The Rescue Dog Assessment

The door slams open against a wall and a person the dog has never met walks directly towards them whilst maintaining eye contact and attempts to touch them using a fake assessor hand.

The dog backs away but the person keeps coming forward, no speaking, no friendly gestures, cold and methodical, the canine equivalent of an episode of Silent Witness. The dog looks back at its closest thing to a safe attachment figure, who has known the dog for less than a week, but no help or reassurance is offered, the dog feels very much alone and threatened, and will act accordingly.

The dog is highly likely to show aggression if it is at all nervous in disposition, and if it is not a particularly nervous dog before the test this bad experience will not help maintain that precious confidence, and may dent it. Remember that with trigger stacking in rescue, a dogs personality can very much turn from Jekyll into Hyde very swiftly, albeit usually temporarily.

So what is the ideal outcome of this test? I assume it is for the dog to not show aggression and to ignore all of its responses to ensure its own survival and instead behave like a friendly bashful puppy; to offer the stranger an undeserved olive branch.

If you want to get a visual of how a dog will behave when faced with what is potentially an extreme threat then this test will most likely fulfil that wish. As if it couldn’t get any worse, for some rescues the outcome of this test alone will determine the fate of the dog; it is rehomed or euthanized. In one centre I saw an odd addition of the stranger wearing a Hi-Vis jacket…lets not even go there.

Why can we not slowly gauge the dogs reactions to people, starting with their behaviour towards the staff that are their main care givers on a day to day basis, then moving on to them getting the chance to meet new staff in a relaxed way. A good assessor can get a good sense of the dogs behaviour towards new people by watching their body language when they see strangers on a walk, and pass at a slight distance. If a dog is nervous of people on walks, especially if they show aggression, then they are usually going to be worse with visitors in their home environment.

For dogs that are fearful of new people, plans should be put into place immediately to gently introduce the dog to a visitor procedure using real life rooms whilst at the rescue. Counter conditioning can be focused on to help the dog view new people as a less threatening occurrence,  and an emphasis on teaching focus work onto the handler will help start a new owner off with good management skills.

In a previous blog I touched on dog-dog assessments, and the outcomes of those often meaning yay or nay for rehoming – of course as with all things it depends on how they are carried out, their are some centres that assess dogs to a very high standard, but still too many for my liking that don’t; but that’s for another blog.

Food tests are also a puzzle to me, which often involve someone touching the dog while it is eating or putting a fake assessor hand into the food bowl. For me however, if you are able to read body language, even at a low level, you will be able to tell if a dog has a guarding issue, or the potential to develop one, without going up the dog when it’s eating. It is also the case that dogs will sometimes guard in rescue that have never guarded in a home, this can be due to fear, stress and lack of trust in this new environment, the dog feels unsafe and has no knowledge of when its next meal will come or if it will come at all. Some dogs can feel this way for quite a while. It is fascinating at the amount of rescue staff that are ‘dreading doing that dogs food test’…..because they have clearly already identified food aggression in the dog, so why are we doing further testing?

When I’ve brought this up before with different groups of people, the counter attack has been “but we need to know if the dog will bite”, my reply is that the early signals tell us all we need to know. Trust the dog because they don’t lie.

Sweeping statements in an assessment can inadvertently unfairly label a dog, as with so much in life things may not always be as they seem and we should be cautious about taking too much at face value without further analysis. If a dog for example is afraid of an object such as a broom that it sees in a kennel block, or a loud noise, it does not necessarily mean that the dog is a nervous dog, or has a noise phobia. In this situation it may simply be that the broom happened to make the dog jump in that exact moment, but in a home environment would not have caused the same reaction as things are stable and predictable. It’s worth remembering that when we are stressed or anxious our tolerance levels are far lower and we tend to spook easily. I don’t have a fear of loud noises, thank goodness as rescues can be pretty noisy places at times, but if I’m in a hyper vigilant state after foolishly watching one too many horror films before my night shift, I’ll be guaranteed to jump at even the slightest noise that would on a usual shift not even gain my attention.

