June 8, 2023 • 41 mins
This week we discuss resource guarding which is a very common problem that most people can fix themselves without spending a ton of time and money. Once you understand it, it is easy to manage in most instances. Learn more about this relatively simple problem that kills many dogs every year because most people feel unequipped to handle.
Original music by Matt Setter and friend Sean!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:03):
Today we're gonna talk aboutresource guarding and that is
Huge.
Yes.
Does it, I guess it kind ofhappens with cats too, right?
With territory?
I don't, I don't know.
Yeah.
Again, we're talking more aboutdogs and cats.
So seriously, someone needs tolike send us ideas on.
What we should talk about withcats.
(00:23):
Yeah.
Because it's not that we don'twanna talk about them or that we
can't, we just don't think of itfirst.
Right.
And because we're not JacksonGalaxy.
No.
I mean, and that's all he thinksabout.
Yeah.
Well, and we have a cat team ofgreat volunteers who primarily
manage the cats.
So you and I are more on the dogside.
I know, but I, I mean, I just.
I was just bottle feeding thattiny ass little kitten that you
(00:45):
were looking at.
Yeah.
But, but then we're gonna, butthen I'm gonna move her over to,
uh, one of our cat fosters sothat she can integrate her and
doesn't get Tarzan syndrome.
Yeah.
Which you might have heard aboutin our Litter Mate syndrome
episode.
Yeah.
But yeah, so we do cats.
I just don't know that I haveproblems with Kat that.
(01:06):
Yeah.
If anyone has any suggestions,any questions about cats, let us
know and we can cover it in apodcast.
Yes, well, dogs definitelyresource guard.
That's probably one of the mostcommon things that we deal with.
And most people, they don't knowwhat it is.
And the worst part is thatthey're often reinforcing it and
(01:27):
making it worse.
Especially little dogs.
Yes.
So the one thing they don'treally want, they are making
happen more and more and moreand it usually results in a
bite.
Mm-hmm.
And or a fight.
And then they realize they havea problem.
Right.
That they didn't realize.
All along, right?
That they've been actuallyenabling this type of behavior
(01:48):
so that it culminated to thisfinal act of violence.
Of violence.
No, it's true.
So resource guarding isdescribing a behavior where a
dog attempts to assert ownershipover something.
There are a variety of thingsthat it can be, even people, but
(02:08):
often it's toys, their bed, atreat crate.
It can be water bowl, oftenfood.
And especially bones.
Bones and animal products likeanimal products, sure, bully
sticks.
Anything that is a chewablething that's gonna lay around
and not get consumed in onesitting is likely to cause
(02:32):
guarding.
Resource guarding.
Mm-hmm.
Not in every dog, but the funnything is, is that a lot of times
people go a very long timeknowing a dog and then they put
them in a different situation,like put two dogs together and
then they realize their dog justattacked the other dog over a
bone and that their dog hasresource guarding and they
didn't know that for five years.
So, it can happen, it can startat any time too.
(02:55):
Mm-hmm.
Oftentimes once a dog starts toget comfortable in a home, yeah.
And so those are the dogs thatwe say kind of let their hair
down.
They, they're on their bestbehavior for like a month, and
then they start to show you whothey are, and they let their
hair down and that's where theresource guarding really comes
out.
Right.
But there's also, there's space,you know, like there's barrier
(03:17):
aggression, so to speak.
So that is basically resourceguarding their crate, their
area, their territory.
Mm-hmm.
Fence reactivity is a resource.
Guarding of their territory,their backyard.
Mm-hmm.
Their front yard, whatever.
and then people think that'sfunny often, especially with
little dogs.
Yeah.
He's so protective.
(03:37):
It's so funny.
I know.
Or, you know, and then they canresource guard.
And it's kind of that, thatconcept of their space, with the
sofa, you let them on the sofaand then all of a sudden they're
like, this is my sofa.
Or their, bed.
Their own bed.
Mm-hmm.
Or your bed.
Yeah, exactly.
Get off my bed.
And people bed's your bed.
Yeah.
And people, especially like,you'll see videos and I don't
(03:59):
understand this.
Like, why, why, why, why do youthink this is funny?
But they will resource guardpeople.
And you see like these pregnantwomen or whatever, or a child
and another person goes to reachfor the child or the pregnant
woman, and the dog jumps atthem, snaps at them, snarls at
them, and they're laughing.
(04:20):
Mm-hmm.
You're promoting a bite.
Yeah.
They, they don't get it.
That, that's a really seriousproblem, and you need to address
that, especially before the babycomes.
Mm-hmm.
I kind of wonder how many peoplehave experienced that before we
get the email where they'relike, I have a new baby and this
is going on.
Mm-hmm.
And it's not aggression towardsthe baby.
It's, it could be towards thehusband.
(04:42):
Right.
Or, you know, towards anybody.
Right.
But the hormones, the pregnancyhormones make it worse.
For some of the dogs becausethey can sense and smell the
changes and it makes, it canmake them more protective.
And so that mm-hmm.
That's something you can'treally avoid.
Right.
And so it's definitely somethingyou have to manage.
Right.
And then some people actually,think it's great that the dog is
(05:06):
protecting their child, untilthe kid has friends and the
friends come over.
Mm-hmm.
And then you're not watchingthem, and then the dog's gonna
bite your kid's friends.
Exactly.
Because.
They've been protecting thechild and, and you let them
think that it's okay.
One of the best things aboutresource guarding is that it's
very predictable.
(05:27):
Exactly.
You can figure out what theresource guarding and you can
fix it.
Yes.
So predictable means fixable.
It's when a dog is reacting tosomething and it's.
Random.
Actually random.
A lot of times people haven'tput the pattern together, but
once they tell us, we can sh wecan see the pattern.
(05:47):
But, if a dog just hauls off andbites somebody when you, you
know, they've been fine aroundkids, they've been fine for, you
know, six months.
That's unpredictable.
Mm-hmm.
Why did they choose to reactthen?
And unpredictable is nottrainable.
It's only manageable.
Mm-hmm.
And the reason predictable istrainable is because, You set up
(06:09):
the situation so you can controlthe outcome, and that is setting
it up so that you can give theman alternative behavior to do
so.
Now I don't want you to growlWhen this person comes over, you
give them a treat.
Mm-hmm.
And, you know, distract them orthe, if it's safe enough, the
(06:31):
stranger can give them thetreat.
Mm-hmm.
But don't push that if they've,you know, they're lunging or
biting or anything like that.
Right.
But I mean, there's a series ofactions that you can perform
training to alleviate certaintypes.
Of, resource guarding, you know,like, if they're, say that
(06:53):
they're being very aggressiveat, with the fence with the
door, you have to be consistent.
Like right now we've got a veryhighly excitable teenage pit
bull mix, and he's been jumpingat the door.
Yeah, he jumps right up to your,like face, like he jumps really
high through the door.
Yeah, because I, you know, Jhe's very excitable and it's not
(07:15):
necessarily that he's, it's notaggression, it's just excitement
and overstimulation.
Overstimulation for sure.
Mm-hmm.
But there's a, a, a, a patternof training to desensitize him.
And that would be the same typeof training with barrier,
aggression with the fencemm-hmm.
And things like that where youhave to consistently.
(07:39):
Call them off, have them sit,have them know that is not
appropriate when someone walksby.
They're gonna be conditioned ifyou do it consistently.
Mm-hmm.
To sit.
At a certain spot if that's whatyou have.
Well, and people usually waittill the reaction happens.
Mm-hmm.
And then try and correct it.
Right.
But the key is that you have tocatch them the second before you
(08:02):
know they're going to react.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
So you, you know, when thedoorbell rings, they go nuts and
they go to the door and theystart grabbing at the mm-hmm.
Rug or, you know.
That's right.
Whatever.
They've been grabbing people'spant legs, like, you know what's
gonna happen.
Mm-hmm.
So, You have to not let thathappen.
Right.
And sometimes you can't bealways consistent with the UPS
(08:22):
guy, for example, but if youhave friends over mm-hmm.
You can set your dog up prior toyour friends coming over.
Yeah.
The same would be like for thedoorbell or(mm-hmm) whatever.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
And you know, some people arelike, well, my dog, you know,
looks outside and just barks ateverything.
Then you have to keep them fromlooking out the window.
Like you have to put them in adifferent room because that's
(08:44):
not good for them either.
So although that's, I mean it'skind of resource guarding, but
it's Right.
You know, whatever generalizedreactivity, you have the ability
to control your dog'senvironment.
Mm-hmm.
Within your home, right?
And if you do it, do thesethings within your home and then
you practice on their, whatevertheir weaknesses are when you're
(09:06):
out in the world, then you, youknow, because you've controlled
the ones you know that you can,and then the chances of you
being able to control anunpredicted stimuli is that much
higher.
