Sorry for misquoting myself .
I got distracted my my pup stealing my close from the hamper.

A.
My answer remains the same. I was referring to people who teach rolling your dog is the solution to behavior problems.

B.
Dogs are social animals. In every social group their needs to be a leader. Being and social and being a pack are two different things but very similar things. A pack is much more rigid and defined and is generally family oriented and in wolves temporary. If I do not lead my dog will. I make the conscience decision to lead.

But maybe our differences at least in part are semantical an we not agreeing on the necessary and sufficient conditions of what constitutes a pack

Well, there are many on this board who "say" that pack dynamics is a crucial aspect of dog behavior, and I'll bet money that a whole lot of them are not recommending alpha rolls as behavior-problem solutions.

I've done alpha rolls. That was back in the bad old days when people knew this is something wolves do and dogs are related to wolves so people just made their own way with that knowledge. This was with a dominant hard GSD and I realize now that wasn't the smartest thing to do but I got away with it that time and with that dog.

Currently however I think that if you do the proper ground work such techniques won't be needed and if there are behavior problems there are far safer ways to deal with them. Where were these great videos, dominant and prong collars back then? Oh, that's right we didn't have DVDs back then and VHS was pretty new. Just showing my age.

Now that I had time to read the articles and comments a little more thoroughly I do agree on some points. I think it's the structure that matters most. Set in place a structure and a set of rules the dog has to follow and enforce those rules and the dog sees you as the pack leader. The particular rule however can vary and does vary from pack to pack even in wolves and feral dogs. If food isn't a scarce resource the pack rules over feeding can become more relaxed. When food becomes scarce however the rules change and this causes strife within the pack until the feeding order is worked out. This is why we want to be consistent with domesticated dogs. We don't want competition and strife in the human/dog pack. Whether this is for food or furniture isn't as important as the fact that the rules are established and consistently enforced.

As Shiela pointed out this works just as well with the rest of the family. When there is structure there is less tension and the overall strife within the pack/family is reduced and you have a calm submissive dog as well as calm submissive teenagers.

Actually I do depart from the pack structure video on the subject of toys, at least in Molly's case. I allow her to have toys and bring them to me if she wants to play. From what I've seen in wolves and dogs it's often the lower ranking pack members who initiate play. They act as the morale officer. With a different dog I might do this differently.

Breed also comes into play here. Molly is mostly a lab and labs have been bred to be less possessive over toys. That's what makes them good retrievers. Food however is a different situation. Molly was dumped and went without proper food until we took her in so she is possessive over her food. Because of this I enforce rules on feeding. People eat first and Molly doesn't bother them. Once the people are fed the cats get fed then it's Molly's turn.

The GSD above however had no issues with food since I got her as a very young puppy and she always had enough food. Lady was possessive about the bed. That was why I did the alpha roll when she challenged me over the bed. It was nice when she was a puppy to let her curl up on the bed but when she reached 80lbs and pushed me onto the floor that was another matter so I started making her sleep on the floor and she challenged me.

So you see the two situations resulted in different rules but as long as they are consistent and fair they work equally well within the pack/family structure. Where people run into trouble is when they are not consistent. If you let the dog eat off your plate after you finish with it one day and scold the dog for eating off your plate while it's sitting on the table and you are talking on the phone you will get a dog who steals food because in the dog's mind the rule wasn't consistently enforced.

@Jennifer
That's probably part of the basis of domestication to begin with. Current theory or at least the latest theories I've seen suggest that dogs descended from less dominant wolves drawn to human settlements by the left over food. Once people realized they could use these animals they started the domestication process. From there the different breeds emerged depending on what was wanted in the dog. I like what someone said before about it not being a matter of "nature vs nurture" but one of "nature & nurture". If early dogs weren't so malleable I doubt they would have made very good domestic pets and working dogs. Look at the problems people have with wolf and wolf hybrids today. I agree with the statements above. Wolves and wolf hybrids don't make good pets. In fact no wild animal makes a good pet.

