A Dog’s Best Friend - Jan Fennell

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would elect me leader of their own free will. There would be no need for violence, coercion or subjugation. The dogs would simply be listening to their instincts. What’s more, as long as I remained a convincing Alpha, they would follow my lead – again as their instincts told them to.

      Slowly, falteringly at first, I began to put together a system of signals, to be used at the four key times so that I could establish myself as leader of my own domestic pack. When we reunited after a separation I made sure we did so on my terms and at a time of my choosing, as a leader would do. I did this by ignoring any attention-seeking, waiting until the dogs calmed down, then calling them to me. In a similar vein I made sure the dogs were calm before leading them out on our walks. At the same time, I began to take charge of situations when there was a perceived danger to the pack. Here, if the dogs barked or got excited at the sign of a visitor at the door, I simply thanked them for alerting me to the danger, thereby relieving them of the responsibility of worrying. Finally, I took charge of mealtimes, taking a mouthful of a snack before laying down the food for my dogs to eat. Again, the idea was that if I was in control of the food then I must be the leader of the domestic pack. Throughout the process, I underscored everything with positive reinforcement, using food rewards to help speed the message that if they did the right thing, good things happened.

      It was like watching a minor miracle take place. Over the following weeks and months, I was able to watch as our levels of communication improved beyond all recognition. And their behaviour improved enormously too – as did my enjoyment of life with them. One thing led to another, and soon I found myself using my method to help other people overcome problems with their dogs. By the mid 1990s, I had taken my first tentative steps into full-time ‘troubleshooting’, with my own small business.

      It was an exhilarating period in my life. What made it all the more exciting was the way it crystallised some of the important lessons I’d been given earlier in my life. I began to see that in my earlier life I had been given many pointers as to the way ahead. Encounters I had forgotten in the past suddenly began to take on new meanings. The respect I already felt for those wise voices of my youth now grew deeper than ever.

      I saw, for instance, the wisdom of old heads such as my Uncle Jim and how right he was in believing we should go along with an animal’s instincts, and to trust its nature to show us the right way to do things. By adopting this philosophy with my own dogs, I had been shown the way ahead. I understood the significance of what Jim Moss had taught me about respecting your dog – and the rewards that flowed from that. I saw too the importance of my cousin Doreen’s idea that dogs have feelings.

      At the root of my new-found thinking about how best to get dogs to comply with my wishes, was the idea of dogs’ innate selfishness, the ‘What’s in It for Me’ principle, as illustrated by Uncle George as he persuaded Rex to stay off his rose beds. Now, here I was using the idea that it is far better to work with the dog than against it, using positive reinforcement to underline key messages.

      I had gleaned so much from listening and watching other people and their dogs. But as I began to use my new-found knowledge, I was certain there was plenty more to learn, both from the present and the past. And I wasn’t wrong.

       LIVING IN THE REAL WORLD

       Why great owners know their limits

      It goes without saying that most owners want the best for their dogs. It is the most natural thing in the world to want to provide your pet with as happy, contented and fulfilling a life as you possibly can. Yet life, as we all know, is never that straightforward. We have our dreams but real life has a habit of getting in the way of them and when that happens, we are faced with some stark choices.

      In my view, the way owners respond to the realities of dog ownership defines them as clearly as anything else. The really great owners I’ve met have all had a strong sense of the limitations they face. I have come across many outstanding people in this respect, but few were more impressive than Terry and Sandra, a couple I met at the very beginning of my career as a ‘dog listener’.

      Terry and Sandra lived in a village near the Humber Bridge, a short drive from my home back in the 1990s, the small town of Winterton, in North Lincolnshire. They had been having severe problems with their crossbred dog Guinness and had heard of me from friends in the area. ‘We’re very concerned about him,’ Terry said when he telephoned me. ‘If we can’t improve his behaviour we’re afraid it’s going to end badly.’

      When I went to visit them, I was still working full time for the local social services department. I had formulated my method and had helped a few people improve their dogs’ behaviour, but the idea of doing it professionally had not really occurred to me. My encounter with Guinness almost persuaded me to give up before I’d really started.

      Terry and Sandra had got Guinness from a rescue centre, where he’d arrived as one of three abandoned puppies. When he first moved in at the age of ten weeks, he had been lively but manageable. Now, at the age of two and a half, Guinness was a giant of a dog. He must have weighed ten stone and was so massive you could have put a saddle on him. He was one of the most obvious examples of an Alpha Male dog I had ever encountered. No one was going to tell him what to do.

      Terry and Sandra reeled off incident after incident in which Guinness had refused to listen to them. If they told him to sit, he would stand there looking at them with disdain written all over his face. If they told him to leave a room he would stand firm. When he was younger, Terry had been able physically to remove him. He was now so big and powerful, even that option was no longer available.

      He was equally stubborn when he wanted something from them. Guinness would routinely take hold of Terry or Sandra’s trouser leg or shirtsleeve and try to drag them in the direction of whatever it was he wanted. Their protests were usually in vain and both had got used to caving in.

      They had both owned dogs in the past and knew this was a situation that just couldn’t go on. But nothing they did seemed to help. Guinness had been taken to training classes locally but he had grabbed the trainer’s arm with such force they were told he was ‘too stupid’ to be trained. Terry and Sandra were loving owners and they thought the world of Guinness. But he was already aggressive towards strangers, squaring up to them and barking loudly in their faces and their concern was that this defiance was leading in only one direction.

      ‘It’s only a matter of time before he does something worse – and that will be the end of him,’ Terry told me.

      The success I had helping other people with their dogs had given me some confidence that I could help. My method was based on the idea that dogs’ problems stem from their mistaken belief that they are the leader of their domestic pack and that their owners contribute to this by behaving as if they are indeed subordinate members of that pack. The only way to correct this was by getting the owner to replace the dog at the head of the domestic hierarchy by means of a bloodless coup, using a visual language the dog can understand to get the message across. This was something that would be implemented gradually at the four key moments in the pack’s daily routine – when they reunited after separation, at times of perceived danger, at mealtimes and when out on the walk. I would begin the process myself during my visit, but after that it would be up to the owner to keep it going over the days, weeks, months (and even years!) ahead.

      There was no question in my mind that Guinness saw himself as leader. Even when speaking to Terry on the phone, I had immediately known what the disdainful look he described was all about. It was Guinness’ way of saying: ‘Excuse me, who are you, telling me what to do?’ The way he gave me a similar look when I arrived at the house only confirmed this.

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