I found this site while trawling the web after having taken care of a dog for one week--she was a 9 year old irish wolf hound/gryphon/whoknowswhat mix. She was instantly friendly with my wife, myself, my son but snarling at my 6 year old daughter who she would not even let approach her. Obviously, I kept them apart but we had a couple of close calls. This all set me wondering as I grew up with dogs and with friends who had dogs, so while I do not have the experience of many on this site, I have seen and been exposed to hundreds of dogs as a child and adult. I have only seen this behavior twice before. One was a dog that a family (insanely in my opinion) kept despite the vet's assertion that the dog likely suffered from distemper rendering it a bit aggressive. The second was a dog directly descended from a famous sleigh pulling team in Alaska. This dog (which seemed part wolf) was so 'wild' that it would only breed if allowed to fight for its mate and build a cavern in the snow. So in one case, a mentally unstable dog and in the second, a dog one might argue is not fully domesticated. This set me then to searrch what domestication consisted of historically. Most agree that originally dogs brought into domestication were probably less trustable, expressed their dominance and essentially partly wild. Breeding over thousands of years has enriched their genetic traits to be friendly, loyal, adept at a particular job, etc. If a dog snarled at the kids 2000 years ago, it was killed. Simple as that. Could it be that we are seeing a genetic drift back to traits that are no longer being selected against. I ask this since I hear so many more people talk about dominance issues with dogs...I know this view is a bit extreme. But while I find the training recommendations spelled out by Leeburg quite realistic (I trained my dogs pretty much along the lines he has outlined) I also dealt with many poorly trained dogs (pulled at the leash, jumped up on people, did not come back when called, etc.) but never felt that the lack of training had anything to do with dominance but simply bad training. In other words, I feel the dog's nature is a central key to a good family. I am interested what others think.

You can take the dog out of the pack but you cannot take the pack out of the dog. In other words, despite domestication (which ends up selecting for juvenile traits), dogs are fundamentally still what they are.

The problems you've described I think stem from poor ownership choices. If Dog A was indeed riddled with distemper, that cannot be factored as a normal case as that's a health condition. Dog B I think had a few loose screws. Why in the ever loving world was he bred, I don't think I'll ever know. He should never have been bred because those crazy traits could have been passed down.

Your lurcher-type (wolfhound mix) was aggressive with your daughter because he saw himself as under you, your wife, and your son, but over your daughter. Was your daughter timid around the dog? Had you enforced the fact that she was a leader over the dog as well, the dog probably would have acted very differently.

I don't think we have a genetic drift going on here, I believe we have way too many "breeders" out there not having a clue when they put two dogs together and too many owners uninformed about proper leadership. Bad training as well, of course; if there is no leadership, training just doesn't go quite as far.

Dominance issues begin with the selection of the dog. Say it's a puppy. How are the parents? What are they known for? If the dam is on sight, is she approachable or do the breeders put her away because she can be nasty? With the litter, does the pup in question bully all the others, is it a middle ground pup, or a shy pup? With the new owners, does the pup have proper ground rules and leadership and training or is it allowed to do whatever it wants because "it's just a dog?"

And you thought it would be easily cut and dried.

If you are asking how the parents are...well then it's genetics. WHo knows.. this was a 9 year old dog! This stated, I came to the same conclusion as you...she put herself above my daughter and below the rest of the family. FACTS were sternly and quickly enforced. The dog profoundly looked regrettful each time...but could not accept her place at the bottom of the pecking order. What I am saying here is that is it possible that I encountered 100s of dogs and merely lucked out that none were agressive but a psycho case and one that was indeed part wild? I do wonder if it is cut and dry. Short of a tortured animal, I am beginning to suspect that nature trumps nuture. A badly trained dog may pull at your leash, but will not threaten a child if its nature is good.

