Which dog should I support as dominant?

Hi crazycrayonmom;

I have been wondering (and I have mentioned this in my response to the post "Dog Aggression (brothers)" if there necessarily should be a dominant dog that the rest of the dogs will follow as the leader of the pack when you have multiple dogs.

From my experience, each dog has a different personality so some dogs have more dominant personality than others. Among my 3 dogs, Holly has the most dominant personality but it does not mean that she goes out the door first, she gets to eat first, she is the only one that can get on the couch, etc. Amazingly enough, she is the one that lets Noah rush out the door before her when he wants to chase squirrels (although Holly likes to chase them as well) and she lets Daisy come inside the house to get to their meals although she is very food oriented herself. When we play our "put away toys" game, Daisy even snatches a toy away from Holly's mouth and Holly is fine with that.

Instead, we implement a seniority system in our household. Holly has been with us for 5 years, Noah for 3 and Daisy 1.5 yrs so we always treat them in that order. They are fed meals at the same time (before we eat) without bothering each other. Fortunately all my dogs are quick and very clean eaters so there is no fight or invasion.

I take one dog (sometimes 2 together) for walk, shopping , to training lessons but they all know they will get his/her turn if they wait.

I would treat Koko as your fist dog, especially Max will outgrow her and it will be easier to change the order later on if Max really shows a dominant and more confident personality, rather than the other way around.

I am curious to hear other people's opinions on this.

Hi kjd,

This is a very interesting subject but in the mean time it is a very difficult subject since every dog is different and every owner has different relationship with his/her dog(s). There is no almighty answer. (that's why it is interesting to me).

What I have been writing here is based on my experiences and my experiences are sometimes different from what is written in books. However, I trust my own judgement most of the time, rather than what is said in a book. I know my dogs better than the author of the book. Books and training manuals are general information. As I said every dog and every owner are different so it is YOU who has to make a decision ultimately.

I think you made a good decision, kjd, when you found another home for Freka. Nobody could have told you what to do but yourself, who was living in the middle of the war and who was seeking for a best solution for both of the dogs.

I am a strong believer that your existing dogs should never got threathened or stressed by new comers. If you can not sort them out, the new comer should be moved to a better suiting home. I think we have been very lucky that all of our addtions and most of our fosters have been getting along so well. Yet, I had to give up 2 foster dogs; one was too playful and got on Noah's nerves (Noah does not like stranger dogs to be too friendly to him) and they ended up a few fights. The other one was a cat chaser and we didn't want our cat and foster kittens to be threatened by the dog all the time.

We currently have no foster dogs, just 2 foster kittens. Our 3 dogs, our cat and the 2 kittens are living in such harmony, not fights, no threats what so ever. No food stealing, no challenging. We never set up their pack order based on the dominance, but we did train them to respect others' resouces and rights. I think each of the animals, and us human beings deserve a peaceful life, don't you think?

crazycrayonmom,

I feel the same way I don't ever want to have two dogs fighting in my presence. Cesar Milan suggests making the calmest dog the dominant one. You and I have both had experience with that NOT working. It could be we are not calm and assertive enough or it could be Cesar has some tricks we don't see or it could be he isn't 100% right. Personally, I'd lean to #3. OTOH, even he admits he cannot make any dog work with any person sometimes he trades dogs with the owner. I'd go along with recognizing what the dogs have decided. Require their respect for you and for one another, but let the Cesar's of the world put alpha Fido under submissive Jake.

kjd

There is a lot in your posting, MaxHollyNoah!

The Loki/Halla attack (no fight, Loki just reacted to the pain) was obviously an exception, especially since Loki appeared to look out for Halla. When Loki had further surgery, I kept the two dogs separated because I was afraid Loki would be hurt in their rough-housing -- they never fought in anger. But the Halla/Freka situation was fighting. I couldn't see anything that set it off except for my presence. The time Freka attacked Halla after finishing her food, I was sitting away from the two dogs. OTOH, it doesn't really matter at this date since both dogs have long crossed the Rainbow Bridge.

I think Cesar Milan has some good ideas, but I am suspicious of others. You see him working with a dog for about 20 minutes, but this may be over a period of days. All you see is what they show on camera. I remember one dog he took to stay at his place. When he brought the dog back and went to pet it, his "calm, submissive state" was a trembling dog. Maybe that was just the dog, but I wouldn't want any trainer to train [B][I]my [/I][/B]dog out of [B][I]my [/I][/B]sight.

I'm dating myself, but years ago there was an English trainer, Barbara Woodhouse (spelling is probably all wrong). She used to take the dogs for "walkies." Barbara had an unusual rapport with all animals -- once, she had hummingbirds dancing around her. Yet she had no patience with us less-fortunate mortals. She was always after anyone who couldn't train their dog as well as she could!

For practical advice, I prefer Victoria Stillwell over Cesar she shows a more realistic picture of a dog learning to behave. She also goes along with your pack structure, MaxHollyNoah as long as the humans are leaders, the rest of the pack will be happy. Many times on the forum, you can see the problem is the dog doesn't see the human as leader. Diferent people have different methods of obtaining that position, The Secrets of Dog Training give one method. I like it because it is non-violent, non-abusive. However, like you, I've never enforced a "me first" when going through doors. In a multi-animal household, as you have, a new member sees immediately who the leader is, so he has only to learn the rules.

After this rambling, my answer to your last question is, it depends. In most cases, with my dog and my family's dogs, they sort it out themselves, and not by fighting. Just as some people are natural leaders, so are some dogs. There do seem to be cases of dogs, especially siblings, who just do not get along. Establishing an order between them may help. [In this case, if I were Cesar, I'd make the calmer dog tops; as a non-Cesar, I think I would concur with the dogs and make the dominant dog tops. If that still didn't work, I'd re-home. Everyone does deserve a peaceful home.]

Your thought, crazycrayonmom?

kjd