Documenting things is vital when assessing in rescue, it helps keep track of the dogs behaviour, stress levels and any issues developing, whether kennel behaviours or not, that need extra training or in some cases a behaviour modification plan put into place. It’s also vital for staff safety.  If the dog has shown signs of re-directed aggression the day before, which was more than the days previous to that, then chances are very soon the dog is going to hurt someone, by keeping careful notes staff incidents can be avoided.

If a dog is kennel stressed, undesirable breeds traits will begin to come out that are not being channelled in the dogs current limited and lacking situation, for example herding breeds may begin lunging at traffic or other dogs because they have nothing else to herd and are frustrated as a result. Breeds that have a predisposition to being suspicious of new people may begin showing aggression to strangers when in a home this was never the case. Take the intake information from the owner with a pinch of salt but don’t dismiss it – a dog may have been fantastic with dogs when on walks with previous owners, but is snappy and reactive at the rescue. Remember that stray dogs have no known history, they may have ran off on a walk or escaped their garden, or they may have been made a stray due to a significant behavioural problem, therefore be careful always about deciding if a dog goes home with children or not.

Assessing dogs should be done gently, with great sensitivity to the needs of the dog, and with real empathy for the trama they are going through, rescue kennels are simply that, traumatic, in so many ways for a social being that needs stability and safe attachment figures to function to the best of its ability.

An assessment is not an audition and shouldn’t be treated as such, we are not on X factor, be realistic and honest, question everything, be objective, and understand that some dogs will prove to be a huge risk despite best efforts to minimise stress and set the dog up for success. At the back of our minds however should always be that this is life, it is important, and giving a dog the best chance at a future should always be the main objective.

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” Albert Einstein

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ‘Not so’ Empty Void Dog

There is nothing as emotionally tough for me in rescue as when an empty void of a dog comes through the doors, robotic in movement, its fear ever present but its behaviour suppressed. This dog has learnt a long time ago that asking nicely doesn’t stop bad things happening to it, that it is pointless to attempt to flee as the threat always follows and intensifies, that at any moment pain may arrive, and like a volcano, wild and unforgiving, anger may erupt from the one person that they are meant to be able to depend upon.

These are the dogs that sooner rather than later will begin biting, they will at some point bite someone that is not actually meaning them any harm because up until now they have learnt the very sad truth that no one is to be trusted, and that people are a very dangerous type of animal. These dogs may seem aloof but are in truth in the throes of what I can only think to label as post-traumatic stress.

These are my favourite types of dog to work with, because the locked away personalities these dogs possess are so incredibly rewarding to bring out. And they aren’t scary dogs really, nor dangerous if handled carefully and methodically, with extreme sensitivity to their signals, these dogs are more confused than anything else. The trick is to not confuse them further.

The first one of these dogs I had the privilege of working with was Ollie, a 7 year old Rottweiler with a stump for a tail and seemingly permanent whale eye. Ollie was a big learning curve for me, he relied on no one for reassurance for a long period of time, and at first falsely appeared independent and aloof. It turned out he was actually incredibly needy, and as opposed to being even remotely confident was in a state of learned helplessness.

Ollie had been used as a guard dog, his life for 7 years was basically being left in a property for 5 days at a time with no access to food, no company, his only interaction being with his owner who dropped in from time to time to beat him up and take his frustrations in life out on Ollie who despite it all was still happy to have some company.

Our daily walks taught me not to try too hard, not to force anything on an animal whether emotionally or physically (e.g. stroking), good things come to those who wait, and eventually the dog will invite you in, but with this type of dog it has to be on their terms for it to be a genuine bond, not just pillow talk.

Ollie would avoid eye contact, and me attempting any ‘watch me’ or formal eye contact training would just put further distance between us, Ollie had spent his whole life under pressure and needed someone to just ‘be’ with him, so for it to work I had to take the pressure off and simply just hang out. Perhaps similar to the ever growing trend of 2 friends who meet up to have coffee ‘together’ and both glued to their phones spend the entire time text separate people whilst sitting at the same table.