Matt I agree on several points. One thing I will just elaborate on is in regards to feeding, feast, famine etc.

In times of large quantities of game and food sources, more packs are formed as higher ranking betas or the surplus of pups that survived thanks to better conditions leave. So packs being smaller makes for less "strict" hierarchy standards/structure as there are fewer pack members to manage, territories will be smaller. This goes for any time pack numbers are low, however.

When food is plentiful there is still a set guideline for consumption of large prey animals - alphas eat most of the organs, this gives them a stronger more identifiable scent and darker pigmentation also. This does not change when game is plentiful except that there tends to be more waste left.

Smaller packs always seem less "structured" and "strict" - in larger packs there are more members to manage and more possitions to obtain or fall from. Each wolf fills a niche, a purpose in the pack. Wolves are specialists, just as dogs are. They also have drive variance.

From being around wolves, wolfdogs, and various dog breeds I will tell you that most people would be very surprised what can happen with experienced, skilled, very knowledgable handling and proper raising -vs- a total lack therof in regards to ANY animal but here specifically, the dog, the wolf, and the wolfdog. Dogs can become "wild" or they can become man's best friend.

I wonder if that holds true for coyotes. The wolves I was around was at a place a few miles away. He used to raise wolves to sell to zoos and reintroduction projects but he stopped raising wolves several years ago.

More recently I've been observing a coyote pack in our area. Last summer I got a night scope and set up a blind in the back yard overlooking a wooded area behind a hay field. I've seen the coyotes several times over the summer. Going to try it again this year.

Matt I don't know much about Coyotes. I know a bit more about foxes but not from first hand personal experience. I would not try to give an opinion on the social hierarchy system of coyotes because I have no experience with them.

In regards to wolves, the raising and handling of them plays a huge part. I won't say that dogs are the exact same as wolves in the same living conditions but quite close - depending also on breed, drive variance etc. Wolves are not pets by any stretch of imagination but raising wolves I notice people tend to treat them like they don't trust them. You must be experienced and very knowledgable to safely handle or raise one, yes, but it's almost as if people don't understand what to do with their own experience and knowledge.

I know from first hand experience that leaving a dog/pup in a wild state with other dogs/pups has a HUGE effect on social behavior/pack drive etc. Not having contact with humans for the 1st weeks or months of life, Duke(the dog in my sigpic) was a wild little beastie! And always will be to a degree.

I think that if we have to debate how similar dogs are to wolves or not, all the more so one should be skeptical about making comparison to other species. I don't know a thing about coyotes (except from Road Runner, lol), but jackals are completely different in terms of their social structure and behaviour. Much of that comes, I don't doubt, from the fact that they don't hunt large prey animals and so don't have to hunt as a pack like wolves do. Clearly, if you have to cooperate with other members of your pack to bring down a moose, you have to have a well defined hierarchy and probably specialised roles. But I suspect that coyotes also hunt smaller mammals, and birds (like road runners?), rather than elk.

I'll have to watch for pack behavior more closely. They do work in packs around here. That much I could see last summer and when they howl you can tell it's a large pack (10-15 at least in close proximity).

They mostly hunt small game (lost a lot of cats over the years). I've also seen them run deer but I've never found a deer carcass I could definitely attribute to coyotes killing it. Seen a number who have been eaten on by coyotes but no way of telling if it was lost by a hunter or the coyotes did the killing. Just too much time had passed between the time the deer died and the time I find the carcass.

Can't say I've ever been afraid of any wolves and I know I've never been afraid of any dog. I think, "respect" is the term to use. Dogs and wolves can smell fear a mile away and if you fear them you have no chance working with them successfully. Dennis (the person I mentioned above) always made sure that anyone who would be working in or around the animal enclosures knew they were wild creatures and no matter how docile they may act one minute that can change in an instant. If anyone didn't believe he could show the scars from a lynx that attacked him when he wasn't careful.