I'm having trouble getting past your two examples; distemper has nothing to do with temperament, so not sure what it has to do with the dog being aggressive.
Wild dogs or wolves will readily breed with or without someone to fight with. Not to mention, wolves are not considered a good cross into sled dog teams, so the dogs are usually husky or hound crosses- NOT wolf crosses. So if this dog wouldn't breed a readily available bitch in season without someone to fight with, there's more wrong there than lack of domestication.
I think dogs do sometimes have an instant dislike to individuals, but still feel that has to do with the dog not knowing it's status in the household.
Did I miss the point completely?
vickie

Here are some links that discuss "genetic drift." I'm not a biologist, and this reply is my first attempt to understand this concept. This reply is a sort of written "thinking aloud."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_drift

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/IIIDGeneticdrift.shtml

http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9036394/genetic-drift

I'm not sure what you are describing can be attributed to genetic drift. It seems unlikely it is a result of genetic drift resulting from some "founder effect" like one of the many genetic condition common in modern specific dog breeds, although this too is possible if the dog were a pure breed (a genetic aggression problem was a major issue for St. Bernard breeders some years ago).

There seem to be conflicting views on how the process of domestication (the original evolution of the "village dog" from wild canids) affects canine aggression, and the more recent concern of how modern selective breeding affects canine aggression.

I do not think it is at all clear that dogs are less aggressive than their wolf-like progenitors. It must depend on definition of aggression, breed, etc. wolves may have more "hunt" and "prey" drive, but this is a very different form of aggression than aggression between pack-mates, for example, or against humans.

Today's third world village dogs are still keen competitors for resources, and therefore capable of limited aggression especially with each other. My wife met a very bold street dog in Athens very intent on food in her back pack, showing that some will try to take resources by force from humans: much like a ball crazy ACD or GSD. Therefore aggression is no doubt a part of "natural selection" of dogs which is the opposite of qualities selected by genetic drift.

Conversely, village dogs that show aggression toward humans, and prey motivated aggression toward domestic prey species (chickens, ducks, sheep) need to have a mechanism to inhibit prey motivated aggression or inappropriate aggression toward humans, and no doubt this is naturally selected for as well. Raymond and Laura Coppinger in their book "Dogs" discuss this inhibitory effect at length, including explaining how important early conditioning is to this inhibitory process. It would seem that this sort of inhibition of prey drive is much more important for domestic dogs than for wild canids.

Also, village dogs no doubt "avoided" a lot of conflict. I'm certain that guardian breeds are selected to NOT avoid conflict, although in fact most still do avoid most conflicts, if possible.

I'd also note that wolves to function in a pack also need to have inhibitory elements to aggression. It is also clear that pure wolves are far less aggressive toward humans than dogs as a rule.

All I would conclude is that in wolves, "village dogs" and modern selectively bred dogs that there is a tension between both aggression and prey drives, and the inhibitions necessary for survival and success. Some of this is genetic, much depends on conditioning. Therefore, aggression problems are likely to always be with us.

I don't think there will ever be a population of dogs that has no aggression, in the way certain populations of humans lack certain blood types as a result of founder effect and genetic drift.

So my answer to your question: the problem you describe, I bet has nothing to do with genetic drift.

rgds, Andrew May

by the way for various reasons I doubt the famous sled dogs in alaska had wolf blood in them.

I note sled dogs that hsve intensedrive to pull can be scrappy, but this is not always the case.

Good post, Andrew!

David, you must remember that dogs are individuals. I've encountered GSDs with the temperament of Goldens, I regularly get to deal with a dominant, somewhat aggressive beagle, I've seen a sheltie that had the absolute worst temperament ever, and of course I've met dogs that exemplified the desired breed traits. Dogs with temperaments against their standard, case in point the aforementioned beagle (totally opposite of what's called for) are typically poorly bred and don't have good genetics to begin with. Right there, you're starting off with an uphill battle. If you're not solid in EVERYTHING, you will encounter problems.

If your wolfhound mix had the typical, catlike, "who cares" sighthound attitude things may have been different. As it were, you just happened to have an individual that was more conscious of rank than usual who either saw right through your daughter or realized that any attempts at leadership coming from her or reinforced by you in relation to her were halfhearted and not serious. I'd hazard a guess that your wolfhound mix was actually a normal dog that needed stronger, firmer, clearer leadership and discipline than what you were used to. Some people are lucky and never own a dog that needs leadership, only owning dogs that will be submissive to them no matter how lacking the leadership and training are.

Think about the experience you had with that wolfhound mix and try to dissect all interactions you and your family had with it. If you can pinpoint where the leadership was lacking and where it was strong, you can better prepare yourself when you do acquire a dog with those traits.