I remember the day that Ollie finally chose to make eye contact, that’s when I learn the beauty of capturing behaviours as opposed to just the mechanics, and saw how much confidence they could put in an animal, as they had the choice to perform the behaviour, or not.

Ollie after 18 months in kennels and intensive daily training found his ideal home, when he went home I sat on the sofa in his kennel and reflected, he’d make me a better trainer, and has helped equip me with the first hand skills to help many ‘Ollie’s’ since.

The thing about using fear in training is that it’s always going to massively backfire, in my naivety I used to think this was an obvious thing for people to see, or quickly grasp and take on board when it was revealed to them, but it seems to not be something people are able to easily accept. Whether this is in actual fact cognitive dissonance where people simply don’t want to see their training methods as abuse, as surely in this realisation they would be forced by their conscience to make a change, as opposed to continuously feeding their under nourished ego by their obsession to control.

The more I work with animals the more I feel that humans are largely sadistic by nature, the circumstances and levels for this of course vary, but certainly for some people when it comes to dog training they very much verge on zero degrees of empathy.

The saddest part for me is the number of dogs losing their lives in rescue shelters due to defensive behaviours shown because the dog has had no choice throughout its life but to stand up for itself, and to assume fight mode in any potentially threatening situation, especially in a new environment, as flight has never worked.

I don’t blame the shelters, some rescues haven’t had adequate staff training to know how to work with these dogs, and even when time and effort is put in, some dogs are sadly beyond the point of being safe to rehome.

I don’t fully blame the owners, though I do feel that it is pretty obvious that causing an animal physical pain isn’t exactly ethical.

For me the blame falls on the trainers that promote aversive methods, I am bitter towards each and every one of them, and I don’t feel like looking the other way because not doing so may god forbid ‘cause a scene.’ Stiff upper lip has never been my best look.

It’s when these disillusioned trainers illogically accuse positive trainers of being evil due to the inevitable deaths of some ‘red zone’ (whatever that means!) dogs, which sadly at times despite best efforts will happen. Though this should hopefully be a very rare occurrence.  

They criticise us because we refuse to pump these dog’s bodies full of volts of electricity or jab them in the neck because we have the science that tells us this will do nothing more than make matters far far worse, and we would rather not use harsh pointless methods that will not in any way help the problem, and instead, if we have no other choice but to make the tough decision to say goodbye, we opt that the dog leave this world with some faith in humanity, than without it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Conflicted Dog

You look in the kennel and see a somewhat confusing sight, the dog flits between creeping towards you with a crouched body, darting away, giving calming signals and then fixing on you with a hard stare body positioned forward. The dog is highly conflicted and in this state is at its most dangerous.

It’s perhaps the equivalent of an insecure person that doesn’t handle stress well and goes between reason and rising anger, who will throw confrontational remarks and then back off just before things get nasty, I’ve been in these situations many a time and it’s never a relaxed experience; the situation at the time feels very unpredictable.

The difference of course is that people can use emotional reason, and analyse interactions, we speak the same language which gives us one major advantage in situations with another human, but puts us at a disadvantage when we are reading dogs as we can be prone to impatience and wanting the affection and bond from the animal quicker than it is ready to give it, we can at times take a small invitation and make an over the top gesture in response.

With these types of dog anything over the top is incredibly risky.

These dogs need time to suss you out before they even exit the kennel, which has now become their safest place in their current novel unpredictable environment, they need to be able to feel that you are no immediate threat, that is most likely the best you will achieve at this stage. Using food at this stage away from the kennel can be risky. The dog may take food, but take care that it doesn’t raise their arousal levels, or cause them to focus too much on you before they are ready to do so, frustration is easy to accidentally bring out in conflicted dogs who lack confidence and are in a state of stress and this can tip them into an aggressive response. Food is a great tool to use from the safety of the kennel bars, ideally throwing the food behind or to the side of the dog to avoid them feeling obliged to approach you before they are ready. Some dogs will find your voice too much, and prefer mechanical markers such as a clicker, which is also handy as can transfer to multiple staff members and eventually volunteers also, others find a neutral tone of voice comforting and respond well to gentle encouragement.