Right?
Because you have to conditionthem basically(mm-hmm) to the
training, before you expo.
(09:28):
I think that's the wagon.
Outside.
Oh, I know.
Like, no, I see.
Yeah.
I think it's someone's pullingthe, the wagon with, with stuff
in it.
Okay.
I totally got distracted.
I don't even know what I'msaying anymore.
Or it's digging.
Are they scratching at the door?
No, no, no.
That's not a dog.
Okay.
It's a wagon.
Okay.
And then, yeah.
(09:48):
Okay.
All right.
What was I saying?
I don't even know what I wassaying.
Oh, conditioning.
Yeah, it's conditioning.
So you're basically, you'recounter conditioning, right?
So for example, your dog likesto guard the backyard, he
patrols, and the minute he seessomeone, he starts barking at
them outside of the fence.
So this is an example of theterritory, right?
(10:11):
The resource guarding of histerritory, per se.
And what you want to do then isnot have him have access to the
backyard without you.
Right.
So you are taking him out, youare working with him, he's on a
leash.
And when someone comes by, ifyou know that there's like a
(10:32):
pattern, I don't know, kidscoming by after school or, or
what have you, if there's apattern of people coming by,
Then you start with your sit,well, and, and your
desensitization that you're theone in control, that you are
making him do certain commands,like sit down, whatever.
(10:55):
It's a training session whilepeople are walking by so he does
not have access to that fence tobark at them.
Yeah.
Well, and you know, it reallycan be as simple as if the kids
come by around three at 2 45,put him inside and then, you
know, this is the lazy way tofix it.
But you have the power.
(11:15):
And that's the thing iseveryone, when they contact us,
they say, I am just not skilledenough to do this.
This is not about skill.
This is about following steps.
Mm-hmm.
Following directions and doingthat hundreds of times so that
your dog's behavior has a newpattern.
And so whenever people say that,I'm like, we're not magic.
(11:40):
This is what we would do.
This is exactly what we woulddo, and you can do it too.
There are times when, you know,they, it is a, a situation where
it's not something that can goon for very long.
Mm-hmm.
Where it's a safety issue.
Mm-hmm.
Obviously, you know, then wehave the muzzle.
Right, right.
But you know, there's othertools that can be used.
(12:01):
Yeah.
But there are situations wherethey're kind of a rock and a
hard place.
Mm-hmm.
And rehoming the dog mightreally be the only option.
Right.
But that's usually with otherproblems too.
Right?
But then rehoming is not anoption right now.
Right?
So, so it, it comes to, you fixit or you euthanize.
Right.
And you would need to euthanize,not us.
(12:23):
Mm-hmm.
So predictable is fixable andthe key is to finding the
pattern.
Mm-hmm.
And you may not recognize it,but chances are if you go to a
behaviorist who hasrehabilitated dogs, they will
recognize it(Mm-hmm) and theycan help you work through those
steps.
And this is not about spendinghours and hours and hours of
(12:45):
extra time training.
Mm-hmm.
This is not about hundreds andthousands of dollars training.
No.
This is about learning what fewsteps you need to take, doing
that consistently.
And so, you know, let's saytechnically you could do like
three classes with a trainer.
You will get the skills, theunderstanding of what you need
(13:09):
to continue to proceed(right).
You won't need the trainer tocontinue to guide you if you
very listen very carefully andyou control the environment.
Right.
So for example, we have a, alittle dog.
Who likes to resource guard, thesofa.
Mm-hmm.
Especially when he's sitting onsomeone's lap on the sofa and he
(13:30):
will actually launch himself offto, bark.
And I don't, I don't wanna saygo after, but, just be reactive.
Yeah.
And to get them away from hislap and sofa.
Mm-hmm.
So how did we fix that?
He has no access to the sofa.
Mm-hmm.
(13:51):
Well, and that is not his damnsofa.
Now that's a pulling in.
Okay.
So, one thing I wanna mention(thanks) is the leash is the
first step.
Mm-hmm.
Always.
There is never going to be atime when the leash isn't the
first step to dealing withresource guarding.
(14:13):
So get your leash, put it on,use it, and then you know, learn
about the steps of resourceguarding.
Often resource guarding canhappen with little dogs.
Especially.
Yeah, it seems like littledogs...
And it's not because of theirsize, and it's not because of
their breed.
It's because people think it'sfunny to let them do that.
(14:35):
So for example, you...
Or they don't want to correct alittle dog...
Right.
Because they're"so little".
Yeah, so you have a little dog,let's say it's a little
chihuahua in someone's arms.
Someone reaches over to petthem, and the dog growls, snaps
or bites, and everyone laughsbecause it seems so ridiculous
that this little dog is tryingto be a big dog and be tough.
(15:01):
That is resource guarding.
And if you laugh, you'reenabling it.
And if the person doesn't putthe dog down, they are
reinforcing the resourceguarding.
Yeah.
So specify where they're puttingthe dog down because I don't
wanna sound right.
Oh, I'm so sorry.
Like, like, take the dog out oftheir arms and put it on the
(15:23):
ground.
Mm-hmm.
So this is where the leash isvery helpful.
So your dog is claiming thecouch, whether it's in your lap
or just the couch with the leashon, you just, you know, give the
leash a little tug and pull himoff the couch.
Not harshly.
Mm-hmm.
Or hard just throw'em offbalance so that they have to
jump off.
(15:44):
And then that to them was like,I do this behavior, I get this
consequence, and they're like,oh.
But reaching for them to getthem off the couch, that act of
lunging at them, especially ifyou're mad or you're trying to
do something in a hurry thatscares them.
(16:05):
So that makes, It's gonna end upbeing a bite.
A bite.
Because no one likes handsgrabbing for them.
No.
So do not grab collars.
Do not grab dogs.
Use the leash.
This means your dog probably hasto have a leash on all the time
in the house.
There is nothing wrong withthat...
While you're working on thisbehavior.
(16:26):
Yes, there is nothing wrong withthat.
You need to fix this or you aregonna get bitten, someone else
is gonna get bitten and thenyou'll have to get rid of the
dog, so it's not worth it.
Having a leash on is so simple.
Right.
And And it's not forever.
No.
And then use it so that everytime that behavior happens, the
(16:47):
same consequence happens.
They get tugged off the couchgently and they're on the
ground.
Right.
And this is a form ofconditioning.
A lot of training and countertraining is conditioning the dog
to expect a certain reaction totheir action.
And that doesn't cost any money.
(17:08):
No.
Or take extra time.
No.
You're already there.
It's already happening.
So it's action consequence.
Action consequence.
And think about that pattern andhow the things you do create a
pattern that may cause your dogto fail in that situation.
(17:29):
So if your dog growls whenyou're putting the food down,
leash them up, make them sit,and then like release them to
the food where you're notputting the hand down.
Right.
Well, I mean, it's a little bitmore involved than that because
then they have to learn thatthat is not their food.
(17:49):
It's your food.
Right.
Again, everything is aboutmanaging and controlling their
environment so that they learnthat certain behaviors are not
appropriate and are not to beallowed.
So a dog who resource guards hisfood and his bowl does not get a
bowl.
He only gets food from you...
(18:09):
From your hand.
From your hand.
And then he's gonna learn toappreciate the fact that the
food comes from you.
Mm-hmm.
And then he's gonna be lesslikely to resource guard.
Well, and that's, And there'smore to it than that, but that
is just your general concept.
Yes.
You have to remove the thingthat they want to achieve the
(18:29):
consequence.
It's kind of like your kids, youknow, they do something bad, you
take away their phone privilegesand you obviously can't take
away food, but you can deliverit a different way.
Mm-hmm.
You can do a routine a differentway.
Yep.
And the thing is that people arealways like, my dog's doing
this....
and you have control over yourpets.
(18:52):
except maybe a cat.
You have control over your dogs,and if you put a leash on them,
you really can manage andcontrol the situation.
You are an adult.
You have control.
Your animal does not havecontrol.
Right.
So remember you have the powerand use that to your advantage.
(19:12):
One of our big resource guardersthat was pretty much a challenge
because he had some like historyof abuse and that would be Heath
Ledger, my dog.
And when we got him, he resourceguarded everything.
So with him, it was a, a counterconditioning of trade and trust,
(19:34):
right?
In his circumstance, it wasabout gaining that trust.
And then once we had taken careof his resource guarding, he
learned to trade.
At first, you never ever tookobjects out of his mouth because
you're just asking to be bit,and we're talking about a 90
pound dog here.
And so you trade it and youalways had a higher value than
(19:55):
what he had in his mouth.
His resource guarding with us,and our six year old daughter
could take anything out of hismouth, that was fixed.
