I've been a dogaholic all my life - I had a typical English family - not too much affection but I had the dogs for my best friends. It’s like we understood each other. I think it started then.
My background is in human psychology and communication. But I was equally interested in animal psychology. Natural horsemanship was so exciting because it was about looking at how horses think and behave and communicate - and then seeing if we could use some of the same language with them (instead of trying to use human values and language and communication and training ideas - on animals with completely different psychology and social systems!)
I think my dog work really took shape in the 90s after Monty Roberts showed us how to behave with horses, and think like horses, and communicate with horses. Such a new and generally much kinder approach.
I was offering some dog boarding on my farm, and it turned quickly into helping people understand and behave in a way that helped their dogs to get things right. A bit like Natural Dogmanship.
I've been helping a lot of people now over the years with this approach. Traditionally, If a dog is behaving in a way we don’t like, we tried to change the particular behaviour with rewards or distraction for example. What I do that is different, is that I help the owner find the cause of the behaviour - its usually us, by the way, something we are doing, which has given the dog the wrong idea of what to do.
It's all about training humans - the dogs are fine. I have rarely met a problem dog. Only dogs that are doing their best.
One of my goals is to show the world that Dogs Are Never Naughty. If people understand this then everything changes between the human and the dog. I explain that a dog cannot be naughty - it requires a kind of double-think that dogs can’t do. A dog is always doing their best. Pretty much always doing what we have accidentally been showing them to do. All my clients deny this. And I can usually show them how indeed they have somehow created the reason or the pattern for the dog’s behaviour that they don’t like..
The problem always boils down to the fact that we are different species - and we are the wrong species for them. Its a miracle that humans and dogs live together. These creatures are still hard-wired the same as millions of years ago. Really we are bringing wild animals into our homes - and expecting them to be like well behaved humans. It's a big ask. And then we get frustrated when their behaviour is that of a dog.
I think of myself as an inter-species translator. Dogs can’t learn human. But humans can learn ‘dog’ - well enough to understand, support and communicate with a completely different species. My job is to teach humans the language of ‘dog’.
The great thing is that it's not difficult to identify the problem - and fix it! I spend some time explaining why the dog will be doing the behaviour - their very logical reasons. And I’ll teach a bit about what makes a dog tick - how they are completely different to humans. To be honest - things go wrong when we think that dogs are like baby humans. They are not! And they have totally different need and priorities.
I take the spotlight off the dog’s problems. Usually the dog doesn’t really have any problems. It’s often just us not quite getting it right. And why would we - we are the wrong species for them! We are totally different. We think different, act different, have different needs and social systems.
Changing things is often not difficult. We work out why the dog was doing the behaviour, what WE need to change - what we need to stop doing with them, and what we need to start doing with them. And if we are diligent and consistent, we untangle the confusions in our human to dog relationship, we set up new patterns of behaviour, and we’ll be on the way to a new relationship with the perfect dog that was inside all the time.
There are two main things that affect how a dog behaves:
Firstly our relationship with our dog. Do they feel safe and relaxed because they can look to us for protection and kind consistent leadership? Or, for example, worried and tense because they don’t have a leader to guide and protect them? Or do they think their job is to protect us? You can see how kind leadership (when we know what this looks like in ‘dog’) works like magic to balance our dog, give them confidence and help them relax.
Getting the relationship right can help nervous dogs AND aggressive dogs, and dogs with every common problem. Its quite amazing to see these changes unfold.
The other things that affect a dogs behaviour are:
Patterns - A dog is hardwired to repeat things. In the wild, if something happened, and the dog was alive at the end of it, it might have been a really good thing - good for survival - so it might be worth repeating. There are many things a dog does because they have always done them! Why have they always done them - because they did them that first time, then the second time… So its really important to create good habits.
I tell my clients: practise the behaviours you do want. And never practise the ones you don’t want - i.e. prevent behaviours you don’t want from the beginning. Jumping up, biting, excessive barking, might all be things that we have allowed (or even encouraged in another context). Like if I'm playing with my dog, it might be fine, but I could also be creating a habit of excitement, jumping up, possibly barking, even biting. If you don’t want a behaviour - don’t teach it - even accidentally.
The good news is that the relationship with our dog, and their habitutal patterns of behaviour, can all be changed - when we understand our part in things, and we make the changes. Its not rocket science. But at the same time we were not born knowing ‘dog’. It’s so understandable that we sometimes treat them like humans or babies - its the language we know. A dog cannot learn human - and so we HAVE to learn ‘dog’ - to some level at least.
Of course the best way is always to get it right from the beginning. It’s a pleasure to see peoples dogs change as the humans change what they are doing. And its fantastic to see people learn how to set off on the right foot with their puppy and have an easy and relaxed time with their dog from day one.
Please phone me if you want to chat about your dog: 07967 735067 or email: judy@thedevondoglady.co.uk
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