Behavior Change, Toy Play, and Learning to Listen

It’s past time I got 5.5 month old Denali into a “puppy class”. Due to availability and schedules and the lack of agility facilities in our area, finding a class was next to impossible. So, our “local” (hour away) training school allowed us to join a Novice class and just spend our turn working on engagement in a new place and puppy skills. Last week was her first class, and she did superbly! So much better than I had expected given my admitted failure at taking her new places lately. She was engaged, she played with her toys and worked for her food and did behaviors that were easy, and some that were hard.

This week we started out really well with our Treat N Train and our food. I even decided she had shown me she could handle learning something new here, so I started training a different verbal cue on a wing. However, almost as soon as I pulled out her tug I noticed something wasn’t quite right. She wasn’t biting it, or gripping. She wasn’t as vocal as she normally is when playing with her toys. She let go frequently. Pretty quickly, she started to disengage. When I walked over to a wing to try to ask her to do a wrap (a behavior she knows well) she immediately let go of the toy and stuck her nose on the ground and began sniffing. I absolutely lost her. I gave her an opportunity to decide she wanted to reengage, but she did not. She made that clear. So I said “okay that’s fine” and got her back to me, fed her for returning to me, and ended our turn. This dog is NUTS about her toy, and so this was highly unusual for me to see.

https://youtu.be/Ra6X2qJP8Z0

While the other dog had his turn I mulled this over in my brain. When I see a behavior that is normally enthusiastically and confidently performed suddenly decline, my first thought is always physical ailment of some kind. Was she sick? Did something hurt? Thinking about it, she had done this to me once before in my back yard and the next day I had found a tooth sitting in my recliner. I could have (and maybe should have) left the toy alone for the remainder of class, but I just wanted to test something for the sake of experience. I took the toy into her turn, but was prepared to immediately abandon it and go back to food if she was not into it again.

I changed my play style. Rather than tugging hard (which she genuinely enjoys) and doing a lot of face-to-face play, I decided to just gently grab the toy for moments at a time, and do a lot more side-to-side play. My older male Border Collie LOVES this type of play- I call it the “happy slappy game.” She gets to determine how hard she pulls on the toy always, and I never actually pull back on her. I just put my hand on the toy and let her decide to pull back if she wants. I could tell she wanted to continue this game because she kept driving the toy back to my hands, her vocalizations returned, and she started doing her kill-shake (which she only does when she’s really “feeling” the toy.) I kept the turn short, and ended it very pleased that I had listened to my puppy and learned something about her in the process.

https://youtu.be/yxl9cea0PbI

We drove home, and upon opening the door to her kennel in the car, I found a molar on the bed.

Moral of the story: Listen to your dogs. Don’t assume “stubborness” or some other label that insinuates a problem with the dog’s character or personality. They’re allowed to have off days, they’re allowed to say no when they experience discomfort. Be amenable to them, adjust your plans. Try something new. 

-Rachel