Are you smiling at me?

Some Dobermans smile.

This is an unsettling thing to the unprepared owner. If you're not versed in the package of canine body language, such smiles might look like snarls. It is a lifting of the lip and a baring of the teeth. But there is no piloerection, no stiffness of posture; when I've seen it in pictures and video, it's been accompanied by body wiggles and airplane ears.

Of course, there are generally accepted "dog smiles" as well:

Doggie-Vous Francais?

One day last week, I saw on some news site or other, that there was a proposal to make sure all dogs in Montreal understood cues in both English and French. The notion would be that since in that part of Canada, lots of folks speak French, there shouldn't be linguistic barriers if you were interacting with stranger-dogs and stranger-people. Yearly testing to make sure owners were complying, etc. The thought of legislated language requirements in dog training makes me suffer ennui.

Of course, it was evidently a spoof. But that doesn't stop it from being an interesting thought. Does your dog understand more than one spoken human language? How is your dog doing with just English?

The Silent Treatment

On Tuesday, I read a blog post called A Simple Trick for Calming an Excited Dog, on the True to Dogs blog. While Elka isn't Super! Excited! All! The! Time! I thought that it would be interesting to try, for my own sake. There are times I talk too much, I know it's true.

For the experiment, we went to a park that we had not visited before. It was totally empty when we pulled up, which was pretty rad. I put the long leash on her, and attached it to the leather leash around my waist. If I was going to go words free, why not hands free too, right?

Signs and Symbols

I've been thinking a lot about how we communicate with Elka, and how she communicates with us. Some of it is from working on the dog training book, some of it is just from those thoughts that surface when you interact with a dog as much as I do.

Dogs work off of body language, and scents, and sounds. Humans work off of body language, sounds, and words, both spoken and written. In fact, we humans take it a step further (if not more) and have symbols that aren't words, but still expected to mean things. Obviously, these things don't mean much, if anything, to dogs. But sometimes they catch their attention.

Last June, I wrote a post called The Things You Notice, where I talked about a red riding hood statue that was in a yard Elka and I frequently passed (now no longer there, sadly). Due to construction, we have a slightly different walk route lately, and today Elka noticed a Buddha statue in somebody's yard.

Book Review: On Talking Terms with Dogs: Calming Signals, by Turid Rugaas

This is a very small book, with a lot of information in it.

There are certain behaviors dogs will use when they want the one they're communicating with (dog or otherwise) to understand that they're stressed, and to calm down, back off, and take it slowly. Turid Rugaas describes these, and illustrates them with fantastic photographs, in this book.

Protection Dog

What barks when appropriate, has four legs, and cost $230,000?

Not my Elka.  Well, the first two are right, but she didn't cost more than our house.

Recently, the New York Times had an article, "For the executive with everything,a $230,000 dog to protect it".  Now, I don't intend to use the New York Times as the leaping-off point for many of my posts, but holy smokes.  I couldn't just let that one go.

It goes without saying that our dogs are valuable to us.  They provide us companionship, and indeed protection.  Some are trained and titled in protection, and that's a whole 'nother ball game.  Some seem willing to protect us, through instinct and (dare I speculate?) love.

Dog yoga

Until I saw the article in the New York Times (Bonding with their downward facing humans), I never thought about dogs + yoga.

My Yoga practice has always been exceedingly private.  Home alone, with a DVD, curtains drawn private.  Of course, with Elka, you're never, in fact, alone, and this extends to yoga.  There are even two books about dog yoga (sometimes called "Doga"), one I have read, and one I have not. The Barking Buddha, by Brenda Bryan, with Bev Sparks doing the photography, is the one I have read.

Fear itself

Can you tell when your dog is afraid?

I touched on this in another post, regarding dogs barking at Elka. However, it came up yesterday while I was at work, as well. A patron came in and said something to the effect of "I just stood in the rain for ten minutes with my dog hoping he'd go to the bathroom."  I commiserated, as Elka does not like going potty in the rain.  She continued, with a smile on her face, "Well, the last time, he didn't go.  He's afraid of the groomer's, and won't walk back with her, so she picked him up, and he peed everywhere.  Like a fire hose." 

And I thought to myself, And you just left him there?  What work have you done to make the groomer's a positive place for him?  I did not preach to her, and sort of regret that I didn't try to go down that conversational avenue, but I doubt she would have welcomed it. Many peoples' attitudes when their dogs are legitimately afraid seems to be: deal with it.  Also, many peoples' attitudes when you give them dog advice is: it's my dog.  What do you know?  Unsolicited advice is rarely welcome.

When I want Elka to go potty in the rain, I want her to "deal with it". When I want her to go someplace necessary but scary, I want her to be calm and realize it isn't the end of the world.  She has never resisted going to the vet, and has always behaved well there.  Below is Elka's "Oh God, it's raining on me!" face.

10 Things You Might Be Doing Wrong Walking Your Dog

Picture this:  it's a bright sunny day, and you and your dog are going for a walk.  You have the leash, you have your keys (and probably phone), and you have your dog.  That's all the preparation you need before you head out the door, right?  Well, maybe.  It probably depends on your dog; for mine, these things are not enough, if we want the walk to be a happy success.

I've thought of a list, by no means complete, of things I myself have done wrong, or have seen people doing wrong, while walking the dog.

Command Clinic: Stay

I put off doing a Command Clinic for Stay, because it's a command that we're kind of weak on.  Elka will stay for a bit, but then decide she's done, rather than waiting for the release.

Then I realized that I should do the Command Clinic for Stay, because it's a command that we're kind of weak on.  This will inspire me to work on it more closely, yes, and then it will no longer be weak.  That's the notion, anyway.

Eventually we'll get to stuff I've taught with the clicker, I promise, but I taught Stay with eye contact and body language, when Elka was actually rather young.