And so we put him up foradoption.
The short story was that hedidn't wanna be adopted out, so
now he's stuck with us, youknow?
No, now I'm stuck with him.
Mm-hmm.
Because he didn't wanna leaveme.
(20:17):
Mm-hmm.
But, we did adopt him outbecause like I said, we had a
six year old child in the housewho could take anything out of
his mouth.
And we were very particularabout the environment that he
would go in and, one of thepeople in the home had a search
and rescue female shepherd.
(20:39):
And so we felt, hey, theyprobably have a handle on
training.
And so we did allow him to beadopted out and we did tell
them, you trade, you never takeanything out of his mouth.
And then we gave him the basicsof how to integrate him into the
house successfully, becausethere's always gonna be a step
(21:00):
back, when they go into a newenvironment and they don't trust
the person yet, et cetera.
Right.
And, we ended up getting himback because he decided that he
had to resource guardeverything.
So he's on a walk or a run.
I mean, this guy was like superathletic that we adopted him out
to.
(21:20):
And he was out there and he'd beon a walk and he decided a leaf,
a leaf of all things he wasgonna resource guard and you
could not take that damn leafaway from him.
In the house he would takecoasters.
He wasn't a beer drinker, but hewould take that coaster and that
was his.
And then tampons, you know,like, I went into the bathroom
(21:44):
and hey, I've just, you know,I've got this, tampon and you
may need it, but you're notgetting it.
And...
Hopefully not used.
No, no, yeah.
Fresh from the box.
Right.
That's, that makes it evenfunnier really, because used.
Would be more...
Just so gross.
Common.
Yeah.
And more likely.
But to guard it before...
(22:05):
In a wrapper.
Is funny.
So...
It's not funny, but...
Yeah.
It's a hilarious thing to guard.
Yes.
And that's the thing is likedogs can guard objects that have
no rhyme or reason.
But it's a possession is nowtheirs and you cannot have it.
And so he ended up bitingsomeone because they decided to
(22:27):
try to take it out of his mouthinstead of giving him a higher
value trade.
All they needed to do was givehim a hot dog and he would've
been like, have your damntampon.
Do you think that he wouldresource guard now, if you tried
to take something out of hismouth?
Oh, I take everything out of hismouth now.
Oh, that's good.
But he's so bad because, it'sthe trade game for him, right.
(22:49):
And so sometimes he'll come upto me with something in his
mouth and I know.
And I know that he has somethingin his mouth cuz he'll kind of
like tuck his head kind of like,a horse.
Which is horrible by the way,cuz horses shouldn't like tuck
their head that way.
But you know that curved?
Mm-hmm.
And so he'll like come up withhis like chin tucked to his
chest and I was like, what doyou have?
(23:11):
And then he like, kind of showsme and I'm like, seriously?
And I'll either be like,seriously, and then I'll give
him a biscuit and he'll be like,thank you.
Or I'll just be like, yeah, youcan have that.
Thanks for asking.
And then he will go away andhe'll like do his thing.
Yeah.
And so it's not like it took alot of money and you have to be
(23:33):
patient that that's how it costsyou time.
Right.
But it's about how you dothings.
Yeah.
The order in which you do thingsto create the optimal outcome.
Right.
And not giving the chance tohave the same thing that you
know is gonna happen, happenagain.
Right.
And people are often in denialand that it might not happen
(23:54):
this time.
No.
It's going to And don't letthem, because if you start to
make progress too, it's notgonna be the end of the world if
a situation that you're notpredicting happens and the dog
does that reaction, but it doestake you a step back.
Mm-hmm.
So you don't want the dog toreact and you need to prevent
(24:16):
the reaction from happening inorder to fix it.
And every time they react ithurts them.
It hurts them emotionally.
And it's like a kid that'sacting out like...
Right.
No kids want to have tantrums.
Kids don't want to be...
In timeout all the time.
Right.
They don't want that.
But if, but they want attention,which is why they're acting out.
(24:38):
Right.
A lot of times.
And so...
But we're not childpsychologists fyi.
No, we are not.
We're not vets, we're notpsychologists.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
But.
It is just about the pattern.
Mm-hmm.
And you have to control thepattern, right?
So there are times whenobviously it might be even
dangerous for you to have, youknow, control the situation.
(25:03):
And so let's just use food as anexample.
I mean, you should not beputting food down with a dog
that resource guards without,let's say a muzzle on a basket
muzzle.
But you should be able to workto the point where you could
without a muzzle, but we wouldadvise using it because people
(25:24):
are going to trip up.
And they're going to hurry andthen they're gonna get bitten.
So we do recommend anytimeyou're working with a dog with
resource guarding, that you geta basket muzzle.
Mm-hmm.
And the basket muzzle will allowthem to eat, breathe, pant, even
play with some toys, and drinkwater without hindering them.
(25:49):
And so it's very important totake the danger out of the
situation(yeah) because ifyou're so worried about the
danger, then you aren't in thebest mindset to be helping them.
You are anxious and youranxiety, they will feed off it.
Right.
So you have to reduce youranxiety so you can be calm.
(26:11):
So you can know I'm gonna dothis and nothing bad is gonna
happen.
And the muzzle will give youthat security.
You have to train them to themuzzle, acclimate them to it,
and there are ways to do that.
The Muzzle Up Project online isa great place to do that.
It shows you step by step how toacclimate your dog to a muzzle,
(26:31):
and especially if it comes downto the muzzle or rehoming, our
euthanization.
Just do the muzzle.
Mm-hmm.
Like it's not that big a deal.
Yeah.
And Method K9 has a good video.
Yes.
On their YouTube.
It's not on their website.
It's on their YouTube.
But no one likes the muzzle.
(26:52):
Like, it doesn't look good.
You look like Hannibal Lecter,but who cares what you look like
if it's gonna save your dog'slife?
So it's like a seatbelt.
Some people don't like to berestrained by seat belts.
Kids complain about them.
They cut at your neck.
Mm-hmm.
Well, you still gotta wear it.
Right.
It is going to save your life.
(27:13):
Right.
And this muzzle may be yourdog's seatbelt.
And why wouldn't you wanna put aseatbelt on your dog and save
their life?
So I'm getting very seriousagain, I get very serious when I
talk about that.
We have a blog, on motleyzoo.org where I discuss the
(27:34):
problem with Muzzles.
Basically that people don'twanna use them, is the problem.
Not that muzzles themselves havea problem.
So if you have a dog that has abite history for whatever
reason, you need to consider it.
One thing I wanted to mentionis, sometimes with resource
guarding, it can even be anempty bowl.
(27:54):
People they're like, but there'sno food in there.
And sometimes it doesn't matter.
They just know that theyassociate that with the food and
it's their bowl so you have toremove the bowl when it's safe
to do so.
Let your dog outside to go pottyand then remove the bowl.
And put it away.
You have to kind of thinkoutside the box.
Mm-hmm.
And, you know, look for clues.
(28:17):
It's like being a detective,Right.
Like what's the pattern?
What exactly are they resourceguarding?
Everyone's different, you know,like with Heath, the trade game
works very much.
So much so that he tries tomanipulate the trade game.
Yeah, that's funny.
Because he's like, I, I couldreally use a biscuit right now.
That's a smart dog.
That's, he's a very smart dog.
(28:38):
He, yeah, he is.
Cuz I mean, he's got like someshepherd in him, so...
He's a herding breed.
Yeah.
And Huskies are extremely smart.
Well he's a malamute mix, not ahusky mix.
Mm.
Mm-hmm.
So I don't know like how smartthose dogs are, he likes to, to
try to, you know, get treats andhe'll bring me something that he
knows that he probably shouldn'thave.
(28:58):
And, so then I'll give him atreat.
Sometimes I just give him atreat regardless, because, you
know, he's a good boy most ofthe time.
Yeah.
You wanna reward the goodbehavior.
Mm-hmm.
And this is where leave it ordrop it(mm-hmm) is a really good
command to help your dog learn.
Right.
And often that is starting witha trading until the dog learns
to let go of what you're asking.
(29:19):
Mm-hmm.
Hoping and anticipating there'sa treat.
There doesn't always have to bea treat at the end.
Right.
It's kind of like having a bonusin your paycheck.
You don't always get a bonus.
No, no.
But you're going to, you know,work to your full capacity in
the hopes of getting a bonus.
Yes.
Yes.
And, and the key is to keep it asurprise.
(29:39):
Don't make a pattern of it(mm-hmm) because then they are
manipulating you and you're notgonna have treats all the time,
but you have your praise.
You can praise them.
That can be the reward, not atreat.
So, you know, remember to usewhat you have.
You have enough tools andability if you think about it,
(30:01):
to work with this problem.
Yeah.
