The American Vet Society of Animal Behavior Speaks out against Milan type trainers

maybe a combination of both nature and nurture, but I let my dogs be dogs for the most part in regards to each other. But I also think different dogs have most of the same stuff in them, just to varying degrees. I mean you can take a litter of German Shepherds that are 4 months old, never seen any of them before and drop pans by them call them to you, and test their prey drive and they will all act a little differently just because of their desires inside of them because they certainly have never seen me before.

I'd say maybe I misled a bit when I said working vs companion. I guess I mean more of strong dogs, which of course I see more of in the working lines than I do in companion type dogs because they tend to be selected for that more, but there are those types of dogs that are companions as well.

The biggest difference is that I can see more of a hierarchy structure in the working dogs I am around, the ones that are left to interact with each other anyway than in companion dogs. I don't know how to explain it, you just have to watch it. You can see how they position themselves, how they react to things, how when they decide that they want something, it becomes theirs, if they want something to stop, it stops. How they observe and watch things, they can be more intense and intent on what they are doing.

Interesting thread.

I am of the opinion that there IS a certain level of "pack" theory that applies to dogs. I feel that dogs build a familial relationship with the other dogs, people, cats, etc. that they live with and that makes up their family group (or pack, if you may). While I know that many people are trying to do away with the term "pack" because of the heavy dominance concepts usually associated with it, I don't think we need to or should toss away a completely concept just because some have gone overboard with it.

'release the hounds' made a good point in the way that dogs act toward other humans. My dogs act like dogs, whether they're interacting with each other or with me. I don't expect them to act any other way. While they may know I'm not a dog, they still greet me in a similar way that they greet each other, they use their noses and mouths and paws with me in ways they do with each other, and I respond accordingly - often in dog ways (I've been known to chew on my dog's neck in play .. *L*). They love it and we have a very good relationship.

Leadership is a tangible quality that is present in at least one of the group (pack) members, and hopefully in most it's more elevated in the human than in any of the dogs. The concepts of controlling their access to food, treats, outdoors, etc. to bring out your leadership falls right in line with a dog controlling access to food, toys, etc. in order to push their dominant nature over another dog. It happens. I've spent 20 years watching it happen with my dogs. I'm not going to drop the word "dominant" just because someone else has mis-used the concept.

I tend to have very strong-minded dogs which may be why I see more dominance-based interactions than some who have posted. If you have mild dogs, it may be expected that you would not see much pack or dominance behavior in them. My shepherds and chows are all very tough, very strong-minded animals though.

We have a big problem in Alaska with dogs that pack together and kill moose and caribou calves in the spring. This is a pack behavior, very common and certainly stemming from natural instincts and not any human-trained behavior. You rarely hear of a single dog killing a calf. It's a group of dogs that band together in order to take on the cow moose and the baby in a (probably loosely organized, but still effective) pack attack. I find it hard to understand why people so willingly believe the "no-pack" concept when it can still be seen as a natural instinct in our domestic dogs when given the chance.

Anyhow, just my thoughts on it all. My little pack is down to four dogs but I've had as many as six altogether (living indoors with six medium to giant dogs is an experience! *LOL*).

Melanie and the gang in Alaska

I agree with release the hounds. Everything the guy is sourcing is legitimate, but he's cherry-picking what he shares and I look askance at the logic of some of his conclusions.

Dogs aren't related to wolves because wolves don't accept them? Grey wolves probably wouldn't accept a Mexican wolf into their pack either, but they're definitely closely related.

Regarding the AVSAB pdf file, this little gem made me slap my forehead:

Now, I'm against the alpha roll. It's a stupid thing to do and asking for injury. But when I look at that answer I think of Yellowstone Wolf 40, who would attack the other female wolves--especially her sister--until they rolled for her. A more accurate answer would perhaps be, "The submissive roll is a sign of deference, similar to when the queen demands that you kneel, KNEEL RIGHT NOW, or she will chop your head off."

(Yes, the submissive roll can and often is given more willingly, but that quote just sticks in my craw.)

I think some groups are so desperate to stem the tide of Cesar Milan style training (alpha rolls, neck jabbing, etc) that they cling desperately to anything that suggests alpha rolls et al are a bad idea--even if the information is technically incorrect.

Incidentally, the Yellowstone wolf biologists refer to "alphas" and "dominance" in their reports. It is totally inaccurate to say they're outdated concepts when it comes to wolves. Here's an excerpt from their 2007 annual wolf report:

Here's the URL of the report (it's a PDF file), incidentally. It's totally fascinating.
http://www.nps.gov/yell/naturescience/upload/wolfarpt2007.pdf

Now if they would only write a paper about how their beloved Science Diet food is a bunch of crap.