If the dog will respond to a sit, practice this using your marker to help instil confidence in the dog and make things feel more familiar which can be a comfort, start through the kennel bars, and then build up to outdoors, watch the dogs body language carefully to check they are comfortable being asked to do this.

The best way of bonding with a conflicted dog is you becoming the best part of their daily routine, you are the outlet for toileting, you feed them, you sit by the kennel and ignore them but you’re there, and they get used to you just ‘being.’ Remember that as each of these interactions is non-threatening it will consequently help build your trust back. Teach the dog that life is predictable, that you are predictable and that their environment is as predictable as you can make it. Screen the dog to limit them becoming stressed by movement of dogs, people etc., kennel in a quiet area and play classical music alongside stress relieving aids such as Adaptil, pet remedy, rescue remedy and so on, if you have experience of zoopharmacognosy this is also a great tool to use in this situation.

Take the dog on 2-3 short walks a day round the same enclosed area ideally on site, so they can spread their scent and begin to relax, after a few days most dogs will begin showing some small signs of recognition of you, a slight tail wag, they may be relaxed enough to sniff the ground in your presence, this is round about the time you can take the dog further afield to slightly more interesting places. The main number one rule with this though is that you have assessed the dogs response to you over the past few days and are confident that if the dog becomes spooked, they are unlikely to then view you as an additional stressor in that situation that is preventing their flight response.

Conflicted dogs may still show some signs of being conflicted weeks after you begin the bonding process, they may lean into you but jump back if you go to touch them, or they may freeze if you do initiate touch, they may then to be even more confusing, nudge you if you stop touching them. They may do 9 out of 10 sits, but freeze on the 10^th and become unsure again, they may begin showing signs of play behaviour but then frighten themselves and begin showing displacement behaviours instead of using you as a form of comfort and reassurance.

When they do begin to bond they may show behaviours that seem over excitable and playful but are actually signs that they are still feeling conflicted, examples of these are mouthing, jumping up to face height and body slamming, especially if they are sudden quick movements that don’t include any eye contact from the dog, and if at this stage the dog is still not showing signs of wanting physical affection from you. When dogs are in this state of stress they are unable to learn the way they may normally do, so don’t expect too much at this stage.

Situations where someone is bitten by a conflicted dog will often be when interactions are moved on too quickly or forced, when we run before we can walk. Believing the dog to be safe due to a slight tail wag, and the dog being non-reactive to them through the bars, coupled with a bit of eye contact or signs of a connection developing, can lead people to forget themselves and stop thinking so carefully about their actions. This is when people can make a silly move as they feel the dog ‘should be fine with them by now’ (not to say people should be there frozen rigid in terror as this won’t help the dog relax either!)

Slow and steady wins the race with a conflicted dog and will gradually see them become less muddled, and gain trust in you as a result of your patient approach. I’ve heard of many conflicted dogs being euthanized merely through a lack of understanding of their behaviour, these dogs are often labelled ‘unpredictable’ which they may well be at first, but it’s important to remember in most dogs this is not a permanent thing.

The majority of dogs will seek a human attachment, because they are social animals. A small minority will have deeper issues going on, and sadly will not make the same progress that the bulk of these dogs are capable of making.

Look beneath the surface and see the dog underneath the fear, beneath the aggressive displays, go slowly out of respect for that animal and see the trust begin to grow between you both, and remember to trust your gut instinct in these situations always to keep you safe as chances are you are taking in more with your eyes than you realise.

Bonding with this type of dog is one of the most rewarding things you will ever do in rescue. It soon becomes addictive, and well, there are worse addictions to have.

