Simple answer, a good dog is hard to find.


A dog that has all the qualities necessary to do police patrol and detector work, real protection work, and good sport work. . .all while still having a good temperament that you can live with as a home companion is a very rare dog. Good temperament meaning social and not dog aggressive, not handler aggressive, and not overly hyper.


The bulk of the qualities necessary to do all of the above well are genetic, you can't train what isn't there to begin with.

Do you believe that a good working dog should be treated as a house companion, even if he has the temperment for it? Wouldn't it lesson his drive to want to work?
I think that when you start to treat a working dog as a house dog you run the risk of toning down some of the very drives that make him a good working dog. What's the point of working so hard when he's getting all the praise, attention and treats at home.
I'm sure there will be plenty of people who disagree with this so I'll admit I've never tried to condition a working dog to be a house companion.
Now lets get back to deciding what a good dog is.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What one person thinks is a good dog another may think otherwise. But there is no doubt, good WORKING dogs are getting hard to find. True breeders instead of puppy producers $$$$$$ may be the reason.

Are good dogs (good drives physically and mentally sound)harder to find or do they just cost a whole lot more than they used to?

When giving demos (police) without fail I get asked why the dogs cost so much and why we get them from Europe. I usually give a quick speech on how the AKC and the notion that bigger is better has led to the demise of the GSD in the US. BTW, I would love to go down the road or even vist a working dog club that has suitable candidates.

There are a some vendors who seem to be able to get a plethora of good (qualified) working dogs. However, they are getting more and more expensive.

I'm sure that there are good dogs being bred in this country even by folks on this board. They just don't seem to be available when I need one LOL

VanCamp wrote:
"The bulk of the qualities necessary to do all of the above well are genetic, you can't train what isn't there to begin with."

Excellent, VC!!! That's exactly what I was driving at <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> .

Kelvin wrote:
"Do you believe that a good working dog should be treated as a house companion, even if he has the temperment for it?"

Yes, this is my personal belief. It may not be feasible for some, which is fine. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. What good is having a protection dog, if he is locked up in a kennel all day and night?

"Wouldn't it lesson his drive to want to work? I think that when you start to treat a working dog as a house dog you run the risk of toning down some of the very drives that make him a good working dog. What's the point of working so hard when he's getting all the praise, attention and treats at home."

Absolutely not! A working dog lives and loves to work. My dogs don’t work at home—they snooze most of the time--it doesn’t take one iota off their drives. They don’t get much attention at home, nor praise, nor treats. A good working dog does not need to be bribed nor coerced to work—that’s the whole idea! Doesn’t apply to puppies, though—they can be bribed to their hearts’ content <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> . The hardest part of raising a working dog is surviving the puppy years. If done properly and with patience a working dog should naturally mature into whatever you want it to be, provided it’s all there to begin with (genetically).

Kelvin wrote: "I think that when you start to treat a working dog as a house dog you run the risk of toning down some of the very drives that make him a good working dog."


There are high scoring Schutzhund housedogs all over the world that disprove that statement.

There are also nice PSDs all over the world that prove that to be wrong as well.

I think it all depends on the dog, the handler, and the environment.

Is it hard to find a good dog because there are less good dogs than say 15 years ago or is it hard to find a good dog precisely because the standards we have now vs. 15 years ago are so much higher? how many "puppy tests" are out there now to determine working and sporting dog candidates? flinks' puppy test is one example of that.
for sport dogs, what is defined as a "good" dog appears to be different than just 15 years ago: i own the 1990 bsp tape from ed; look at the obedience and protection from that year and compare it to a recent bsp tape, or wusv or even our nationals. the dogs have to not only be more precise in all exercises, they have to be faster, "happy", and absolutely exact in the highest competitions. the protection in the 1990 bsp has dogs with chewy grips, dogs that are slow to out, forging in the heeling, etc. to say that those dogs back then were "harder, tougher, more real" dogs than today's schutzhund dogs is, in my opinion, to miss the point of today's more exact standards in competition: the dog has to have the quality of trainability to a higher degree than they used to and at the same time the handler has to be more precise in their training.
as i believe renee pointed out earlier, a working dog has to want to work anytime, anywhere. as a tool for determining a good working dog, i believe schutzhund is invaluable as an indicator of the quality of trainability, and for a dog to prove himself in competition before moving on to a working career as a psd or sar dog or what have you i believe the sport has a high value.
therefore, i think that to say finding a "good" dog is hard is exactly what all these tests and competitions have led to: the point of all the tests and competitions is to weed out, right from the beginning, the "unsuitable" dogs. so as we have higher standards and more knowledge now than say 15 years ago, it should follow that it is harder to find a good dog. just my opinion....

Well, that was basically my original question.
I have heard time and time again that the dogs these days "aren't what they used to be". I had suspicion that that this statement was just sort of a pat remark that didn't necessarily hold much truth.
Perhaps more people are "in" to the sport than ever before, but it's just hard to believe that it's so darn difficult to find a good working dog....and maybe our standards have just become more refined as you say.
However, I wonder if I could just post a few questions on this board, do a bit of surfing the net, and within a matter of days (or much less) be hooked up with a pup that will have more working dog traits than I'd probably ever care to handle! Can you imagine if you were looking for a good GSD back in 1975 without the internet, living in a rural area of the country...now THEN a good dog truly WOULD be hard to find!
By asking that original question, I was attempting to find out if there was maybe some other angle that I just wasn't seeing about these sorts of comments regarding the rarity of a good working dog.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Renee Felknor:
—what do you really see? A better dog or a better handler? I think it’s a better handler.

I agree, we're better trainers today.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Renee Felknor:
Do the dogs today have better trainability? Definitely not

Then I'd like to hear your definition of trainability. The characteristics that make a dog trainable to me include a willingness to accept leadership (I don't want to have to fight the dog for top spot every day), high motivation (today that comes in the form of strong prey drive for the toy), and medium sensitivity to physical corrections. Those are a dime a dozen these days.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Renee Felknor:
hard to find today is a dog still possessing genetic obedience and intelligence.

That "head full of sense" can be lacking sometimes, but I find it's almost always cuz of excessive prey drive. I do think you can have TOO much of a good thing.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Renee Felknor:
a SchH dog is not going to protect you from real danger unless you train for it specifically? My question is: why the hell not??? Why shouldn’t a dog as intelligent as a GSD, a dog which is famous for its NATURAL protective qualities, be able to discern between a real and “perceived” danger and act accordingly?

IMO, we've got a bit of a schizm in the so-called working lines. You've got your sport dog - super high prey, calm grips, often a 'beta' type dog, high threshold for defense. Then you've got dogs with a low threshold for defense, show more outright aggression, often combined with lower prey drive, greater handler hardness and dominance. The sport dogs have such a high threshold for defense that it is sometimes difficult to impress them - they don't recognize a threat. In addition, if they are the type to adopt the beta role and be willingly led, there is no reason for the lower ranking animal to defend the boss. It's the boss' job to defend the pack, and that's US.