Seriously, I don't understand why a body such as this is given any creedence for training issues, when they can't get things right that should be closer to their realm of expertise, like diet.

It does make you scratch your head doesn't it? Or at least it should.

Just a comment on strong minded dogs. Remember I live with JRTs. I have seen them 'pack up' on other dogs (or cats) and attack. I CAN'T let them just be dogs with each other or I would have dead dogs.

I get what you are saying. To me its semantics. If an animal is social but doesn't live in a stable pack (in nature) then I wouldn't call it a pack animal. I would say it has a social structure for sure. I am sure that Pariah dogs have a social structure and treat different members of the community differently than others. But does that mean they live in co operative packs?

Are there dogs who are pushy and tend to get their way.. yep. Dekka is pushy. BUT over some things Kaiden is 'alpha. Scandal could get a lot of things here way. But my group does not have a cohesive group hierachy like my horses do. My horses have a very clear (tho at times convoluted) structure. They are undoubtedly herd animals. If there were to be tossed out in the prairies the would likely stay as a herd until other horses showed up.

I really doubt my 7 dogs would stay together. The whippets would pair up.. but the rest would likely go their own way, happy (or not lol) to see each other when doing the rounds.

I just wrote something and it disappeared because suddenly, for no apparent reason, I got logged off. Anyhow, nevermind all that. Dekka just put it into fewer words than I did.

Exactly what is in my mind.

Dogs will group up and take down large animals sometimes. But primarily, they're scavangers and scavanging animals don't benefit from a regular pack. There are behaviors and functions particular to pack animals. And there are a lot of those missing from pariah dogs and more so from the dogs in our households. Pariah dogs don't have a stable pack like a wolf pack. Random dogs come and go continually and frequently...not seen in a wolf pack or other species that live in packs or herds. Families, social group...yes. Pack persay? Not exactly.

And with our dogs, I see no relation between squabbles over resources and social status. That's something humans invented I think.

And it's true...the terms, pack leader, dominance, submission, stutus etc have become associated with a free for all as far as how dogs are treated. That's part of why I steer clear. It reminds me of CM too much and how he intimidates and supresses dogs. I'd much rather associate less ambiquous terms when describing interacting with dogs.

what seperates a "pack" from a social group or family? What behaviors are missing? What don't they do that would make them pack animals? Is it all or nothing? Why can dogs have so many behaviors that are found in "pack" animals, yet can't be called them, what in particular makes it so?

If I see a group of canines its a pack, when i see a group of lions its a pride, a group of cows or horses, a herd, ducks are a flock a gaggle of geese a colony of prarie dogs, etc.

Those are words to call a group of animals.. even if they aren't living in that group. (oh and to have a herd of horses you need 9 or more....)

Dogs do have behaviours that are found in pack animals, and the have ones that are different. Cats have behaviours that are found in pack animals, but that doesn't make the domestic cat a pack animal. (though the domestic cats are social animals and when living 'wild' show similar social patterns in relation to their own kind as pariah dogs do) I think people see social co operative aspects of dogs and automatically equate it to pack behaviour. Social and co operative behaviours are essential in pack animals. But they are also found in non pack species too.

so what behaviors do dogs have or are missing the take them out of the "pack" animal catagory ( and i'm not talking about mules) . I would never argue that a cat in the wild is a pack animal unless it was a lion.

well that for starters pack animals form stable cohesive groups. Dogs don't.

Pack animals tend to have a fairly linear and stable hierarchy.

I disagree that they don't, I live with one that is cohesive, and have a heiracrchy, i know i'm not alone

Maybe all mine are followers, but i don't see any dominance hierarchy in my house. Aside from me controlling the resources.

I think its easy for som' people to see a "pack structure" when they have a group of dogs that don't get along all the time.

I always hear people talking about one dog being alpha over the other. When (ussually ) in reality its just a poorly matched pair of dogs, or they are squabling over poorly managed resources.

If all these dominate rituals were true, my cat, Twitchy, is higher up on the rungs than most of the dogs.

I didn't say mine don't have a hierarchy.. just that its not that one dog always gets its 'prize' I am sure there are some dog that might in a group setting. BUT if dogs were pack animals ALL people with groups of dogs would see clear hierarchy and would have dogs who would live voluntarily in a pack.

Is it always consistent though?

When we had Spike (wolfdog) and Cheyenne (Golden Retriever) together, their interaction was much more social, and dependent upon environment, than anything consistent with the rigidity of "pack" theory.

