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Understanding normal dog behavior can help to prevent many of the behavior problems that our pet dogs have. It’s interesting that many of the behaviors that are normal for dogs are the things that give us the most problems like chewing, jumping, guarding, counter surfing, chasing, aggression and social behavior.
So if we can understand pet dog’s normal behavior we can provide the right training, enrichment and environment for our dogs so that they fit into our world.
Social Animals
Dogs are naturally very social animals. This is one of reasons that we have them as pets. Dogs can form strong social bonds with humans this is what we love about them. They enjoy spending time with us and need to be close to us. Dogs do not do well being left alone.
This is why it is so important that if your dog is left alone all day while you’re at work that you provide something for your dog to do and try to exercise them before you leave in the morning.
It is also important when you leave in the morning or arrive home after work to keep these encounters very low key. Don’t make a big fuss about leaving this only makes the separation more difficult for your dog.
Your dog knows all the cues of you getting ready in the morning and can become stressed watching you get ready. The stress of anticipating you leaving added to the stress of being alone all day can lead to a dog with separation anxiety.
So just leave and return with no drama at all. This can also help with the dog that is very excited upon your arrival. When you return try to ignore your dog and do not greet them unless they are calm.
Jumping
One of the reasons your dog jumps up to greet you is that this is normal for them to want to get close to your face. So to prevent this make sure arrivals are low key and that you wait for a calm dog before you say hi. Only reinforce behaviors that you want.
Scavengers
Has your dog ever grabbed your sandwich while your back was turned? This is actually a very normal behavior for your dog. They are opportunistic scavengers.
This means if a dog sees food they think I need to eat it and eat it quickly before someone else gets it. Food was hard to come by for early dogs so when they did
find food of course they devoured it.
Chewing
Chewing is natural for dogs it is very enjoyable and it keeps their jaws strong. Their ancestors needed strong jaws for hunting. Our house dogs don’t need strong jaws for hunting but they still love to chew. This is why it is important to give them plenty of things to chew on or they may chew something of value that they shouldn’t.
Predators
Have you ever seen a dog chase a cat or a squirrel? Well they love to chase small animals and moving objects. This is because our dogs are predators. That is why when you’re on a walk and your dog spots a squirrel it is impossible to move their attention away from it. It seems like your dog has forgotten all of its training. This is because you’re competing with the genetic trait of predatory behavior.
The predatory behavior of dogs is based on deeply embedded skills of acquiring food. A predatory sequence includes searching, with nose, stalking, rushing toward prey, chasing, bite, hold, shake, kill, dissect and eat the prey.
I’m sure you have seen a dog shake a stuffed animal and then rip it apart and pull out all of the stuffing. This is another part of their predatory sequence and is normal dog behavior.
Resource Guarding
Another common genetic behavior is resource guarding. This is based on dogs having to work for their food by hunting and killing their prey. After all that hard work for their food a dog is not going to easily give it up. They guard it with their life to be sure they get to eat.
It’s interesting how this trait of resource guarding can still show up in our domestic dogs even when their food is so plentiful. This is why we teach puppies to release and give us a toy and practice food bowl exercises.
Aggression
Also dogs have a good skill of showing aggression without fighting. They bark, growl, snarl and snap looking very scary. This is to scare other dogs away from their food. This behavior also works to get us to back away from a bone or toy your dog may be guarding.
All of these behaviors are normal in the dog world. However since they are living with us dogs need to adjust to our world. As owners through education, enrichment and training we need to provide the right outlets for our dog’s behavior. Then we will have happy, socialized well mannered dog that meet the standards of our lifestyle. |
