as it can do a little of everything. The key is keeping the balance.

When we take two puppies from a litter and they live and play together, they start to balance each other. They become two halves instead of two individuals. As they grow older one is often the more reserved while the other will appear to take the lead, and be the stronger of the two. However, the quieter one can often turn out to be the strongest and if there is an argument at some point this dog can turn on the other. A dog working sheep will be encouraged to use all its skills without putting too much focus on its strongest skill, that way it keeps the balance. If we now look a collie in a companion home it can soon lose its balance, constantly tugging at a toy or chasing a ball will tell it these are skills it needs to excel at whereas a quiet time and mental skills are equally, if not more essential. Once a dog becomes obsessed with an action it will start to be possessive over the action, and this is where the more reserved dog will back down. It doesn’t mean that giving a home to litter mates can’t work out, but it does mean it’s harder work as they need to be exercised and trained separately so that together time is a treat, and not taken for granted.

Now let’s go back briefly to the shepherd’s litter. They have a great life growing up together, they play, they play fight and they practice their skills on each other. By the time they are old enough to start being trained for work they have each developed their strongest skill. Now you might be able to see where this is taking us. From that litter there will be some really good dogs that are eager to work and may even compete in trials. So why do we keep getting dogs brought in from shepherds who say they can’t understand why they’re not working? The rest of the litters are working well but there is always at least one just not interested, lovely dogs and with sweet nature, but maybe a little lost.

Now, when we think of the litter being together for several weeks or months, we can see how they will have formed a pack, each having a set of skills that would be right for training for sheepwork. But just as there’s always a young pup sitting in a corner watching, there is always one in the grown up litter that doesn’t have a place to be, there is no pack area to guard as there would be in the wild!

These dogs are literally left with no purpose in the group, every dog with a skill is employed and the job of keeping the home area safe and protected is not needed. Sometimes these dogs will take to working but only when they have been on their own for quite some time.

Now if we jump back to the two siblings in a companion home, we can see how easy it is for them to never really reach their full potential of skills. Even if they don’t need them they need to develop them in order to become balanced individuals. The dynamics of our own families are no different. We encourage siblings to be individuals and to follow their own paths in life. This doesn’t make them drift apart, if anything it helps them to understand each other as individuals.

Dogs are not very different from us, we just need to see life through their eyes and communicate in a way they understand.