More ?'s about prey drive

Jason L

It's like what Lies said, it's the "working through" part, the persisting of drive in the face of pressure that really tell you about the strength of the drive.

Last month we had a police dog handler from the UK stay with us and he was VERY impressed with Bugsy re his desire to work and intensity.  Said he would have been an amazing police dog, I thought that was interesting for various reasons.

From you described in the original post, Bugsy sounds like he has a low threshold (very easy to activate). If you add on top of that a dog that is persistent in his drive, then you have a dog that will definitely keep you on your toes!

Jason L

Bugsy sounds like he has a low threshold (very easy to activate). If you add on top of that a dog that is persistent in his drive, then you have a dog that will definitely keep you on your toes!

 

Where were you when I brought him home?  just kidding, but he has been a challenge

I love crazy dogs like that!

Here is a funny video of Ike at 5 months that shows what I am talking about - low threshold, high persistence. You see the environmental stuff simply do not exist when his drive is activated.

 LOL that was awesome - Ike you are a very determined guy

Jason L

This is an interesting topic. I'm of the opinion that play drive is simply a form of prey drive (or rather prey drive re-directed). But I also subscribe to the definition that Helmut Raiser gives in his book "Der Schutzhund" that prey drive is fundamentally a survival mechanism and as such encompasses all sorts of activity like chasing, seeking, tracking, killing (shaking to death), possessing, and finally eating (so Raiser food drive is a form of prey drive).

I understand most of those things to come under the SEEK umbrella as well. But not play. Play to me serves a couple of purposes. It is practice of hunting skills and conditioning of muscles required for hunting, but it's also a strongly social activity and I have read arguments that it's more important for learning social skills than hunting skills. Furthermore, it seems to be a very important aspect of a good working dog's personality. A dog that performs well has a strong desire to play chase and capture games, but is also a natural retriever, indicating that their play has a strong social aspect they anchor to human handlers.

When Kivi goes into chase mode, the social aspect of play is likely to drop out. It doesn't go completely, but he gets quite intense about chasing sometimes. When he is being chased it's all social, but when he's the one chasing his body language changes. He gets an edge to him. I don't let him do the chasing in doggy games much. Erik is good at putting a stop to it when he's had enough of being rolled, but some dogs just run faster.

I'm not sure if Liesje have encountered the same thing too - but at our club we get plenty of people who bring their dogs out to try tracking (or even protection) because of what they see in their dogs at home (sniffing on the walk, chasing small animals) but - more often than not - that simply does not translate to a working field and the stress/pressure that come with the territory. At home dogs do these stuff because it's fun and they "want to" do it but on the field there is always a sense of "have to" so the dog's drive need to be strong enough to overcome the stress/pressure of work.

I'm not disagreeing with this, but would like to offer a further observation to think about. Erik is extremely alert and interested in everything, so it is sometimes difficult for him to concentrate in new surroundings. In contrast, Kivi has his head in the clouds most of the time. But when Kivi is asked to do something he does it regardless of where he is and what's going on around him. He has tunnel vision. He doesn't have strong drive to overcome the stress of work, he just doesn't find those situations stressful. He does one thing at a time and does it very well. If I can get his arousal at the right level he will play regardless of what is going on around him, but getting him aroused is the difficult bit. For Erik he would need more drive to get him past stressful situations, but getting him aroused is very easy.

Erik is extremely alert and interested in everything, so it is sometimes difficult for him to concentrate in new surroundings. In contrast, Kivi has his head in the clouds most of the time. But when Kivi is asked to do something he does it regardless of where he is and what's going on around him. He has tunnel vision. He doesn't have strong drive to overcome the stress of work, he just doesn't find those situations stressful.

The persistence I refer to (and maybe Jason will chime in) with regard to drive is much more than simply a new environment or environmental distractions.  For me there is a distinction between stress and pressure, and when it comes to drives carrying through I'm referring to pressure.  Stress can be anything that throws a dog off balance, like simply putting the dog in a strange environment and asking the dog to work.  With regard to drive, I'm referring to pressures that are forcibly applied either by someone or something in the "way".  Drives in bitework, back-tying, even tracking lines (you can learn a LOT about how your dog tracks by putting him on the start of the track but holding him there with the line), forced retrieves, physical barriers (the dogs used to have to do crazy jumps and scale walls).  At a minimum, I'd like to know how the dog reacts when he is intentionally frustrated by the handler (something as simple as backtying or holding the dog by the collar and flipping the toy around with your other hand...does the dog give up after a while of struggling to get the toy?  Or does he get annoying and just try to get it more?).

For example, a dog coming fast and biting a sleeve hard and full alone is not a full picture of active aggression.  What does the dog do when the helper takes control by pushing the dog forward and driving him with a stick?

Nikon will also focus and obey when let off leash in a totally new environment, but that is not an indication of a lack of drive (actually the opposite, most of his obedience training is mark/reward with a ball, so his ball driver supersedes any desire to be distracted by the environment, even when there's no ball present).

If I can get his arousal at the right level he will play regardless of what is going on around him, but getting him aroused is the difficult bit. For Erik he would need more drive to get him past stressful situations, but getting him aroused is very easy.

This is important because there is drive and then there is the threshold.  A low threshold does not mean high drive, and a higher threshold does not mean low drive.  Some of the best dogs I've seen as far as strong fighting drives and active aggression have a much higher threshold.  They appear mellow and even lazy until you get them working in the right frame of mind and see that they will fight and carry through with more drive than many other dogs who might activate with little to no stimulation but don't have the power and fight to back it up.