Cheyenne was raised in a flat-terrain suburb back East; Spike was raised in the rougher terrain of the Lake Tahoe area. They met as adults. Inside the house, Cheyenne was the "boss" of both dogs. She was far more well-versed in "house manners" than Spike ... she taught him what she already knew. He became much better at "house manners" and learned how to act better around the cats. Outside it was completely reversed. Spike, having been raised in the terrain here, knew how to navigate it much better than Cheyenne. She followed HIM while outside. By observing and following his lead, she soon learned how to scramble up rocky terrain and how to swim in water that moved quickly rather than slowly.

Their relationship was social ... they helped each other depending on circumstances. This particular relationship was not the result of training ... it developed naturally between them after we had socialized them to each other. ("Socialized" because again they met only as adults ... they weren't raised together.)

EDIT: Also good to remember that the above mutual-benefit social relationship existed between these two dogs ... even though one of them (Spike) was indeed a wolf hybrid, mix of wolf and domestic dog. So if the "pack theory" as applied even to wolves truly existed ... or was as rigid as it's sometimes stated ... then why wouldn't Spike fit that mold? He didn't.

This is totally out of curiosity, but in your opinion would your dog's retain the same cohesive structure if you were out of the picture? Would they have formed it in the first place without your guidance?

Also, earlier you mentioned that you knew a really hard bitch that didn't like outside dogs, and wouldn't breed except to one specific male. What breed was she? (just really curious) I guess without seeing her myself, I would have interpreted that behavior as a type of dog aggression, similar to how some of the really game strains of bullies won't breed without being restrained. From what I understand, it's wouldn't be out of the question for a dog aggressive animal to not tolerate strange dogs, but to be comfortable with familiar ones.

And you also mentioned how some of the hard bite dogs will go for the handler if the handler is on the ground. Wouldn't that be pure prey drive? I guess I don't understand how that is a type of social behavior. But I don't know everything so maybe I'm missing something.

Also, I think the problem people are having with the "pack" model being used is that, nearly 100% of the time it refers to "wolf pack". They are the ones studied in the most detail, we have the most information about them, that is just how the term is used. And it has been proven to be an innaccurate behavioral model for training dogs. That is what people have an issue with. It can also be interpreted vaguely, like a "pack" of african wild dogs, who have a totally different social structure. It's been tainted by one association and is vague enough it could mean a million other different things. That makes it impossible to be concise with which is important in science.

And for the most part, I agree with your posts, just wanted to throw that in there so you don't misunderstand.

*note: the rest of this is directed at nobody in particular, it is just some observations*

We too have dealt with dogs packing up and killing livestock. Like I said before, dogs will pack up when it's to their benefit (bringing down large game), but these same dogs all split up when it was over. They didn't build dens together. They didn't live together and stake out a territory. They didn't band together to help raise the puppies of the dominant bitch because they all bred at will.

Most of them were feral or strays, a few of them were neighbor dogs (huskies, shepherds, and dalmations). Which is interesting, because the neighbor dogs lived as far as 5 miles apart from each other in a home/farm environment, had completely separate "packs" on their home turf in terms of the humans and other dogs they shared living space with. Specifically it was the husky and shepherd who chose to temporarily pack up with strangers and each other (though they lived 5 miles apart in separate households), they killed my cousins horse. They had packed up with these feral dogs on more than one occasion to take out livestock, but they didn't live together. They didn't go around staking out a territorial boundary with this group of animals. They didn't raise a litter of pups together. They simply got together to hunt, and when it was over went their separate ways. Extremely different from a wolf. I would not say their group consituted a "pack" in the behavioral sense. It was a group of loosely organized dogs hunting together.

It does seem to be an issue of semantics. To a lot of us on here, a "pack" is a group of tightly bonded animals that hunt/eat/den/ together and share the responsibilities of raising offspring, regardless of how closely related those offspring may be. Then there are social animals, who well, socialize, and sometimes cooperate when it benefits them. A lot of the body language and posturing is similar, but the whole underlying structure is really different. Then you have the non social animals, like bears, who pretty much are death to others of their own kind if they aren't interested in breeding.

Romy, I think my dogs would have the same structure if I were not here. Buzz would probably have been killed or run off but the structure between Gunnar, Daisy and Bruzer would be as it is now.

I think the thing where a dog- even bite trained ones- goes after the handler if the handler is in a weak position is a natural reaction. Someone on another forum I belong to recently posted a video of police dogs that went after the handler 100% of the time when the handler was attacked by a decoy and was put on the ground, with the decoy over the top. As soon as the handler reversed the position and the decoy was on the ground, the dog refocused on the decoy. I think you also have to take into consideration how those dogs were raised- they were not raised from puppyhood by the police handler, they were given to the handler at 18 months or more of age. They didn't get the bonding that you'd get if you raised it from an 8 week old pup. But, another woman who didn't have a bite trained dog did the same experiment with her dog, it was some kind of hound dog, and it went after her as well. Once Gunnar is ready for muzzle fighting work, I'm going to try this scenario and see what he does. It'll be a while before he's ready for that though.