And then the problem, like Isaid, I mean it's not cookie
cutter, so every dog hasdifferent motivators.
But there is, once you develop apattern, then you can develop a
strategy.
And the strategies, may havevariables in it.
(30:22):
So it's not cookie cutter, cuzevery dog's an individual, but
there's a basicness to it thatyou can...
Kind of a standard process.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But how exactly you achieve thatmay be different.
Right.
Typically the steps are thesame.
I had a little rat terrier namedMs.
Krabapple and that's the teacherin the Simpson, the Simpsons.
(30:46):
And the reason we called herthat is cuz she had this
gigantic overbite, just like theSimpsons do.
And so we called her Boppy forshort and she had terrible
resource guarding.
The first night we brought herhome, like we didn't know there
was a problem, and I thoughtsomething was going on with her
(31:06):
mouth.
And she was in Bryan's lap nextto me and I went to point at
what was, what's going on withher mouth.
And she snapped at me andthankfully missed me.
And I was like, oh, I think wehave some resource guarding.
This is in the early days.
I think Ms.
Krabapple was like, Maybe thethird dog that I had really
(31:29):
dealt with.
Wow.
And, she had terrible barrieraggression, so she'd be raging
against the cage scratching and,and, so the first morning the
Bryan went to work and I had tolet her out.
I opened the door like sixinches and I opened the crate.
(31:51):
So that she had to like a shootright out the door.
Mm-hmm.
Because I was afraid to touchher, but then I was like, oh my
God, now she's loose in theyard.
How am I gonna get her?
Mm-hmm.
And she came right up to me,like, but I was still afraid of
her.
And, you know, it got to thepoint where we taught her what
was appropriate, what wasn't.
She did have a problem with, youknow, if you did certain things
(32:15):
and you didn't control thesituation, she would bite
people.
That wasn't resource guarding.
That was just her initiationright.
But it got to the point where wecould put our hand in the bowl
while she's eating it, she issnarling and mm-hmm.
Trying to eat the food, but shewould not bite us.
(32:36):
Right.
But she couldn't help thatreaction.
And you know, we kept herbecause we could manage her.
It was, wait, totally, let's go.
Training is happening.
We kept her because we couldmanage it.
We didn't have kids, we didn'thave a lot of guests, like we
(32:58):
knew how to manage it.
So it wasn't a problem for us todo that.
But she otherwise really wasn'tadoptable and she ended up being
a great dog for a really longtime, like, I don't know, 10
years or something.
And, there's definitely no doglike her, but she was a basket
case in a lot of ways and weaccepted some of her problems,
(33:18):
but we worked with other ones.
Right.
And you know, sometimes whenpeople have training problems,
like they'll go to a trainer andthey'll say, you know, my dog,
it has all these problems.
And you know they came to youbecause...
it's okay.
It's okay.
What are they doing?
(33:39):
In our boarding kennels,sometimes we get certain
behaviors and we are doingboarding train.
However, for the clients who arejust boarding, we just manage
because they haven't asked fortraining.
Sometimes they don't think theyneed training either.
(34:00):
That's really probably thebigger one than they don't wanna
pay for it.
They don't think they need it.
Right.
But, so we do have a dog whocomes to us and he is a resource
guarder of his food.
And he's not a small dog whichcan be a dangerous thing.
I mean, it's not okay for smalldogs to resource guard, but when
(34:21):
you have bigger dogs who canknock you down, them resource
guarding is, dangerous.
Right.
So he is a resource guarder ofhis food.
And, and to the point, like hisfirst day with us, you know, you
put your food in there becausehe doesn't care if you walk in.
Hmm.
Like you can play with him.
He's great, but the minute foodcomes out, his eyes change, his
(34:45):
demeanor changes.
Mm.
And you're like, dude, that'skind of hardcore.
So, you know, everything's fine.
You put your his food down, youshut the door.
Then all of a sudden it's Mr.
Hyde.
That's what happened with mysecond foster.
And she had a wire kennel andthe kennel almost collapsed
because she was flipping out.
(35:07):
And that's the my firstintroduction to barrier
aggression.
And it was cuz I fed her and thefood went flying everywhere.
And like I was, she wasn'tresource guarding her food
though.
I was like, oh my gosh.
Like, and that's why I was like,I can't do this.
Yeah.
But yeah, but then they did.
Now look at you.
Yeah.
You know, so when everyone saysthat, yeah.
When everyone was like, oh myGod, I can't do this.
(35:29):
I was like, dude, how do youthink we started?
Right.
You know, like we startedclueless.
Yeah.
We were not born this way.
Yeah, no.
Like my Basenji bit me all thetime.
Because I was stupid, but youknow, I'm like, oh, it's okay.
I love you so much.
But yeah, so I was not arehabilitator or a trainer at
(35:51):
all with my first dog, so...
I never even had dogs until Iwas an adult.
I got married and I had a dog.
So I have even less experiencethan a lot of people.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
So anyone, I mean, anyone can doit, right?
You just kind of want to...
Be determined.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anyway, so this dog, likehardcore, I'm gonna kill you.
Don't touch my damn food.
(36:12):
And you just walk by and helunges and means snarling,
everything like that.
And he's not one of our dogs.
He's not one of our trainingdogs.
So, we haven't established anykind of bond.
Nothing.
And so, okay, so I blew in hisface.
Oh yeah.
(36:33):
And he was just like, he's like,ah, I'm gonna eat you.
And then I blew in his face andhe is like, what, what just
happened?
I'm gonna eat you.
And I blew in his face again.
He's like, I don't know that Ilike this.
And then he's like, no, I'mgonna eat you.
And so I blew again.
And he's like, you know what?
This, this isn't worth it.
I just, no.
He's like, this is stupid.
I don't, I don't like it.
(36:53):
And then he sat and he stoppedlunging.
So again, when I said it's notcookie cutter, you gotta figure
things out, you know?
So in this regard, blowing intospace, it's that air and they
have pet correctors that areair.
Mm-hmm.
And I didn't have it on me atthe time, so I just blew.
There's, there's both compressedair that makes a noise.
(37:14):
Mm-hmm.
And then there's air that'sactually directed.
So it's like a, like a, a gun ofair almost.
Not a gun.
No, I don't, I mean, it is thepressure of the air coming out.
It's not the noise.
Right.
That is making the effect.
It's the actual feeling.
Right.
And he did not appreciate meblowing it in his face.
And, so needless to say, Hetried it again, next meal and he
(37:41):
got blown at, so now anytime hecomes to the kennel, he'll think
about it and then he is like,yep, nope, nope.
She's gonna blow in my faceagain.
I ain't gonna do it.
Well, and that took what, just acouple times?
Exactly.
A couple times.
Yeah.
And something as dumb as blowingin a dog's face can fix this
problem.
And I'm not saying that youshould do that.
(38:03):
No.
No.
Because remember there was akennel.
Yeah.
There was a kennel between us.
Mm-hmm.
So it's not like, I mean, If wewere gonna train him, obviously
we would train him differently,but this was to manage him in
our boarding facility.
Mm-hmm.
So that the other staff memberswould not potentially get bit.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
That's a really funny one, butit just goes to show you how
(38:24):
bizarre it can really be.
Yeah.
But that at the core of it, it'ssimple why it's happening, it's
simple or simple that it'shappening.
Mm-hmm.
And how to fix it.
Right.
And you know, most people canfix this if they just give it
attention.
Mm-hmm.
And again, not like extra timeor extra money, like it just pay
(38:46):
attention and you know, maybewrite things down, write down
what they guarded or you know,just so you can kind of look
back and see a pattern.
Yeah.
And then that might help you ifyou're having trouble figuring
out what they're guarding, andobviously if they're guarding
just about everything, that'svery difficult and you're, you
(39:07):
are gonna need to use a muzzlefor that.
But it's still fixable,(right)it is fixable.
Like they need to know that youown those things.
Mm-hmm.
That they're using them andthey're lucky to have them.
Right?
Yeah.
So it helps them understandthat, okay, well, yeah.
Action and consequence, right?
Mm-hmm.
I mean, your child does not ownthe phone.
(39:29):
No.
You bought that phone.
You pay the monthly fee for thatphone usage.
So that is your phone.
And if you don't behave, Thatbecomes your phone again.
Mm-hmm.
So here you can borrow my phoneand use it.
Mm-hmm.
As long as you, you know, doyour homework, do your chores or
(39:50):
whatever.
And if you don't, then guesswhat?
It's my phone again.
Mm-hmm.
Same thing with dogs.
That's my food and I'm allowingyou to have it.
And that's my sofa, by the way,too.
Alright, so that's all we havetime for today and I am Jme.
(40:12):
I'm Pate.
And this is our podcast.
