(Relatively) new behaviour issue with Ben

the "in charge" dog does not move - neither towards the danger, nor to increase visibility, nor to "claim" any space, nor to "claim" the guarded resource.  The dog they are all getting their signal from, in fact, makes the least noise usually - she's often relatively quietly watching and assessing the intrusion or novelty that is causing the alert. 

With all due respect to Rugaas, I gather from this that dogs really don't key off body language in this context, much.  Which makes sense because guarding/alerting behavior in the feral/wild/working context, often happens over a distance.

that's interesting brookcove. My "in charge" dog has clearly delegated watchdog barking/territory guarding to the "lesser dogs". They bark, and sometimes run towards the supposed threat, while she watches them; if she does decide to move towards the "threat" (whether barking or not barking) they increase their noise level and may charge faster at the "threat" ahead of her. If I move towards the supposed "threat" (without issuing doggy instructions) the dogs also increase their noise level and may charge at the "threat" ahead of me.

The whole "claim the door" thing is bogus. What's happening is the person doing the "claim the door" is giving off threatening vibes to scare the dogs into watching that bully with apprehension instead of paying attention to their watchdog duties. I'm not sure what turning your back to the dogs instead of glaring at them threateningly is supposed to do- puzzle them with such odd behavior into being quiet? convince them you are listening hard to the "threat" so they wait for instructions? I'll have to try it someday.

brookcove

He's just prepping you for your Maremma baby.    I expect in a few months to hear from you, "wow, that wasnt so bad after all - what was I worried about?"   

Yup I think so LOL.  

Benedict

The other things he finds rewarding, like fuss and tug games are things I do with him frequently throughout the day anyway, so they wouldn't have much

He sounds like he could be a K-9 except that he might not be hard enough to bite and hold. K-9's are rewarded with tug, rather than food. Tug is quite rewarding, and when a suspect tries to get away, he is inadvertantly doing the one thing the dog is rewarded with, though, in the moment, it is work. And, being rewarded with tug, the dog cannot be thrown off the game by a suspect tossing food at the dog. Also, at least I have noticed here, K-9's are trained with german commands. They are clear and concise words the dogs can hear anywhere and, oddly enough, most criminals in America don't speak german, so they can't give a command to confuse the dog, though I think most of the dogs are only going to respond to their handler and no one else during work.

Anyway, Ben sounds fine to me.

ron2

He sounds like he could be a K-9 except that he might not be hard enough to bite and hold.

He wouldn't be hard enough, he comes from a long line of soft-mouthed working labs.  I taught him to enjoy tugging and he really does love it, but he lets go of anything we're tugging with just a look from me, and he's the most gentle lab I've ever heard of when it comes to his toys.  We have cheap stuffies (that I got assuming he'd destroy them) from over a year ago that don't have so much as a stitch out of place, he just carries them around in his mouth so gently that they fall out sometimes.  In other words, he will happily tug and will even try to initiate tug games, but it's too easy to get him to stop - a suspect wouldn't have to know German commands, they'd just have to look at him LOL. 

mudpuppy

I'm not sure what turning your back to the dogs instead of glaring at them threateningly is supposed to do- puzzle them with such odd behavior into being quiet?

I think in Ben's case turning my back to him is telling him that while I am checking out the threat, I'm not interesting in engaging him and therefore rewarding his excessive behaviour.  I'm being very careful about staying relaxed and continuing to do whatever I was doing, like sorting the mail.  He does seem to be getting it. 

the "in charge" dog does not move - neither towards the danger, nor to increase visibility, nor to "claim" any space, nor to "claim" the guarded resource.  The dog they are all getting their signal from, in fact, makes the least noise

So true, in my house, too.  Perhaps that's why Turid wanted people to remain with back to the dog and totally quiet.  It may not exactly replicate this behavior, since you do have to move to get to the door, but it does not create "noise", which I find often makes dogs more anxious and likely to continue barking.  Just a thought. 

 It is definitely difficult to convince a person to give a dog the freedom that they give each other.  It's counterintuitive to us to decrease pressure when we want the dog to do something - our urge is to make them do it.  Dogs let each other do stuff.  So it's hard to sit and basically do nothing until it's time to do something - and then it's not about forcing the dog to your will, but simply resetting the situation so the dog can get another chance to be right.  In this case, that's why I suggest "away time" - and emphasize that one no longer pay attention to the question of whether the dog is barking or not, until one starts over again.

Sometimes you can't tell, after one or two or three times of doing this, that the dog is learning.  That's why the "correction" is very low pressure.

The other thing we tend to do is look for the whole enchilada.  Failure is defined for many people as, the dog is still barking.  Maybe the dog hesitated before resuming barking, though, or looked back, or even just flicked an ear on your signal or verbal correction. It's important to realize that that's progress.  This is why dogs are minimalists. 

You see a couple dogs in a confrontational situation and it seems very, very tense, as they  stand with hardly a move. It makes us intensely uncomfortable, because humans hate silence.  From the dog's point of view, though, they are having an animated conversation.  Both are being careful to give the other an "out" (assuming neither is pathologically undersocialized) so they are comfortable and will carry on the discussion as long as necessary to work out what they need to, in order to interact.