Thanks Dan.

What I don't understand, is if "going after" a weak packmate during a confrontation with a stranger is a pack behavior, what would the purpose of that behavior be? Wouldn't it make more sense, in a self preservation kind of way, to go after the threat that is incapacitating your hunting buddy? Or is their intent to "cull" the weak member and take off with the stronger victor? I'm just not getting it.

Let us know when Gunnar gets to try it, that would be really interesting to find out. It's so cool to hear about you two and your training together.

but mine do get along, and I can still see the heirarchy. Why is that so hard to believe. There were a few others on here that as far as I can tell know their dogs pretty well and can see the same thing. When I can read my dog and see that she really wants something and she just goes over and takes it from the others, whenever she wants with no bickering or fighting or squabbeling, what would you call it? She can give it up, let somebody else have it or care less about it as well, but as i've said time and time again, when I can tell she wants it, she gets it, no questions asked from any animal in the house, but me. WHy is that?

It could very well be possible

why would that be? Most people I know don't have a clue what they're seeing in a dog no matter how many they own. Lots of owners I see are just "lucky" their dogs get along or they are "unlucky" that they don't. They can't see or decipher any of the everyday interactions that are happening all the time.

There is a wide range of behaviors in dogs. I've spent time in SA where dogs run free everywhere. Some roam in little packs, some don't. Some will seek out human companionship, some don't. They come in all shapes and sizes, but just because it is not clearly evident by all people in all dogs doesn't mean it isn't there. Because I have seen clear examples where it is.

and not all dogs have the same pack tendencies, lots of companion dogs are bred for middle of the road stuff, it suits them better as family dogs. With most dogs, field labs, working GSD's, mals, sled dogs, etc. The dogs that are still bred with more drive and intensity to do stuff seem to have a lot more pack type behaviors than those that don't. Why is that?

I guess there really aren't any "pack" animals then because wolves can go out on their own, especially when they don't need to be together for food, which is a big reason why our companion dogs probably don't "willingly" join up in packs at every oppourtunity, they don't have to, unless we make them live together.


I don't know. I doubt it. They wouldn't have to, they could probably scavange and stuff on their own. I think they'd stick together for a while though, but if all humans were gone, I think they probably would stick together, at least most of them.

I don't think they would have formed this without me either, but again because they wouldn't have to. Most dogs are split from the families at 8 weeks of age and shipped off to other places and forced to live with other animals and humans that take care of their needs. But they have to form one with me because that is how we live, and they are more than capable. I guess if I and everyone else was gone and they had to work together to survive, my money is that they would most certainly pack up, readily and effectively.


In a lot of ways no, does my alpha bitch always get the toy, does she always go first, does she always get fed first, does she always keep the bone, No. She lays on her back and plays around and rolls, and will give up toys when she's done with them, and let every animal in the house eat out of her dish when I'm around. but it is consistent always, and that when she wants the toy, or she wants something to stop, she gets her way always. There is no fight, it just happens. What would you call that?

German Shepherd

a pack will instinctively go for the animal on the ground, even within packs, when a dog or wolf or whatever goes down, the rest jump on that animal. It's instinct. That isn't the only explanation for this behavior, but this a whole other discussion on its own.

I have that issue with it to, that people have bastardized the theory to rationalize some pretty stupid training, but that doesn't mean I ignore what's in front of me either.

It is confusing isn't it. I posted an example of a strange dog illiciting a cry for "help" or maybe it was just pain from our cat and our dogs jumping on the dog, which is totally contradictory from the dog going after the guy that is "down" because of instinct. But there can be different reasons for that too that can come into play.

I never said it was all black and white, i get confused sometimes too , well a lot, but I try hard.

Have you ever seen a pack of dogs just turn on another dog? This just brought up a great example. Not necessarily a "pack" but these dogs are familiar with each other and do seem to have a pretty set hierarchy when together with one dog being clearly the most submissive in temperment to the point of weakness and to live on her own i'm sure wouldn't make it long without human help.

The other dogs don't really pick on her, but you can see she is the low man on the totem pole. She was off on her own in a big dog run outside with 5 other dogs when one of the other dogs got stepped on by it's owner and yelped. Immediately 2 of the other dogs jumped on the weaker dog off minding its own business and without the quick work of myself and her husband i'm sure that dog would have been killed.

I can't really explain it or know if its true or not, but it sure appeard that the cry of weakness triggered a response to cull the weakest from the group. But they weren't a living together group either, but I have never seen anything like that before or since. anyone else ever experience this?


Dan you have video? I'd like to see please.