As goes the proverb “For the friendship of two, the patience of one is required.”

 

Dog Bites – Investigating The Reason

This blog is about ITR – ‘investigating the reason’ behind a dog bite, the cause and effect, and the external factors which can cause a dog to react in a situation in a way that does not show their true character, or define them. It also covers my passion for thorough detective work into every single dog bite, simply because a dog’s life is always worth the effort.

I saw a clip several years ago now, of a dog temperament assessment to determine a particular dog’s suitability for rehoming. As is often the case on TV, it was a pretty brief clip, but one part of it remains firmly in my mind to this day. There was a dog, a little red staffie, being assessed with other dogs. The assessment involved watching the staffie, who had just entered the room and who was on a collar, being held on a tight lead, as another dog entered the room. The dog that entered was fairly “starey“ at the staffie and was quite excitable which triggered the staffie to pull on the lead further and stare at the other dog, but without a still body, without anything conclusive. Yet the conclusion from this assessment was that the dog was not suitable for rehoming, due to its ‘aggressive interest’ in the other dog. This baffled me then and still baffles me today. Of course TV shows are not going to be completely true to life in terms of time restrictions and therefore the things are edited and cut, but to use that clip to support the decision? I’ve watched the clip multiple times since and am no more at peace with it.

I’ve heard of various rescue centres determining a dog’s fate after entering a dog’s space while they are eating high value food, and ignoring any ‘go away ‘signals the dog is attempting to clearly display – a fake assessor hand is put into the dog’s food bowl and moved around in there until the dog shows aggression. The dog is then labelled as aggressive and un-rehomeable as a result. Labelled, just from that, and just like that, in a matter of a 1-minute test, and consequentially, the dog’s continued life, or euthanasia is determined. “But what if a child put their hand in the dog’s food bowl” I’ve heard people say – well firstly a dog that does show resource guarding behaviour is highly unlikely to be rehomed with young children if the centre is at all sensible, and secondly, a careful management and rehabilitation plan should be in place with the new owners, which would be explained thoroughly. There’d also most likely be the offer of post home support – from any decent shelter anyway.

But it’s this idea we can label a dog from a simple test that bothers me the most – that we can fit them into little boxes and that we can put that dog’s entire temperament into that box. The dog is deemed as being unable to offer an alternative behaviour in a different environment, despite not being tested for this, and the dog is summed up as aggressive, even though the aggressive display is in actual fact a response to an identifiable predictable trigger or situation. Should we conclude that the dog doesn’t deserve the chance of a rehabilitation programme to attempt to help them with this behaviour before we dismiss their life as irrelevant?

There are of course exceptions to this – I am not talking about the dogs that have put in serious bites, or have a history of aggression that would be near impossible to safely rehome. I am not speaking of these dogs, but of the dogs that have been set up to fail, labelled as a biter and therefore cast aside without further appropriate examination.

Take the following scenario – a phone call comes in to a rescue centre about a dog they have rehomed. ‘The dog bit a visiting child in the face’ they say – and now for me comes the moment that determines the type of rescue centre answering the call. Does the centre take this statement literally or does the centre ask appropriate questions to discover the scenario behind the bite? Is the dog’s life viewed as important enough to have some detective work involved?

I can assure you there is in many of these cases, external circumstances and much more to the situation than an unprovoked launch of random aggression towards a child that was not in any way at fault (in terms of action not moral responsibility) and was being actively supervised. Let’s bear this in mind for a moment and consider if many parents actually do this – active supervision! I’ve heard of many cases in various rescue centres like the above, and actually in every single one I know of, on investigating the situation the centre found there had been a lot of stressful occurrences – trigger stacking – in the days leading up the incident.

Often you will find that the ‘bite’ was in fact a snap, or a nip that caused no damage to the face, or if damage it is superficial due to a nick in the skin. The incident itself had involved inadequate adult supervision, with the fact it was the child’s face that was bitten being due to the child kissing a sleeping dog, hugging a dog trying to eat its food, a child jumping on top of a dog, or a child pinning a dog to the floor to copy TV dog training techniques (let’s not open that can of worms).