I cannot do it right! And, andthen...
Rock On.
Rescue on.
Wait, why did I squeak?
You didn't say shit.
I don't know.
Why do I have so much troublewith this?
Today we're gonna talk aboutresource guarding and that is
Huge.
Yes.
Does it, I guess it kind ofhappens with cats too, right?
With territory?
I don't, I don't know.
Yeah.
Again, we're talking more aboutdogs and cats.
So seriously, someone needs tolike send us ideas on.
What we should talk about withcats.
(00:23):
Yeah.
Because it's not that we don'twanna talk about them or that we
can't, we just don't think of itfirst.
Right.
And because we're not JacksonGalaxy.
No.
I mean, and that's all he thinksabout.
Yeah.
Well, and we have a cat team ofgreat volunteers who primarily
manage the cats.
So you and I are more on the dogside.
I know, but I, I mean, I just.
I was just bottle feeding thattiny ass little kitten that you
(00:45):
were looking at.
Yeah.
But, but then we're gonna, butthen I'm gonna move her over to,
uh, one of our cat fosters sothat she can integrate her and
doesn't get Tarzan syndrome.
Yeah.
Which you might have heard aboutin our Litter Mate syndrome
episode.
Yeah.
But yeah, so we do cats.
I just don't know that I haveproblems with Kat that.
(01:06):
Yeah.
If anyone has any suggestions,any questions about cats, let us
know and we can cover it in apodcast.
Yes, well, dogs definitelyresource guard.
That's probably one of the mostcommon things that we deal with.
And most people, they don't knowwhat it is.
And the worst part is thatthey're often reinforcing it and
(01:27):
making it worse.
Especially little dogs.
Yes.
So the one thing they don'treally want, they are making
happen more and more and moreand it usually results in a
bite.
Mm-hmm.
And or a fight.
And then they realize they havea problem.
Right.
That they didn't realize.
All along, right?
That they've been actuallyenabling this type of behavior
(01:48):
so that it culminated to thisfinal act of violence.
Of violence.
No, it's true.
So resource guarding isdescribing a behavior where a
dog attempts to assert ownershipover something.
There are a variety of thingsthat it can be, even people, but
(02:08):
often it's toys, their bed, atreat crate.
It can be water bowl, oftenfood.
And especially bones.
Bones and animal products likeanimal products, sure, bully
sticks.
Anything that is a chewablething that's gonna lay around
and not get consumed in onesitting is likely to cause
(02:32):
guarding.
Resource guarding.
Mm-hmm.
Not in every dog, but the funnything is, is that a lot of times
people go a very long timeknowing a dog and then they put
them in a different situation,like put two dogs together and
then they realize their dog justattacked the other dog over a
bone and that their dog hasresource guarding and they
didn't know that for five years.
So, it can happen, it can startat any time too.
(02:55):
Mm-hmm.
Oftentimes once a dog starts toget comfortable in a home, yeah.
And so those are the dogs thatwe say kind of let their hair
down.
They, they're on their bestbehavior for like a month, and
then they start to show you whothey are, and they let their
hair down and that's where theresource guarding really comes
out.
Right.
But there's also, there's space,you know, like there's barrier
(03:17):
aggression, so to speak.
So that is basically resourceguarding their crate, their
area, their territory.
Mm-hmm.
Fence reactivity is a resource.
Guarding of their territory,their backyard.
Mm-hmm.
Their front yard, whatever.
and then people think that'sfunny often, especially with
little dogs.
Yeah.
He's so protective.
(03:37):
It's so funny.
I know.
Or, you know, and then they canresource guard.
And it's kind of that, thatconcept of their space, with the
sofa, you let them on the sofaand then all of a sudden they're
like, this is my sofa.
Or their, bed.
Their own bed.
Mm-hmm.
Or your bed.
Yeah, exactly.
Get off my bed.
And people bed's your bed.
Yeah.
And people, especially like,you'll see videos and I don't
(03:59):
understand this.
Like, why, why, why, why do youthink this is funny?
But they will resource guardpeople.
And you see like these pregnantwomen or whatever, or a child
and another person goes to reachfor the child or the pregnant
woman, and the dog jumps atthem, snaps at them, snarls at
them, and they're laughing.
(04:20):
Mm-hmm.
You're promoting a bite.
Yeah.
They, they don't get it.
That, that's a really seriousproblem, and you need to address
that, especially before the babycomes.
Mm-hmm.
I kind of wonder how many peoplehave experienced that before we
get the email where they'relike, I have a new baby and this
is going on.
Mm-hmm.
And it's not aggression towardsthe baby.
It's, it could be towards thehusband.
(04:42):
Right.
Or, you know, towards anybody.
Right.
But the hormones, the pregnancyhormones make it worse.
For some of the dogs becausethey can sense and smell the
changes and it makes, it canmake them more protective.
And so that mm-hmm.
That's something you can'treally avoid.
Right.
And so it's definitely somethingyou have to manage.
Right.
And then some people actually,think it's great that the dog is
(05:06):
protecting their child, untilthe kid has friends and the
friends come over.
Mm-hmm.
And then you're not watchingthem, and then the dog's gonna
bite your kid's friends.
Exactly.
Because.
They've been protecting thechild and, and you let them
think that it's okay.
One of the best things aboutresource guarding is that it's
very predictable.
(05:27):
Exactly.
You can figure out what theresource guarding and you can
fix it.
Yes.
So predictable means fixable.
It's when a dog is reacting tosomething and it's.
Random.
Actually random.
A lot of times people haven'tput the pattern together, but
once they tell us, we can sh wecan see the pattern.
(05:47):
But, if a dog just hauls off andbites somebody when you, you
know, they've been fine aroundkids, they've been fine for, you
know, six months.
That's unpredictable.
Mm-hmm.
Why did they choose to reactthen?
And unpredictable is nottrainable.
It's only manageable.
Mm-hmm.
And the reason predictable istrainable is because, You set up
(06:09):
the situation so you can controlthe outcome, and that is setting
it up so that you can give theman alternative behavior to do
so.
Now I don't want you to growlWhen this person comes over, you
give them a treat.
Mm-hmm.
And, you know, distract them orthe, if it's safe enough, the
(06:31):
stranger can give them thetreat.
Mm-hmm.
But don't push that if they've,you know, they're lunging or
biting or anything like that.
Right.
But I mean, there's a series ofactions that you can perform
training to alleviate certaintypes.
Of, resource guarding, you know,like, if they're, say that
(06:53):
they're being very aggressiveat, with the fence with the
door, you have to be consistent.
Like right now we've got a veryhighly excitable teenage pit
bull mix, and he's been jumpingat the door.
Yeah, he jumps right up to your,like face, like he jumps really
high through the door.
Yeah, because I, you know, Jhe's very excitable and it's not
(07:15):
necessarily that he's, it's notaggression, it's just excitement
and overstimulation.
Overstimulation for sure.
Mm-hmm.
But there's a, a, a, a patternof training to desensitize him.
And that would be the same typeof training with barrier,
aggression with the fencemm-hmm.
And things like that where youhave to consistently.
(07:39):
Call them off, have them sit,have them know that is not
appropriate when someone walksby.
They're gonna be conditioned ifyou do it consistently.
Mm-hmm.
To sit.
At a certain spot if that's whatyou have.
Well, and people usually waittill the reaction happens.
Mm-hmm.
And then try and correct it.
Right.
But the key is that you have tocatch them the second before you
(08:02):
know they're going to react.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
So you, you know, when thedoorbell rings, they go nuts and
they go to the door and theystart grabbing at the mm-hmm.
Rug or, you know.
That's right.
Whatever.
They've been grabbing people'spant legs, like, you know what's
gonna happen.
Mm-hmm.
So, You have to not let thathappen.
Right.
And sometimes you can't bealways consistent with the UPS
(08:22):
guy, for example, but if youhave friends over mm-hmm.
You can set your dog up prior toyour friends coming over.
Yeah.
The same would be like for thedoorbell or(mm-hmm) whatever.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
And you know, some people arelike, well, my dog, you know,
looks outside and just barks ateverything.
Then you have to keep them fromlooking out the window.
Like you have to put them in adifferent room because that's
(08:44):
not good for them either.
So although that's, I mean it'skind of resource guarding, but
it's Right.
You know, whatever generalizedreactivity, you have the ability
to control your dog'senvironment.
Mm-hmm.
Within your home, right?
And if you do it, do thesethings within your home and then
you practice on their, whatevertheir weaknesses are when you're
(09:06):
out in the world, then you, youknow, because you've controlled
the ones you know that you can,and then the chances of you
being able to control anunpredicted stimuli is that much
higher.
Right?
Because you have to conditionthem basically(mm-hmm) to the
training, before you expo.
