Looking deeper - chin on the back

I'm coming to think there is no such thing as a "dominant gesture". When you're talking "chin on back" are the dogs shoulder-to-shoulder? that's definitely a play signal. I've seen "chin on back" that looked like an affectionate friendly gesture when dogs were sleeping in a pile as well.

At least with mine it's affection, pure and simple and it tends to happen while relaxing.  It's always seemed, at least in the situations here, to be a "I can relax with you -- thanks for being here! - you're a convenient chin rest & cuddle"

I agree with you, MP. Though I've heard some people describe chin on back as a dominance move, I have not seen it in that context. Specifically with the dogs on my south side. The hound mix and the Mini- Schnauzer. They will put chin on back and it's part of the play. In fact, the only time I've seen one of them "tell" the other what to do, it involved a head butt that was merely a mechanical means of moving them out of the way, and not even related to social dominance. I have my own canine sociology lab just sitting in the backyard.

Dogs are perpindicular. KT faces one way and Penny's body is at a right angle to his when she puts her chin on his back. Perhaps the slight anxiety I see is just KT being nervous about Penny being so close to him. She does have a history of quite suddenly biting him.

I think I do still believe in dominant gestures, even though I don't believe in social ranking. Penny has her ways of telling Kivi Tarro what to do. Sometimes it's "Don't come any further" which leaves him lying at the open door and whining but refusing to come in when I call him. She tells him with a hard stare. I think of that as a dominant gesture because she's the one calling the shots and she tells him that he doesn't want to push her with the promise of violence in her body language.  

 I believe sometimes dogs use moves that are dominance gestures to initiate play.  It seems a way to force another dog into reacting or paying attention.  Selli knew a very friendly dog who she would ignore.  He noticed that she would snark at other dogs when they mounted her, so he decided to mount her and when she turned around to snark at him he started to play with her, they played frequently after that. 

From small signals the dogs can figure out if something is truly a dominance gesture or a part of play, just like actions that would seem to be aggressive displays are tweaked slightly to become play moves.  

corvus

it's "Don't come any further" which leaves him lying at the open door and whining but refusing to come in when I call him. She tells him with a hard stare. I think of that as a dominant gesture because she's the one calling the shots and she tells him that he doesn't want to push her with the promise of violence in her body language.  

Ah, but is that truly dominance? If you are at my house and let's say you pick my guitar(s) in a way that I don't like, and I say "put that down," is that me being dominant or me stating my boundaries? I think there is a difference between social dominance and social boundaries. Also, what appears to be dominance in her having an effect on KT could be just KT reacting in his own way, as in shutting down and staying still, regardless of what someone else says. As he gets older, KT may change his reaction and ignore both her and you, or ignore her and listen only to you. Which is still not dominance, it's KT responding in the way he sees fit, just as you see fit, et al.

And my opinion and $1.60 in north Texas will get you a Diet Coke.

Okay Ron, that's a fair call. Puppies respond to just about everyone by trying to avoid conflict. I caught Kivi Tarro mid-wee inside the kitchen one time and cried out "AH!" and hustled him outside. He was so surprised he got frightened and for the rest of the evening I had trouble convincing him it was okay to be in the kitchen. He'd again lie at the door and refuse to succumb to coaxing, much like he does for Penny when she gives him a hard stare from inside. He's just trying to figure out the rules and in his experience, if he gets them wrong he gets punished, so he tends to err on the side of caution. It's an oddly beautiful thing to watch him working out how this new world works. If I could be assured that I wouldn't accidentally punish too hard, I'd be happy to embrace the punishment side of things like Penny has. But one day Kivi Tarro is going to be bigger than Penny and he's going to get tired of her pushing him around. He'll test to see if her threats are real and when he discovers it's all not as bad as he thought it was she'll lose most of her control over him. Little wonder Penny tries to maintain control through scary displays and seemingly random attacks. Pity for Penny that she's never found another way. Too lacking in confidence to abandon rigid control until she's forced to. 

Anyway, now that I think about it it's the act of setting boundaries that I guess I am seeing as dominant behaviour. When one draws a line, isn't that a very assertive move? When I draw a line, I mean to be respected, and that shows in my body language and consequently I am respected, whether by dogs or people (not rabbits so much, though. They care not for lines drawn by slaves no matter how sternly they were drawn). Why am I respected? Because my body language says I care very much about this and I might just fight about it. That to me is dominant body language, although maybe assertive would be a better word. 

But one day Kivi Tarro is going to be bigger than Penny and he's going to get tired of her pushing him around. He'll test to see if her threats are real and when he discovers it's all not as bad as he thought it was she'll lose most of her control over him.

no, don't worry. The physical size of a dog doesn't matter. Seriously, the female dog that rules my household is about half the size of most of the other dogs. It's all about who wants it more when it comes to dogs, not who is physically the biggest and strongest. And usually the dog in charge is a female.

ron2

And my opinion and $1.60 in north Texas will get you a Diet Coke.

