The other day, whilst out walking my two nutters, we happened upon a lady and a little girl with their german shepherd puppy (on a guess about 6-8mths old) and a Jack Russell.

As soon as her german shepherd spied my two, he began barking and whining and pulling on the lead to get to them.

We walked straight past as my older boy can be a little funny with dogs who get a bit exuberant and carried on throwing the ball as normal (we always have a ball on us as it means I have complete focus from the dogs and it works as a brilliant recall if I need to get them back for whatever reason.)

Anyway, a few minutes later an adult GSD came onto the field, she ran over to ours and had a bit of a sniff but was quite calm and relaxed. Her owner walked over to the lady with her puppy GSD and when the adult GSD followed, the puppy went ballistic.

Now most puppies I have seen, tend to greet older dogs with a mixture of playfulness, excitement and occasionally a little apprehension. This dog was barking and lunging and the adult GSD (all credit to her brilliant temperament!) turned her back and looked a bit shocked (I know that’s a humanisation, but you should have seen the look on her face!)

Rather than let the pup get some distance and calm down, the owner proceeded to grab the pup and ‘force’ the dogs to meet – perhaps thinking the pup would calm down if he could just ‘say hello’?

Instead, the pup managed to get away from the owner, backed off initially, then lunged for the adult GSD again, barking and growling.

I watched in amazement as they caught the dog and the little girl then ‘alpha rolled’ the pup in an attempt to control it.

My thoughts on the situation are this:

1 – Why is the dog reacting in this manner to other dogs? (fearful? not enough socialisation? bad experience with another dog in the past?) It is so important to understand the why’s and wherefore’s if you want to ‘speak dog’ because without properly understanding why something is happening, you won’t know how to change it.

2 – Why is a little girl alpha rolling her GSD which, although she can do it now, is going to grow into a large, powerful dog who might at some stage take exception to being pinned and could potentially cause some damage?

I truly can’t understand why people expect their dogs to behave ‘properly’ without giving a second thought to any underlying cause for why the dog might be reacting or behaving in an undesirable manner.

What also leaves me speechless is the fact that so many people (and children it would seem!) are prepared to use force to ‘train’ their dog, rather than put a little more effort into actually understanding how dogs learn, and then employing the proper (and much more appropriate) techniques to work on modifying the behaviour and emotional responses that the dog has to a stimulus.

There are better ways out there – google Ian Dunbar or Karen Pryor into google if you REALLY don’t know where to start – so there is no excuse for you to manhandle your dog.

If you learn to speak dog, you will end up with a much happier hound – and a much happier you who knows how to build confidence and support your dog with his emotional reactions.

And if you are really worried, please consult a qualified behaviourist.

Get rid of the alpha rolls – you are very likely just making things worse!

For a more in depth blog on appropriate training methods, please click here