Thanks for the info Mike,
We have so many businesses in NYC that have so-called PP dogs on premises that I wonder how safe the dogs are. I know the people that own these dogs are not experienced. I would expect they went the send the dog to the trainer route.

Quote from Will:

"And if there was a way to train K9's to 100% prevent child bites from happening, don't you think that we'd be jumping on that training? Such training doesn't exist, unfortunately."

Yes I do realize that there is no training that 100% guarantees that a dog will never bite a child; however, I have no statistics but I believe there are many more bites on children from dogs with no PP training than from Police Patrol Dogs. My point (perhaps I could have made it better) is that PP training should not INCREASE the chances that a dog will bite a child or anyone else without sufficient provocation.


Quote from Will:

"And what exactly do you mean by "a criminal behaving criminally"? If someone is in my yard, adult or child, they're trespassing - which is a crime."

I think that a person usually gives away what their intentions are by their actions, demeanor, posture, and other behaviors that a dog can see and discern. True if someone is in your yard without permission then they are trespassing, but shouldn't a good dog recognize the difference between a shady character (burglar or whatever) and a wandering child? I believe that they should be at least that discerning.


Quote from Will:

"And speaking of "criminal behavior", here's another thing to think about, which the amateurs also fail to see - suppose your assailant is a calm, cool individual that is only threatening you verbally, but is deadly serious? Someone in your backyard armed but motionless, telling you that he'll kill you and meaning every word he says. But your dog won't engage him because he's not moving ( no prey drive initiation ) and his voice and mannerism is cool and calm ( no defensive drive initiation ). This is why *all* Police Patrol Dogs and many PPD's have to be trained for civil aggression, i.e., to initiate an attack without being provoked.
Sadly, *very* few PPD's can or will go civil - if they could, they most likely would have been sold as K9 candidates."

No argument here, in this situation most of the PP dogs I have seen would be useless. I am not saying that a dog is going to be able to read the mind/intention of any and every criminal -- my hope would be to have them key on the behavior of the obvious/dumb ones (which I believe most are <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> ).

I have read much of your advice and comments on this forum and I very much respect your experience and knowledge in this field -- but are you saying that all PPDs are never to be trusted with wandering children and/or non-threatening adults?

Mike,
Strictly from a liability standpoint, yes, I'm saying that ( and believe me, I wish that I wasn't! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> ).
For a dog trainer that trains or provides dogs in this category, my goal is to protect my clients from harm. That means along with providing a PPD or Police Canine that will actually do it's job, I also need to decrease a clients liability to a minimum. That entails educating the client to ensure that they understand the need for strong fencing and maintaining close and continual control and observation of their dog. That advice usually increases a clients safety from a crime standpoint anyhow, so I can kill two birds with one stone.

It's like leaving a loaded gun in plain view, maybe nothing will ever happen - but can you 100% absolutely for sure know that a child will not pick up the gun and a tragedy ensure? Of course not. Same for the child/ dog situation. Kids by their nature are chaotic and non-predictable, and that's not a good situation to place *any* dog in. A PPD with significant training may be safer than an untrained dog in that type of situation, but it's still a dog and that makes it not 100% certain. And the additional training it received will *absolutely* ensure that any lawsuit resulting from such a bite will be much more severe towards you and your insurance company ( and the insurance company will try to shift liability to you, have no doubt )
I have been an expert witness now several times in court cases regarding PPD's, and without fail, the bad event was preventable. Seeing the outcome of these cases ( none of them were from dogs that I provided ) has actually changed my view on clients ( I provide a several page questionnaire for potential clients that goes into maddening detail about them and their life styles. It's intrusive, but it helps me do a better job ) and made me much more cautious in accepting new clients.


Mike, there are countless more bites that occur from untrained dogs as opposed to bite trained dogs, but those statistics won't help us since the number of bite trained dogs is so small in the population of dogs in general. But good point, though! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

As far as expecting a dog to differentiate between criminal and harmless behavior, that sounds good in theory, but if it were trainable....we'd be doing it already. remember, we're talking about dogs, with limited comprehension - humanizing the dogs ability to distinguish between good and evil intent won't help us from a realistic standpoint.


Man, I love a well thought out discussion! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Well I don't know PP dogs, but I am pretty familar with Rottweilers. This sounds like a bad situation,perhaps because of the vague info, but still; the wrong situation for a Rottweiler. Like Will pointed out, we can't expect our dogs to decipher "good and evil" or "child and adult." You can't expect the dog to know the difference between a bad trespasser and Grandma who decided to come through the back door.

In the original post, it was stated that PP training would be a plus, and that serious effort would be made to obedience train the dog. I got the impression that the guy wanted a dog more for his bark than his bite. If you want a guard dog, spend the money and get a PP dog. If you want a dog to play the part without the liability, go with something else. There are plenty of nice dogs in resue that would fit the latter; there is one on our rescue program that is very vocally protective, I doubt his follow thru is very good, but still; is anyone going to test to see if the full grown adult male Rottweiler means what he says? Not likely.

Again, if the Rottweiler is what you want but you are worried about dominance, go with a bitch. Females are so much more naturally protective than the males. They fit the role of family member much better than the boys as well (little or no dominance issues).

Okay I don't want to hammer this thing into the ground but this subject is very important to me. I think the point of disagreement that we are having is not whether or not a dog is able to be discriminating at all, but rather how much a dog is able to discriminate. To help illustrate this I am pulling a quote from Will:

Quote from Will Rambeau posted 12-10-2004 10:32 PM:
"In personal protection, I strive to train dogs that will willing engage a bad guy not wearing a sleeve or bite suit, which act as keys to let a dog know that it's time to bite - and it's a lot harder to train a dog for this, plus many dogs ( including plenty of SchH titled dogs ) lack the ability to go civil on a bad guy."

