In a previous thread about French Ring, it was suggested that a fully trained protection dog should be worked in all drives.

How is a well trained dog rewarded for working in defense or fight drive?

What good is defence in bitework? Why is it better than prey?

 Quote:

Originally posted by Dave Lilley:
What good is defence in bitework? Why is it better than prey?

The answer depends on your definitions of defense and the purpose (goals) of training a dog in protection/apprehension skills.

Self defense is not a positive attribute to be displayed during sport competition, it is one that many if not most service dogs will experience during a combat situation and although they should havew experience in self defense it should not be a "feeling" that apprehension work is grounded in. As far as personal protection? It is my feeling that a dog with great character and good hobby training will provide enough of a presence to keep most thugs away, and if in fact there is a problem, dogs with this type of character and training with little if any of what people define of "practical protection work" is necessary other that a brief exposure off the sport field. So, self defense is not a good thing necesarily to train in unless you're into guard dogs, then push away with dogs of poor character because that is what makes them vigilant for the most part.

I would have to agree with Kevin on this. This pretty much sums up the level of what most personal protection dogs should be..A dog that has the right chararacter and is trained in sport for hobby, or was trained for a period of time in a hobby sport and providing that they are not working the dog in prey all the time, will be what most need for PP.
I also agree that dogs that have a lot of defense are the best guard dogs. They are always alert, and really do not like strange things or sounds in there envoirment, and will defend it. This is not to say that the "typical" patrol prospect could not be a guard dog, but I feel he would be wasted, and should be put in back of a patrol car. For those that breed, working dogs, there are always usally some dogs , that have more defense and no prey, so why not compete or place the more balanced ones in service? Most of the dogs that have more defense, are normally not safe to have around people.

How is a well trained dog rewarded for working in defense or fight drive?

Defense is rewarded by driving the decoy away, ending the decoy's attack, fighting off/scare off whatever is causing fear.

Fight is rewarded by kicking the decoy's ass. (submission and control of movement, winning the fight, some say detaining and/or driving enemy away as well)

my opinion:

the reward for a dog that responds defensively, is the threat (decoy) flushes in prey, thus allowing the dog to attack (in prey) and win/kill.

through continuous repitition the dog becomes conditioned to expect the threat to become prey as long as the dog shows strong active aggression.. You could say that the point is to trick the dog to always come forward (against its natural instincts)...

I also agree with VanCamp's post above regarding Fight...

I agree with his defense concept in a clinical sense, but I am relating this to dog training goals on the field/street..

at least, that is how I understand it..

Nice post Matt.

Matt replied: "the reward for a dog that responds defensively, is the threat (decoy) flushes in prey, thus allowing the dog to attack (in prey) and win/kill.

through continuous repitition the dog becomes conditioned to expect the threat to become prey as long as the dog shows strong active aggression.. You could say that the point is to trick the dog to always come forward (against its natural instincts)..."


Funny... that is EXACTLY how they are training Ringsport here in Lansing. The helper gets tougher and tougher on the dogs... eventually they show some unsureness... sometimes hackles...helper encourages dog to fight through the unsureness... rewards by going to the ground or giving a traditional prey win.

But the consensus seems to be that "Ringsport is ALL (100%) prey"???

They just don't seperate out the drives and determine... "today we will work on defense"... its built into the entire program... Am I missing something?

the reward for a dog that responds defensively, is the threat (decoy) flushes in prey, thus allowing the dog to attack (in prey) and win/kill.

There is a tape demonstrating the basis of this training. It is old and done on consumer video equipment but maybe Ed still sells it. It is of Bernard Mannel.

That said, it is a popular sport methodolgy, and one that has been used (I use it too) but it has also been the demise of much of what makes great working dogs great. It precludes the need for much fight drive (combat drive, fighting instinct, etc.) in the sport dog. The training can be taken to eztremes where the dog that would not normally succeeed in bitework does because he is learning to escape the pressure of bitework through biting and subsequently avoids the pressure through biting. Looks good on the field, absolutly sucks out of a training environment, is deadly in real scenarios if used on substandard dogs. If used on quality dogs the performances are often spectacular with intense barking at the blind and almost abnormally hard grips. Lifespan in the sport is diminished (they come apart eventually and succomb to training problems or stress related probelms) though and on the streeet problems crop up (won't really bite or if it does won't let go).
But, it is easy training, fast training, and common.
The ultimate in extreme training was what I saw at a guard dog company years ago with Dobies. The put the dog on a short piece of chain on a backboard (Bill Koehler has a picture in that old book of his) and everyone at the facility would take turns horse cropping the crap out of the dog until welts appeared on its chest.....really got them into survival (self-defense). Eventually the dog would try to bite everything that got close and they would let it get a rag. Poor buggers would savage the rag. This eventually became a hidden sleeve or wrap. Ugly training.

Kevin,

I would agree with you, only if the decoy was unaware of what he was doing to the dog at specific moments.

If the decoy is reading the dog properly, it would never truly settle into fight, let alone defense for more than a split second... it would become conditioned to elicit prey responses for defensive stimuli...

am I missing something? how could this damage a dog, or shorten its sport lifespan?? The way I understand it, it would strengthen the dog, since it would never be actually using its defense (survival) reactions at all during training..

GENERAL STATEMENT: By the way, what I have explained above, couldn't be furhter away from the Koehler-experience that Kevin alluded to, just for clarification purposes <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />