Working your dog in defense

[GSDElsa]

I did some table work with Medo today, and it got me thinking...how many schutzhund people these days really work their dogs in defense at all throughout their schutzhund careers? We are always talking about how we're losing our strong dogs......so really.....how many out there put real stress on your dog and even attempt to bring out this drive in them? And how did you do this?

[gagsd]

From my limited perspective, an awful lot of people work their dogs in defense while thinking they are doing prey work.

[hunterisgreat]

I work my dogs a great deal, 75% of the time, in aggression (as opposed to pure defense, which is I'm assuming what you meant by defense). I don't like the resulting picture from all prey work. I work them in purely prey for certain things and situations, but the final picture is the highest state of aggression we can produce

[hunterisgreat]

Originally Posted by gagsd

From my limited perspective, an awful lot of people work their dogs in defense while thinking they are doing prey work.

And even more think their dog is working in aggression/defense when they are actually 100% in prey

[hunterisgreat]

We started with table work. With Katya it is/was a matter of conditioning her to go into that state of mind on command. With jäger it is/was setting up scenerios off the field/out of the routine to get him in that state of mind. I'd feign cleaning up the gear and turn off the stadium lights at the end of the night, the helper would be ominously staring from the woods edge... This would bring out the full aggression in jäger so I could a) praise and encourage that, and b) eventually bringing in more control while keeping the aggression high. It's harder to get him in high aggression if he sees blinds setup or knows we are "just training". This is the primary reason I do suit work and starting muzzle work with him... To get the proper state of mind "in the routine" and on a Schutzhund field. Katya is doing lots of muzzle work for the same reasons. If you watch those vids I've posted she is getting nice and intense in her muzzle work. We will keep going down this path with both as far as it leads and as fast as walking that fine line of control will allow.

[Liesje]

My dog has seen too much defense, or at least it was allowed to become that for him (he would come out onto the field in too high a state of defense). Now we have added in more prey work, bringing more balance. He is still more defense than prey which I like but the overall picture is higher drive, stronger, more powerful dog (and better biting). I've never put him on a table though, not against it at all but I don't think he needs it and no helper has suggested it. We actually had a seminar today and one of his last reps he did in the blind the judge said would have been full points guarding which is huge for us since I messed him up a few years back and have been working that out ever since, but he's finally to the point where he's starting to show even better than he was before we messed up.

As for stress, yes in general I am all about teaching the dog to work through pressure, using rewards as releases not bribes, etc. I learned a few ideas today that I plan to work on this winter. In bitework I'm a big fan of the PA test because there are eight frontal attacks but no bites. And by frontal attack I don't mean a helper zipping crab-style out of the blind holding out a sleeve, I mean full suit charging the dog/handler with lots of verbal threat and stick. For me protection is about a lot more than "gripping" and biting. I've seen some "top level" SchH3 dogs fall apart on these exercises (and this is only the first level of SDA which you can actually skip over) because they are so equipment focused and/or have no idea how to deal with a real attack without the security of a bite and some of these dogs can show defense and do have strong aggression but get so patterned trained for sleeves they aren't really processing a true threat.

[x11]

i could not do that - put a dog on a table to work it in defence, i got a very nasty dog out of the box, if he wasn't like that i would not do anything to make him that way, i would just use him for whatever his talents (or lack of them) dictated.

to put a dog on a table and push it into defence for sport to me is better but not much better than making dogs fight each other jmo.

[Mrs.K]

I prefer not to. Especially not Nala. She's enough dog as it is. Anyone that ever saw her, knows what I'm talking about.

[hunterisgreat]

Lets set some ground rules here... "Table work" can mean wildly different things to different people... And can BE wildly different for the same dog in the same table scenario with a different helper. Also, defense and aggression mean different things to different people

[hunterisgreat]

Originally Posted by Mrs.K

I prefer not to. Especially not Nala. She's enough dog as it is. Anyone that ever saw her, knows what I'm talking about.

It doesn't change the dog really... No different than teaching a dog to control themselves in prey. Anyway, aggression is the appropriate state of mind in much of the protection work