(09:28):
I think that's the wagon.
Outside.
Oh, I know.
Like, no, I see.
Yeah.
I think it's someone's pullingthe, the wagon with, with stuff
in it.
Okay.
I totally got distracted.
I don't even know what I'msaying anymore.
Or it's digging.
Are they scratching at the door?
No, no, no.
That's not a dog.
Okay.
It's a wagon.
Okay.
And then, yeah.
(09:48):
Okay.
All right.
What was I saying?
I don't even know what I wassaying.
Oh, conditioning.
Yeah, it's conditioning.
So you're basically, you'recounter conditioning, right?
So for example, your dog likesto guard the backyard, he
patrols, and the minute he seessomeone, he starts barking at
them outside of the fence.
So this is an example of theterritory, right?
(10:11):
The resource guarding of histerritory, per se.
And what you want to do then isnot have him have access to the
backyard without you.
Right.
So you are taking him out, youare working with him, he's on a
leash.
And when someone comes by, ifyou know that there's like a
(10:32):
pattern, I don't know, kidscoming by after school or, or
what have you, if there's apattern of people coming by,
Then you start with your sit,well, and, and your
desensitization that you're theone in control, that you are
making him do certain commands,like sit down, whatever.
(10:55):
It's a training session whilepeople are walking by so he does
not have access to that fence tobark at them.
Yeah.
Well, and you know, it reallycan be as simple as if the kids
come by around three at 2 45,put him inside and then, you
know, this is the lazy way tofix it.
But you have the power.
(11:15):
And that's the thing iseveryone, when they contact us,
they say, I am just not skilledenough to do this.
This is not about skill.
This is about following steps.
Mm-hmm.
Following directions and doingthat hundreds of times so that
your dog's behavior has a newpattern.
And so whenever people say that,I'm like, we're not magic.
(11:40):
This is what we would do.
This is exactly what we woulddo, and you can do it too.
There are times when, you know,they, it is a, a situation where
it's not something that can goon for very long.
Mm-hmm.
Where it's a safety issue.
Mm-hmm.
Obviously, you know, then wehave the muzzle.
Right, right.
But you know, there's othertools that can be used.
(12:01):
Yeah.
But there are situations wherethey're kind of a rock and a
hard place.
Mm-hmm.
And rehoming the dog mightreally be the only option.
Right.
But that's usually with otherproblems too.
Right?
But then rehoming is not anoption right now.
Right?
So, so it, it comes to, you fixit or you euthanize.
Right.
And you would need to euthanize,not us.
(12:23):
Mm-hmm.
So predictable is fixable andthe key is to finding the
pattern.
Mm-hmm.
And you may not recognize it,but chances are if you go to a
behaviorist who hasrehabilitated dogs, they will
recognize it(Mm-hmm) and theycan help you work through those
steps.
And this is not about spendinghours and hours and hours of
(12:45):
extra time training.
Mm-hmm.
This is not about hundreds andthousands of dollars training.
No.
This is about learning what fewsteps you need to take, doing
that consistently.
And so, you know, let's saytechnically you could do like
three classes with a trainer.
You will get the skills, theunderstanding of what you need
(13:09):
to continue to proceed(right).
You won't need the trainer tocontinue to guide you if you
very listen very carefully andyou control the environment.
Right.
So for example, we have a, alittle dog.
Who likes to resource guard, thesofa.
Mm-hmm.
Especially when he's sitting onsomeone's lap on the sofa and he
(13:30):
will actually launch himself offto, bark.
And I don't, I don't wanna saygo after, but, just be reactive.
Yeah.
And to get them away from hislap and sofa.
Mm-hmm.
So how did we fix that?
He has no access to the sofa.
Mm-hmm.
(13:51):
Well, and that is not his damnsofa.
Now that's a pulling in.
Okay.
So, one thing I wanna mention(thanks) is the leash is the
first step.
Mm-hmm.
Always.
There is never going to be atime when the leash isn't the
first step to dealing withresource guarding.
(14:13):
So get your leash, put it on,use it, and then you know, learn
about the steps of resourceguarding.
Often resource guarding canhappen with little dogs.
Especially.
Yeah, it seems like littledogs...
And it's not because of theirsize, and it's not because of
their breed.
It's because people think it'sfunny to let them do that.
(14:35):
So for example, you...
Or they don't want to correct alittle dog...
Right.
Because they're"so little".
Yeah, so you have a little dog,let's say it's a little
chihuahua in someone's arms.
Someone reaches over to petthem, and the dog growls, snaps
or bites, and everyone laughsbecause it seems so ridiculous
that this little dog is tryingto be a big dog and be tough.
(15:01):
That is resource guarding.
And if you laugh, you'reenabling it.
And if the person doesn't putthe dog down, they are
reinforcing the resourceguarding.
Yeah.
So specify where they're puttingthe dog down because I don't
wanna sound right.
Oh, I'm so sorry.
Like, like, take the dog out oftheir arms and put it on the
(15:23):
ground.
Mm-hmm.
So this is where the leash isvery helpful.
So your dog is claiming thecouch, whether it's in your lap
or just the couch with the leashon, you just, you know, give the
leash a little tug and pull himoff the couch.
Not harshly.
Mm-hmm.
Or hard just throw'em offbalance so that they have to
jump off.
(15:44):
And then that to them was like,I do this behavior, I get this
consequence, and they're like,oh.
But reaching for them to getthem off the couch, that act of
lunging at them, especially ifyou're mad or you're trying to
do something in a hurry thatscares them.
(16:05):
So that makes, It's gonna end upbeing a bite.
A bite.
Because no one likes handsgrabbing for them.
No.
So do not grab collars.
Do not grab dogs.
Use the leash.
This means your dog probably hasto have a leash on all the time
in the house.
There is nothing wrong withthat...
While you're working on thisbehavior.
(16:26):
Yes, there is nothing wrong withthat.
You need to fix this or you aregonna get bitten, someone else
is gonna get bitten and thenyou'll have to get rid of the
dog, so it's not worth it.
Having a leash on is so simple.
Right.
And And it's not forever.
No.
And then use it so that everytime that behavior happens, the
(16:47):
same consequence happens.
They get tugged off the couchgently and they're on the
ground.
Right.
And this is a form ofconditioning.
A lot of training and countertraining is conditioning the dog
to expect a certain reaction totheir action.
And that doesn't cost any money.
(17:08):
No.
Or take extra time.
No.
You're already there.
It's already happening.
So it's action consequence.
Action consequence.
And think about that pattern andhow the things you do create a
pattern that may cause your dogto fail in that situation.
(17:29):
So if your dog growls whenyou're putting the food down,
leash them up, make them sit,and then like release them to
the food where you're notputting the hand down.
Right.
Well, I mean, it's a little bitmore involved than that because
then they have to learn thatthat is not their food.
(17:49):
It's your food.
Right.
Again, everything is aboutmanaging and controlling their
environment so that they learnthat certain behaviors are not
appropriate and are not to beallowed.
So a dog who resource guards hisfood and his bowl does not get a
bowl.
He only gets food from you...
(18:09):
From your hand.
From your hand.
And then he's gonna learn toappreciate the fact that the
food comes from you.
Mm-hmm.
And then he's gonna be lesslikely to resource guard.
Well, and that's, And there'smore to it than that, but that
is just your general concept.
Yes.
You have to remove the thingthat they want to achieve the
(18:29):
consequence.
It's kind of like your kids, youknow, they do something bad, you
take away their phone privilegesand you obviously can't take
away food, but you can deliverit a different way.
Mm-hmm.
You can do a routine a differentway.
Yep.
And the thing is that people arealways like, my dog's doing
this....
and you have control over yourpets.
(18:52):
except maybe a cat.
You have control over your dogs,and if you put a leash on them,
you really can manage andcontrol the situation.
You are an adult.
You have control.
Your animal does not havecontrol.
Right.
So remember you have the powerand use that to your advantage.
(19:12):
One of our big resource guardersthat was pretty much a challenge
because he had some like historyof abuse and that would be Heath
Ledger, my dog.
And when we got him, he resourceguarded everything.
So with him, it was a, a counterconditioning of trade and trust,
(19:34):
right?
In his circumstance, it wasabout gaining that trust.
And then once we had taken careof his resource guarding, he
learned to trade.
At first, you never ever tookobjects out of his mouth because
you're just asking to be bit,and we're talking about a 90
pound dog here.
And so you trade it and youalways had a higher value than
(19:55):
what he had in his mouth.
His resource guarding with us,and our six year old daughter
could take anything out of hismouth, that was fixed.
And so we put him up foradoption.
The short story was that hedidn't wanna be adopted out, so
now he's stuck with us, youknow?
No, now I'm stuck with him.