Is the child at fault? No it’s a child. Is the dog at fault? No, not in my opinion. Should the dog be labelled as ‘aggressive?’ No, but the next home should be carefully vetted due to the now bite history, and the dog should be reassessed on return to the rescue, a lot of dogs can be successfully rehomed and never repeat ‘offend’ if all facts are examined. Of course there are those where the bite was severe and this does understandably effect the decision to rehome.

If the dog usually has good responses to real life stressors that you can’t shield the dog from then you would look into different circumstances for rehoming. Is the dog biting as it is in pain or has an undiagnosed health condition? – this is a massive reason for many dogs biting seemingly with no warning, and no prior cause – this must be looked into before casting a dog aside. Is the owner calm enough to give a coherent account of what happened – were they in the room at the time of the incident or are they relying on a young shaken child’s account of what occurred? Is the owner angry at the dog due to feeling protective of the child and so potentially exaggerating, or are they angry at themselves and so don’t explain all the facts. Crucially, are they going to defend the dog and, potentially, not tell the whole truth? The facts are important, whatever they reveal.

It is really not the case that when a dog has bitten it is sitting there, eyeing you up and plotting when and how it will bite again, and yet we label dogs that have bitten once as ‘biters’ ‘vicious’ ‘aggressive’. If I lose my rag and after lots of provocation and tormenting, shout at a friend, am I an aggressive violent person? Surely my entire temperament should be looked at to determine this. How do I respond when I’m not stressed, not provoked – am I likely to commit mass murder in the future, because I raised my voice in response to a very stressful experience? Should the person that triggered me to raise my voice not also adapt their behaviour in future to lessen the likelihood of this happening again? Or should I be imprisoned or killed off in case I may one day go beyond raising my voice? Extreme example – yes – but no more extreme than what we do to dogs.

Let’s move onto looking at the kennelled dog’s mental state now, and the possibility for a dog in kennels to show aggression, and to do this properly we need to take into account kennel stress. There are very few human equivalents to this if any, and no example that perhaps can be logically comparable, without seeming like a desperate clutching at straws comparison. The best example I’ve heard commonly used, is a comparison with a maximum security prison. Are we going to expect these prisoners to act the way they’d act in society – possibly in some cases yes actually due to the fact they have been imprisoned in a pretty impenetrable prison, but in a lot of cases, no. Being captive, surrounded by aggression of various kinds, having your choices taken away, your freedom, having sensory deprivation and restriction on exercise, little or no comfort, total lack of social interaction or very limited in some cases, potentially poor quality food and so on – would you not be negatively influenced by this in some way? Would you not become somewhat ultra-protective of what little resources you do have? Would you feel physically, emotionally and mentally healthy in this environment? Would you not panic if taken from your cell by unfamiliar people in uniform, put in an unknown environment and then another prisoner is brought in on the other side of the room. You’d most likely have no idea why you are in that room, what is about to happen, know who this other person is – using the example of the staffie perhaps you have been placed in a test to measure your social behaviour, now, bearing in mind the stress you are under in your daily life, the fear you are experiencing due to the environment you live in and have suddenly been placed in, are you going to behave socially and get top marks in these ‘tests?’

Experience has shown me that judging a book by its cover, and taking things at face value, without further investigation, can be highly detrimental and lead you down the wrong path. I am passionate about setting a dog up for success and not judging things without a proper examination of the dog, any external factors, the history and so on, because I believe every dog has a right to this. It isn’t my intention to insult any rescue centre, but merely to put across my hope that each rescue will be a devil’s advocates as I am being and examine in depth every possibility. It would be rather sad for rescue centres to do otherwise, to not value life enough to carry out analysis of the bite, the dog and the potential for rehoming.

To sum up, in the words of a much wiser person than I, “Condemnation without investigation is the height of ignorance” Albert Einstein.