And,  1/3 gallon of gas.  LOL 

I think the chin on the back can be either showing a bit of dominance; initiating play or simply affection.  Completely depends on what is going on at any particular moment.

It's all about context. Males will indeed place their heads onto a bitch to test her out. If she allows the chin they may try a paw...then a full mount. It's always best to check first. Rather the way a male gazelle will shove a front leg between the hind's rear legs.

It is a dominant gesture, IMO sometimes...one way to diffuse a dominant act...is with play. My dogs will posture at one another...then the lesser dog will playbow to diffuse the situation and they will play. I think you're summation is correct. I think it is an invitation but also given as "I want to play with you...and I hope you understand that refusal isn't necessarily going to make me happy"

In the context of litters of puppies...mine sleep all over each other. BUT they also start their dominance tussles many times by paws or chin over the back when standing or when a littermate is sitting. In fact when I wanted to particularly irritate a certain dominant puppy...I would rest my hand on her back...this peeved her greatly....which I found amusing. Eventually she would simply accept the hand and I'd stroke her a bit and she'd waggle and get feisty and we'd play a bit.

Hmm, good point, Gina. It seems to me that Penny does this mostly when she wants to play, but KT is clearly a teensy bit anxious about it, although a few weeks on she does it less and invites play by more conventional means, and when she does still do it KT pretty much ignores it or tries to initiate play, which he spends about 80% of his time doing anyway.

Mudpuppy, in Penny's experience size does matter because when a bigger dog gets tired of her bullying, she can't physically overpower them. Inevitably, dogs get tired of very controlling behaviour and like any schoolyard bully, when they do get tired of it, Penny is required to resort to violence if she is to maintain control. Typically, she fails to physically overpower the dog and subsequently abandons the hyper-controlling tactics in favour of trying to avoid conflicts instead of starting them all the time. It's happened to her 4 or 5 times, now, to varying degrees. Some dogs don't take bullying at all so it doesn't last long.

I think that KT like every other dog Penny has ever lived with will eventually get tired of her controlling behaviour and test her. When he discovers the worst she can do to him is lose a physical contest, the dynamics will change. And that's just one reason why I don't think it's a good idea to train dogs through punishment or physical corrections. But yeah, I most certainly agree it's about who wants it more, but I expect there will come a time when KT discovers he doesn't want any more bullying every bit as much as Penny wants to maintain her sense of control and we'll have a defining moment. Or maybe he'll put up with her bullying indefinitely, but as even dopey, amiable Jill got tired of it within a few weeks, and shy Chloe got tired of it after 2 years, and Raz the Gentleman put his foot down after about 2 days, I am expecting it to happen eventually. Penny is not a very happy dog when she's in hyper-control mode.

Sorry this isn't completely on point, but I gotta post this picture.  This was Muffin the Intrepid and Foxy the Mostlie Sheltie (the butt/back being used).  A minute before I snapped this picture it WAS his chin.  I think this is clearly a case of extreme dominance and testing boundaries, don'tcha think? *grin*

I never got a picture but many many times I saw Foxy rest HIS chin on Muffin (Muffin having the far superior padding you understand and the Mostlie sheltie chin being far sharper)

This was very early on when we had Muffin and you can see the pain in his face.  Quite honestly -- this was "comfort".  Plain, pure and simple.  Not so much to the point as just plain sweet.  Sometmes dominance, sometimes just plain offering comfort - as individual and unique as the dogs in question.  (Ron, I'd love to see your sociology lab!!)

My female, Brooke is the initiator of play 85% of time and beside the biting and tugging the neck (she loves all that loose skin around River's neck) or pulling him down by his collar she often nudges him with her snoot - as if to say, come on! come on! let's wrestle and chase!   She will also put her chin on him in the same nudging type of manner.  I've also seen her many times body slam him with her butt!  All dominate jesters in my eyes but there only used to initiate play.

Ahh yes -- the inflamous "butt slam" -- Billy uses that one on Luna ALL the time.  Oh 'scuse me -- did MY butt hit you?  Well, of course I'm playing ... not a lot you understand ... just for a bit ... not like *I* was trying to get YOU to play with ME ...YOU being the more playful YOUNGER pup ..."

There was a good discussion on the 'butt slam' not long ago -- very informative (still rotfl MINE off)

I love these informal discussions -- we all have such a wide range of personalities in our dogs, and learning how  these things can be interpreted is truly so helpful.  Until I read it here, I really wasn't aware the 'butt slam' was a universal dog thing.  But the diversity within our individual packs makes each one of our observations so helpful. Some are more experienced as trainers than others, but each of us knows our own dogs pretty well and comparing how they use these tools of communication is just sooo darned kewel!