Mm-hmm.
Because he didn't wanna leaveme.
(20:17):
Mm-hmm.
But, we did adopt him outbecause like I said, we had a
six year old child in the housewho could take anything out of
his mouth.
And we were very particularabout the environment that he
would go in and, one of thepeople in the home had a search
and rescue female shepherd.
(20:39):
And so we felt, hey, theyprobably have a handle on
training.
And so we did allow him to beadopted out and we did tell
them, you trade, you never takeanything out of his mouth.
And then we gave him the basicsof how to integrate him into the
house successfully, becausethere's always gonna be a step
(21:00):
back, when they go into a newenvironment and they don't trust
the person yet, et cetera.
Right.
And, we ended up getting himback because he decided that he
had to resource guardeverything.
So he's on a walk or a run.
I mean, this guy was like superathletic that we adopted him out
to.
(21:20):
And he was out there and he'd beon a walk and he decided a leaf,
a leaf of all things he wasgonna resource guard and you
could not take that damn leafaway from him.
In the house he would takecoasters.
He wasn't a beer drinker, but hewould take that coaster and that
was his.
And then tampons, you know,like, I went into the bathroom
(21:44):
and hey, I've just, you know,I've got this, tampon and you
may need it, but you're notgetting it.
And...
Hopefully not used.
No, no, yeah.
Fresh from the box.
Right.
That's, that makes it evenfunnier really, because used.
Would be more...
Just so gross.
Common.
Yeah.
And more likely.
But to guard it before...
(22:05):
In a wrapper.
Is funny.
So...
It's not funny, but...
Yeah.
It's a hilarious thing to guard.
Yes.
And that's the thing is likedogs can guard objects that have
no rhyme or reason.
But it's a possession is nowtheirs and you cannot have it.
And so he ended up bitingsomeone because they decided to
(22:27):
try to take it out of his mouthinstead of giving him a higher
value trade.
All they needed to do was givehim a hot dog and he would've
been like, have your damntampon.
Do you think that he wouldresource guard now, if you tried
to take something out of hismouth?
Oh, I take everything out of hismouth now.
Oh, that's good.
But he's so bad because, it'sthe trade game for him, right.
(22:49):
And so sometimes he'll come upto me with something in his
mouth and I know.
And I know that he has somethingin his mouth cuz he'll kind of
like tuck his head kind of like,a horse.
Which is horrible by the way,cuz horses shouldn't like tuck
their head that way.
But you know that curved?
Mm-hmm.
And so he'll like come up withhis like chin tucked to his
chest and I was like, what doyou have?
(23:11):
And then he like, kind of showsme and I'm like, seriously?
And I'll either be like,seriously, and then I'll give
him a biscuit and he'll be like,thank you.
Or I'll just be like, yeah, youcan have that.
Thanks for asking.
And then he will go away andhe'll like do his thing.
Yeah.
And so it's not like it took alot of money and you have to be
(23:33):
patient that that's how it costsyou time.
Right.
But it's about how you dothings.
Yeah.
The order in which you do thingsto create the optimal outcome.
Right.
And not giving the chance tohave the same thing that you
know is gonna happen, happenagain.
Right.
And people are often in denialand that it might not happen
(23:54):
this time.
No.
It's going to And don't letthem, because if you start to
make progress too, it's notgonna be the end of the world if
a situation that you're notpredicting happens and the dog
does that reaction, but it doestake you a step back.
Mm-hmm.
So you don't want the dog toreact and you need to prevent
(24:16):
the reaction from happening inorder to fix it.
And every time they react ithurts them.
It hurts them emotionally.
And it's like a kid that'sacting out like...
Right.
No kids want to have tantrums.
Kids don't want to be...
In timeout all the time.
Right.
They don't want that.
But if, but they want attention,which is why they're acting out.
(24:38):
Right.
A lot of times.
And so...
But we're not childpsychologists fyi.
No, we are not.
We're not vets, we're notpsychologists.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
But.
It is just about the pattern.
Mm-hmm.
And you have to control thepattern, right?
So there are times whenobviously it might be even
dangerous for you to have, youknow, control the situation.
(25:03):
And so let's just use food as anexample.
I mean, you should not beputting food down with a dog
that resource guards without,let's say a muzzle on a basket
muzzle.
But you should be able to workto the point where you could
without a muzzle, but we wouldadvise using it because people
(25:24):
are going to trip up.
And they're going to hurry andthen they're gonna get bitten.
So we do recommend anytimeyou're working with a dog with
resource guarding, that you geta basket muzzle.
Mm-hmm.
And the basket muzzle will allowthem to eat, breathe, pant, even
play with some toys, and drinkwater without hindering them.
(25:49):
And so it's very important totake the danger out of the
situation(yeah) because ifyou're so worried about the
danger, then you aren't in thebest mindset to be helping them.
You are anxious and youranxiety, they will feed off it.
Right.
So you have to reduce youranxiety so you can be calm.
(26:11):
So you can know I'm gonna dothis and nothing bad is gonna
happen.
And the muzzle will give youthat security.
You have to train them to themuzzle, acclimate them to it,
and there are ways to do that.
The Muzzle Up Project online isa great place to do that.
It shows you step by step how toacclimate your dog to a muzzle,
(26:31):
and especially if it comes downto the muzzle or rehoming, our
euthanization.
Just do the muzzle.
Mm-hmm.
Like it's not that big a deal.
Yeah.
And Method K9 has a good video.
Yes.
On their YouTube.
It's not on their website.
It's on their YouTube.
But no one likes the muzzle.
(26:52):
Like, it doesn't look good.
You look like Hannibal Lecter,but who cares what you look like
if it's gonna save your dog'slife?
So it's like a seatbelt.
Some people don't like to berestrained by seat belts.
Kids complain about them.
They cut at your neck.
Mm-hmm.
Well, you still gotta wear it.
Right.
It is going to save your life.
(27:13):
Right.
And this muzzle may be yourdog's seatbelt.
And why wouldn't you wanna put aseatbelt on your dog and save
their life?
So I'm getting very seriousagain, I get very serious when I
talk about that.
We have a blog, on motleyzoo.org where I discuss the
(27:34):
problem with Muzzles.
Basically that people don'twanna use them, is the problem.
Not that muzzles themselves havea problem.
So if you have a dog that has abite history for whatever
reason, you need to consider it.
One thing I wanted to mentionis, sometimes with resource
guarding, it can even be anempty bowl.
(27:54):
People they're like, but there'sno food in there.
And sometimes it doesn't matter.
They just know that theyassociate that with the food and
it's their bowl so you have toremove the bowl when it's safe
to do so.
Let your dog outside to go pottyand then remove the bowl.
And put it away.
You have to kind of thinkoutside the box.
Mm-hmm.
And, you know, look for clues.
(28:17):
It's like being a detective,Right.
Like what's the pattern?
What exactly are they resourceguarding?
Everyone's different, you know,like with Heath, the trade game
works very much.
So much so that he tries tomanipulate the trade game.
Yeah, that's funny.
Because he's like, I, I couldreally use a biscuit right now.
That's a smart dog.
That's, he's a very smart dog.
(28:38):
He, yeah, he is.
Cuz I mean, he's got like someshepherd in him, so...
He's a herding breed.
Yeah.
And Huskies are extremely smart.
Well he's a malamute mix, not ahusky mix.
Mm.
Mm-hmm.
So I don't know like how smartthose dogs are, he likes to, to
try to, you know, get treats andhe'll bring me something that he
knows that he probably shouldn'thave.
(28:58):
And, so then I'll give him atreat.
Sometimes I just give him atreat regardless, because, you
know, he's a good boy most ofthe time.
Yeah.
You wanna reward the goodbehavior.
Mm-hmm.
And this is where leave it ordrop it(mm-hmm) is a really good
command to help your dog learn.
Right.
And often that is starting witha trading until the dog learns
to let go of what you're asking.
(29:19):
Mm-hmm.
Hoping and anticipating there'sa treat.
There doesn't always have to bea treat at the end.
Right.
It's kind of like having a bonusin your paycheck.
You don't always get a bonus.
No, no.
But you're going to, you know,work to your full capacity in
the hopes of getting a bonus.
Yes.
Yes.
And, and the key is to keep it asurprise.
(29:39):
Don't make a pattern of it(mm-hmm) because then they are
manipulating you and you're notgonna have treats all the time,
but you have your praise.
You can praise them.
That can be the reward, not atreat.
So, you know, remember to usewhat you have.
You have enough tools andability if you think about it,
(30:01):
to work with this problem.
Yeah.
And then the problem, like Isaid, I mean it's not cookie
cutter, so every dog hasdifferent motivators.
But there is, once you develop apattern, then you can develop a
strategy.