So based on this quote I am assuming that there are "bad guy" criteria other than a bite suit and sleeve that trigger a dog to be aggressive (Will R. please correct me if I'm wrong or if this is not what you meant here).


Quote from Dana:
"Like Will pointed out, we can't expect our dogs to decipher "good and evil" or "child and adult." "

Let me reiterate my point as to a dog discerning "good and evil": I am not expecting a dog to decipher a person's intentions; however, I think that a person almost always gives away what their intentions are by their actions: demeanor, posture, and other behaviors that a dog CAN see and discern. True if someone is in your yard without permission then they are trespassing, but shouldn't a good dog recognize the difference between a shady character (adult burglar or whatever) and a wandering child? I believe that they should be at least that discerning. Now as far as a dog not being able to decipher "child and adult", I think you are simply wrong about this based on my personal observation and experience. I would correct/discourage my dogs from any type of aggression towards "little people" (i.e. anyone under 4 and 1/2 feet tall). I think this is a pretty safe bet unless my home is attacked by "Mini Me" ...


I would be very interested in hearing from those with experience in home PPDs and what criteria your dogs would utilize before attacking or being aggressive with someone. I do realize that these dogs are going to be suspicious of anyone outside of their pack. However, one of the things I like about some of the GSDs that I've seen is that they don't just randomly bark, lunge, and generally act aggressive in an indiscriminate fashion -- they are suspicious of all strangers but once the person has been accepted they act fine.

The dogs that I have now and have had in the past are not high drive dogs and it usually takes a certain type and sufficient amount of stimulation before they will bark at someone at all. I genuinely enjoy training dogs and have only just begun protection training (so far only aggressive display -- no bite work as I don't believe the adult dog I am working with now has the nerves for it). Once again, if by doing PP training I am making my dogs more of a risk (I am NOT speaking of legal risk or personal liability here) to children then I will stop doing this type of training. I believe that a bite trained dog should also be trained to be discriminating based on the situation. (size of the perpetrator, behavior, etc...)

Thanks again for the input and I don't think this is too far off the original topic of this post which involved protection dogs and the safety of children around them -- among other things.

And if the 12 year old boy who is tall for his age wanders into the "invisible fence" zone? Still a child by our standards, can a dog discern that this is a no-threat person? Or another loose dog wanders into the "invisible fence" zone and picks a fight with your dog? Are you going to pay to stitch him back together, if he comes out of the fight alive?

Perhaps the dog can discern adult/child, good/evil. But considering an actual fence will keep this guy from ever testing out whether or not his dog is capable of this, I don't see why you would risk it. There are so many variables that happen, even if the real fence is in place. If he wants the dog, he can get a fence.

Apparently I have failed to effectively communicate my point. I am not advocating against getting a fence. I would never leave any unsupervised dog in an unfenced area. I do train my dogs in an unfenced area and they do know the boundary of my yard. However, when I am not at home to supervise they are crated or in a fenced dog run.


Quote from Dana: "And if the 12 year old boy who is tall for his age wanders into the "invisible fence" zone?"

If a 12-year-old wandered into my unfenced yard when my dogs were out I would be there to handle the situation. There will always be questionable scenarios and I guess that IS my point: if you train a dog for protection and the dog has enough confidence to take on a "bad guy", how does the dog determine who the bad guy is? Will the dog attack anyone who climbs the fence or enters his area including small children?


Quote from Dana: "Or another loose dog wanders into the "invisible fence" zone and picks a fight with your dog? Are you going to pay to stitch him back together, if he comes out of the fight alive? "

This has happened and I was there to handle it.


My question goes back to the one that Jerry Messina and Tim Keller were getting at: "if you have a protection trained dog, does this make the dog inherently more dangerous to children or non-threatening adults?". My answer is "no" with the right training and the right dog; but in order to believe this you must acknowledge a dog's ability to be at least somewhat discriminating, not of intentions but behaviors.

I don't believe anyone ever said protection trained dogs are more likely to be dangerous or to bite. I think the point being made was that the actions of a dog are not 100% fullproof either way. On the one hand, a PP trained dog is under more control with its ammount of training. On the other hand, it is also more suspicious than the average dog because of its training. So does that make it more or less dangerous? As I said, I'm only minimally familiar with PP dogs.

Quote from Dana:
"I know at least one incident where an invisible fence failed to keep a child out of a yard with the "guard dog" and the kid was lucky to just have his leg ripped open."

Quote from Dana:
"I don't believe anyone ever said protection trained dogs are more likely to be dangerous or to bite."

How do you reconcile these two statements? Is there a difference between a protection trained dog and the "guard dog" that you mentioned in your earlier quote? I agree that there is never a 100% certainty on the actions of a dog but that is not my point. The "guard dog" that you mentioned sounds to me like a dangerous dog that would be great for a junkyard as it is behind a barb-wire fence, but I think people like Tim and myself are looking for a "guard dog" that is also trustworthy with our children and their friends. If such a dog does not exist then I too would opt for the drooly lab that Jerry mentioned. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />


Quote from Dana:
"On the other hand, it is also more suspicious than the average dog because of its training. So does that make it more or less dangerous? As I said, I'm only minimally familiar with PP dogs."

Yes this is true and I think a good question -- perhaps totally dependent on the training and the dog. I too have limited PPD experience and am just looking for input. Thanks Dana for your input.