Ed meant by "this is also foolish"...as foolish as starting a dog in defense too young and too early.
So, I assume that a dog worked in prey too long didn't have defense added when they were ready.
What are the main drawbacks of having a dog locked in prey?

Two words patience and time, I personally prefer a young dog working in prey, I feel as the dog matures the defence should come in naturally, some males are slow mine is, he is 14 mnths now and still working only in prey, I would not push him either
he is very comfortable with good grips, what this is to me is not locked in prey but confidence building, cos as time goes by my helper will assess his progress and put a little more fight into the sleeve work, slowly slowly catchee monkey..LOL this is my motto go slow staying inprey builds confidence, at the end a confident dog will bite well and enjoy the work.
If you are looking for civil drive well thats a different story,
I have never seen it as yet in a young dog, and wouldn't want to see it either.The earlier a young dog is put under to much pressure, the worse the bite and the more likely it is to run
into avoidance, No siree wouldn't want to go there, to much hard work to bring the dog's confidence back up.

Ok Ok... I know a young dog should not be worked in defense!
This thread has taken a different turn than what was originally intended. If you are interested in when to start defense work, or what it means, and how, a dog gets locked into prey then perhaps a new thread could be started..please? I am looking for an answer to a specific question here and being taken way off topic.

Bradley went and re-read your question again sorry if I misunderstood you, but my answer still is Prey=confidence= good grip,Your question related to grips you also mention defence??? if the origenal groundwork for grip and carrying was good, it should either still be good and yes intensity will come along in time depends on the individual dog. Grip work could also have deteriated over time if to much pressure/defence brought into early or the foundation was done only in defence,Obviously how the dog was worked at foundation level will determine whether you need to revist work on the grip,not to mention genetics some dogs just have poor grips so extra effort needs to be put into improve this so yes I would then re-do focus work on grip.What age??? who can say for definite,lets face it no two dogs are the same the video is based on the generic, I would think you need to use some of your own intiative here.I thinking analysing your dogs weaknesses and strengths perhaps with a experienced helper might help? If you want a second opinion, I bounce stuff off other people all the time.
Some dogs grip and bite well from the word go and will not have to revisit grip work.I beleive these dogs will mostly have done the foundation in prey and not defence hence the emphasis on everyone focusing on the prey aspect in the thread, you cannot seperate the two, in my mind anyway.Anyhow If this is not making sense feel free to ignore the above, hope this helps tho.

Bradley, what are your goals for this dog? Are you competing in a sport, or doing personal protection?

Michelle, thank you. I know that when a thread starts to go off topic it tends to get turned into a separate discussion, so thanx for clarifying for me. Unfortunately I still don't really have a clear answer yet... maybe there just isn't one? But your info did help a bit.

Mike, there is no "this dog" at the present moment. I am just trying to educate myself on the theories of working a dog (and only a dog of appropriate age and ability ) in defense. I am gearing the goal for this knowledge toward PSD work.

I'd like to re-visit this topic, as I think I have now answered my own question... almost.

Toward the end of The First Steps of Defense, Ed states in his narration that,

 Quote:

"The training eventually needs to come back to grip development... We want to see the intensity of civil work being carried over into our bite work...If the dog is to be a service dog then this switch from civil into grip development needs to be accomplished through hidden sleeves and muzzle work. If the goal is to be a sport dog the training with civil work is followed by serious prey guarding."

At this point in the dogs' training would this grip development be done in prey drive or defensive drive? And what type of developments are we looking for. For example, at the very start of a dogs training we are looking to reward countering, gripping carrying, etc... So what exactly is the trainer looking to develop at this stage?

Is this where the trainer is looking to begin the development of fight drive?

OK I hope this doesn't irritate anyone too badly but, I'm going to keep my questions on defense going for another 48 hrs in the hopes that there is at least one board member who can answer them whom may have just not been signed on in the last little while.

at this stage you're looking to develop balance. or, rather, bring it back.

you start with prey, reinforce/develop grips. barking comes from defense, so that's what comes next. but only in small doses and always immediately back to prey for the calming/balancing effects. once a dog is mature you can put a little more heat on them and bring defense higher, to bring out the civil or "fight" if the dog has it in them, but the calm grips of prey work past go to crap. you work through it. once the dog is comfortable in their new-found "power" and are able to turn the "fight" on and off themselves, you go back to re-developing the grip with prey - side to side, letting them pull, etc. - the ultimate goal being to have a dog that is balanced enough to come out swinging like a true bad a$$, but confident and calm enough in their work to maintain good grips.

it's all about pushing the dogs little by little to take more and more stress – and bring more and more intensity to the work – but always maintaining balance and clarity as they do.

Great, thanks Chris. That's an excellent concept to keep in mind when re-visiting the grip training. So, at this phase in the dog's protection training development the work goes back to prey games for the most part, in that the techniques used to develop the grip are the same, but there is still an element of pressure being put on the dog from the helper, similar to the defense work? Is that the idea?

By "balance" are you meaning that the dog is again in school for good grips but shouldn't be forgeting that the helper is still a fighting partner (lesson learned in defense training)? Essentially, you have the intensity that the dog faces off against his "fighting partner" with brought back to prey games?

If such is the case, then should the helper be switched? For example, I would most likely use a new helper to push a dog into defense, but later on should the same defense helper be used to further improve the dog's grip or should we be going back to our "play-pal" prey helper?