Adopted a shelter dog, really want to keep him but . . .

Sounds pretty scary.  I'm hoping the professional coming out Monday is a positive approach trainer.  This type of behavior can't be dealt with using force or punishment. 

 I admire you for being willing to work on it and I hope he can be rehabbed.  JRT's are wonderful dogs but they aren't for everyone.  Many are euthed or live their lives isolated due to aggression that was never properly addressed.  I believe it's quite possible to overcome it but it will take a big committment on your part and extreme diligence while you work on it. 

Good luck and please let us know what the trainer has to say on Monday.  JRT's are one of my favorites, that's my nine year old on my sig picture.

JackieG

Good luck and please let us know what the trainer has to say on Monday.

 

I would appreciate hearing what the trainer had to say and how things are going....

If you don't mind buying an expensive book, grab a copy of Brenda Aloff's "Aggression in Dogs."  She is very well known for her work with JRT's.

jacks are known for their dog aggression. this is going to take a POSITIVE behaviorist (as Jackie said). he may need to burn off some more energy too - so he has a clearer mind to think with. do you have a yard for him to run in?

Terriers are sensitive dogs - and do tend to shut down when force is used.

Yes, an update on what the trainer says would be great!

 

"This type of behavior can't be dealt with using force or punishment. "............Actually, it can. You are unfortunately 180 degrees wrong. It can't be dealt with by using exclusively "positive" methods. Postive reinforcement cannot inhibit normally occuring behaviors. In the case of a Jack Russell, this behavior has been genetically reinforced for many generations. At the moment of arousal, the dog doesn't want treats or affection. Redirection is virtually impossible - and even if you can do it, there is no latent effect. Meaning, you have to continually redirect the dog every time he senses animals outside, as long as the dog lives. By the way, no, it does not take a large commitment, neither does it take a lot of time. In effect, by limiting your methods to something that simply can't work, you insure that the dog will continue the behavior and will go back to the shelter. Think about it. Positive reinforcement increases behavior because the dog wants what you are offering more than it wants to do its instinctive behvaior. It does not inhibit anything, it merely attempts to compete with terribly powerful instinctive behaviors - invariably failing. As youself - can you get a Lab to stop retrieving ducks with treats? Not a real Lab. Can you get a Cattle Dog to ignore cows with treats? Nope. How about a beagle - can you get a beagle to ignore the scent of a rabbit with a hotdog? Reliably? Nope. If you have any kind of an open, logical mind and want to keep the dog, go here... http://www.clickandtreat.com/html/offleadinhibitions.HTM The information is based on more than 25 years of practical experience working with aggression by veterinary referral. Meaning, it stands any logical test. The same information was presented at the 2009 Assoc. for Behavior Analysis International conference in the form of a 6 hour workshop and an internation paper presentation. A reprise of the information is being presented at the Ontario (Canada) Association for Behavior Analysis conference in November. As an aside, I've fixed two sets of Jack Russells, one set of Toy Fox Terriers and a trio of Jack Russell/Chihuahua mixes with the same behavior in the last month. The solution requires a knowledge of how to apply aversive control AND positive reinforcement. Neither of these two opposites will do the job by themselves. The insistance that there is a polarity that must not be mixed is a knee-jerk of people who no nothing of how to apply aversive control skillfully.

My knee jerk reaction to your post is that you made some HUGE assumptions of what I recommended.  You seem sort of defensive.  When offering advice on a dog forum to people who I have no idea of their level of training abilities, I will always recommend they use positive methods and that they find a trainer who uses them too.  Mistakes made using positive are rarely going to make the problem worse but using force and punishment can result in some pretty bad scenarios when used incorrectly.

 

Gary, while I don't disagree about the genetic component, and I realize that "at the moment of arousal" the dog will not eat or pay much attention to the handler, I think that the issue is more about the moment BEFORE arousal, and what you do with that.  That's where the training must happen, and where you can build the "shut off" switch.  The reason most handlers cannot is because their timing and understanding of the process is not there.  Aversive control can be used skillfully, and that's the only way it should be used.  But, the problem is that owners have a hard time doing it, and an even harder time finding someone to help them who does it humanely, so the situation is worsened, not improved. 

As to the assertion that you cannot get a herder to stop herding, I don't agree.  You can put the behavior on cue, and you can get a dog to differentiate between species (sheep ok, horses not ok) using positive methods, premack, etc.  Otherwise, my very drive-y working (real old time working lines) Aussie would be diving into my horse's stall daily, yet she isn't.  I took an old stock dog handler's advice NOT to dissuade her from horses until she had been on sheep.  That way, if you stay away from the horse, you GET the sheep;-)   If you don't herd the broom or the vacuum, you get to herd the bottle or chase the frisbee. 

Perhaps you could elaborate for our OP how you fixed the JRT's by posting a case study.  That way, others can evaluate for themselves your skillful use of aversive control.  Maybe it's time to start talking specifics, since aversion techniques are not created equal, and can backfire on people, as you know.

 

I agree that there are times when aversives are the most effective option. I use bark collars to inhibit my dogs barking - they are a vocal breed and we have close neighbors so their barking has to be inhibited. The use of these collars has caused no aggression, fear or other unwanted behaviors - the dog just learn not to bark. I would be very interested in hearing more about this specific use of aversives and when the use is suggested. However, I have to say that I find the suggestion that people will dump or kill their dogs because they can't do agility to be a bit...I dunno, offensive. The information in the article stands on it's own, without such heavy use of fear and emotions to push it. That actually comes off rather insulting to dedicated owners who would never consider dumping or killing their dog and may actually cause people to not pursue learning more on the subject.

 I guess this is why I'm very much a "how can I channel this?" rather than a "how can I stop this?" kind of person. And why if I can condition an incompatible behaviour I will, and I have had more success with this than I ever thought I would. I can call my herding dog back to me when he's gleefully running after birds and he'll come, despite the fact that he instinctively would very much like to chase birds. The same dog is the kind of dog that tries to grab my ankles when I'm running. I tried to tackle this by taking away the reward (stopping) without realising that for him, stopping the moving object was the aim. I then started carrying a toy for him to latch onto instead of me, and that helped a lot more. Right up until one day he leapt for the toy when I wasn't ready and he came down strangely on my leg and hurt himself. Being the soft dog that he is, an inhibition was formed and it took a good deal of coaxing to get him to come anywhere near me while I was running. I wouldn't say he has never bitten me while running since, but it went from very common to very rare, although I did a little extra positive work after that.

I think that creating an inhibition would have been a fine and sensible way to deal with this and would have saved him being hurt, but I was afraid to do it because I knew he'd associate the punishment with being next to someone while running but I didn't know how strong it would be and how easily overcome again. Especially hard for me having just said goodbye to my first dog who I had punished incorrectly as a youngster and spent the rest of her life trying to make up lost ground and never managing to. 

I think that given my time again I would still not create an inhibition because I don't feel I'm skilled enough to know not just how to do it properly but how to quickly pick up the pieces and put them back together again and train the right thing so that I never have to punish that thing again. I think that now I could probably get the timing right, but I would still want someone there to help me, and I am yet to meet a trainer I would trust to understand what I was aiming for and how best to handle it with my particular dog. I've met a few online, but none in person yet.

Incidentally, I have a great deal of faith in desensitisation. One day a friend of mine tried to pat my wild hare while he was hiding in his cage. He exploded and after bouncing off my ceiling for a minute, he ended up on my windowsill quivering in terror. It was hours before he had calmed down enough to go back in his cage, and it took about 6 months of desensitisation for him to allow someone to crouch near his cage again. Given I had to crouch near his cage to feed him or lock him up at night, this was tricky and I had to sidle in from some distance away. Anyway, long story short, hares rarely take food from you even when they are feeling perfectly chipper. All I had at my disposal was desensitisation with no rewards, and hares are about a hundred times more flighty and nervy than even a reactive domestic dog. And more unpredictable! Yet, it worked.

Mind you, if I could jerk the hare out of fight or flight mode with a timely punishment, I would. If it were possible to use a punishment to prevent him from sprinting away in blind terror, I would. There is definitely a time and place for punishments with dogs, but you just really want to make sure your timing is superb, you will be able to pick up the pieces afterwards, and you know exactly how you're going to get the problem in hand with rewards once you have created that short-term inhibition. Unfortunately, most trainers I've met react rather than plan. They use punishments that are too mild too often, or they use stronger punishments and consider the job done while the dog is still trying to figure out what happened and why.