And the strategies, may havevariables in it.
(30:22):
So it's not cookie cutter, cuzevery dog's an individual, but
there's a basicness to it thatyou can...
Kind of a standard process.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But how exactly you achieve thatmay be different.
Right.
Typically the steps are thesame.
I had a little rat terrier namedMs.
Krabapple and that's the teacherin the Simpson, the Simpsons.
(30:46):
And the reason we called herthat is cuz she had this
gigantic overbite, just like theSimpsons do.
And so we called her Boppy forshort and she had terrible
resource guarding.
The first night we brought herhome, like we didn't know there
was a problem, and I thoughtsomething was going on with her
(31:06):
mouth.
And she was in Bryan's lap nextto me and I went to point at
what was, what's going on withher mouth.
And she snapped at me andthankfully missed me.
And I was like, oh, I think wehave some resource guarding.
This is in the early days.
I think Ms.
Krabapple was like, Maybe thethird dog that I had really
(31:29):
dealt with.
Wow.
And, she had terrible barrieraggression, so she'd be raging
against the cage scratching and,and, so the first morning the
Bryan went to work and I had tolet her out.
I opened the door like sixinches and I opened the crate.
(31:51):
So that she had to like a shootright out the door.
Mm-hmm.
Because I was afraid to touchher, but then I was like, oh my
God, now she's loose in theyard.
How am I gonna get her?
Mm-hmm.
And she came right up to me,like, but I was still afraid of
her.
And, you know, it got to thepoint where we taught her what
was appropriate, what wasn't.
She did have a problem with, youknow, if you did certain things
(32:15):
and you didn't control thesituation, she would bite
people.
That wasn't resource guarding.
That was just her initiationright.
But it got to the point where wecould put our hand in the bowl
while she's eating it, she issnarling and mm-hmm.
Trying to eat the food, but shewould not bite us.
(32:36):
Right.
But she couldn't help thatreaction.
And you know, we kept herbecause we could manage her.
It was, wait, totally, let's go.
Training is happening.
We kept her because we couldmanage it.
We didn't have kids, we didn'thave a lot of guests, like we
(32:58):
knew how to manage it.
So it wasn't a problem for us todo that.
But she otherwise really wasn'tadoptable and she ended up being
a great dog for a really longtime, like, I don't know, 10
years or something.
And, there's definitely no doglike her, but she was a basket
case in a lot of ways and weaccepted some of her problems,
(33:18):
but we worked with other ones.
Right.
And you know, sometimes whenpeople have training problems,
like they'll go to a trainer andthey'll say, you know, my dog,
it has all these problems.
And you know they came to youbecause...
it's okay.
It's okay.
What are they doing?
(33:39):
In our boarding kennels,sometimes we get certain
behaviors and we are doingboarding train.
However, for the clients who arejust boarding, we just manage
because they haven't asked fortraining.
Sometimes they don't think theyneed training either.
(34:00):
That's really probably thebigger one than they don't wanna
pay for it.
They don't think they need it.
Right.
But, so we do have a dog whocomes to us and he is a resource
guarder of his food.
And he's not a small dog whichcan be a dangerous thing.
I mean, it's not okay for smalldogs to resource guard, but when
(34:21):
you have bigger dogs who canknock you down, them resource
guarding is, dangerous.
Right.
So he is a resource guarder ofhis food.
And, and to the point, like hisfirst day with us, you know, you
put your food in there becausehe doesn't care if you walk in.
Hmm.
Like you can play with him.
He's great, but the minute foodcomes out, his eyes change, his
(34:45):
demeanor changes.
Mm.
And you're like, dude, that'skind of hardcore.
So, you know, everything's fine.
You put your his food down, youshut the door.
Then all of a sudden it's Mr.
Hyde.
That's what happened with mysecond foster.
And she had a wire kennel andthe kennel almost collapsed
because she was flipping out.
(35:07):
And that's the my firstintroduction to barrier
aggression.
And it was cuz I fed her and thefood went flying everywhere.
And like I was, she wasn'tresource guarding her food
though.
I was like, oh my gosh.
Like, and that's why I was like,I can't do this.
Yeah.
But yeah, but then they did.
Now look at you.
Yeah.
You know, so when everyone saysthat, yeah.
When everyone was like, oh myGod, I can't do this.
(35:29):
I was like, dude, how do youthink we started?
Right.
You know, like we startedclueless.
Yeah.
We were not born this way.
Yeah, no.
Like my Basenji bit me all thetime.
Because I was stupid, but youknow, I'm like, oh, it's okay.
I love you so much.
But yeah, so I was not arehabilitator or a trainer at
(35:51):
all with my first dog, so...
I never even had dogs until Iwas an adult.
I got married and I had a dog.
So I have even less experiencethan a lot of people.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
So anyone, I mean, anyone can doit, right?
You just kind of want to...
Be determined.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anyway, so this dog, likehardcore, I'm gonna kill you.
Don't touch my damn food.
(36:12):
And you just walk by and helunges and means snarling,
everything like that.
And he's not one of our dogs.
He's not one of our trainingdogs.
So, we haven't established anykind of bond.
Nothing.
And so, okay, so I blew in hisface.
Oh yeah.
(36:33):
And he was just like, he's like,ah, I'm gonna eat you.
And then I blew in his face andhe is like, what, what just
happened?
I'm gonna eat you.
And I blew in his face again.
He's like, I don't know that Ilike this.
And then he's like, no, I'mgonna eat you.
And so I blew again.
And he's like, you know what?
This, this isn't worth it.
I just, no.
He's like, this is stupid.
I don't, I don't like it.
(36:53):
And then he sat and he stoppedlunging.
So again, when I said it's notcookie cutter, you gotta figure
things out, you know?
So in this regard, blowing intospace, it's that air and they
have pet correctors that areair.
Mm-hmm.
And I didn't have it on me atthe time, so I just blew.
There's, there's both compressedair that makes a noise.
(37:14):
Mm-hmm.
And then there's air that'sactually directed.
So it's like a, like a, a gun ofair almost.
Not a gun.
No, I don't, I mean, it is thepressure of the air coming out.
It's not the noise.
Right.
That is making the effect.
It's the actual feeling.
Right.
And he did not appreciate meblowing it in his face.
And, so needless to say, Hetried it again, next meal and he
(37:41):
got blown at, so now anytime hecomes to the kennel, he'll think
about it and then he is like,yep, nope, nope.
She's gonna blow in my faceagain.
I ain't gonna do it.
Well, and that took what, just acouple times?
Exactly.
A couple times.
Yeah.
And something as dumb as blowingin a dog's face can fix this
problem.
And I'm not saying that youshould do that.
(38:03):
No.
No.
Because remember there was akennel.
Yeah.
There was a kennel between us.
Mm-hmm.
So it's not like, I mean, If wewere gonna train him, obviously
we would train him differently,but this was to manage him in
our boarding facility.
Mm-hmm.
So that the other staff memberswould not potentially get bit.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
That's a really funny one, butit just goes to show you how
(38:24):
bizarre it can really be.
Yeah.
But that at the core of it, it'ssimple why it's happening, it's
simple or simple that it'shappening.
Mm-hmm.
And how to fix it.
Right.
And you know, most people canfix this if they just give it
attention.
Mm-hmm.
And again, not like extra timeor extra money, like it just pay
(38:46):
attention and you know, maybewrite things down, write down
what they guarded or you know,just so you can kind of look
back and see a pattern.
Yeah.
And then that might help you ifyou're having trouble figuring
out what they're guarding, andobviously if they're guarding
just about everything, that'svery difficult and you're, you
(39:07):
are gonna need to use a muzzlefor that.
But it's still fixable,(right)it is fixable.
Like they need to know that youown those things.
Mm-hmm.
That they're using them andthey're lucky to have them.
Right?
Yeah.
So it helps them understandthat, okay, well, yeah.
Action and consequence, right?
Mm-hmm.
I mean, your child does not ownthe phone.
(39:29):
No.
You bought that phone.
You pay the monthly fee for thatphone usage.
So that is your phone.
And if you don't behave, Thatbecomes your phone again.
Mm-hmm.
So here you can borrow my phoneand use it.
Mm-hmm.
As long as you, you know, doyour homework, do your chores or
(39:50):
whatever.
And if you don't, then guesswhat?
It's my phone again.
Mm-hmm.
Same thing with dogs.
That's my food and I'm allowingyou to have it.
And that's my sofa, by the way,too.
Alright, so that's all we havetime for today and I am Jme.
(40:12):
I'm Pate.
And this is our podcast.
I cannot do it right! And, andthen...
Rock On.
Rescue on.
Wait, why did I squeak?
You didn't say shit.
I don't know.
Why do I have so much troublewith this?
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