One of my passions in veterinary medicine is behaviour. I have always enjoyed helping owners learn to live with their anxious, aggressive and/or compulsive animals. Well, almost eight years ago I got a graduation gift, an English Cocker Spaniel puppy.
Within two weeks, I knew I had my hands full. Kodak was showing signs of four different aggressions – impulse control aggression (aggression to two legged family members), fear aggression (aggression to men and young children), territory aggression (no one was allowed to take anything from him) and interdog aggression (to all dogs). My poor boy had to endure so much anxiety based on his genetically induced abnormal neurochemistry. You can imagine how heavy my heart was as dogs do not fully emotionally mature until they are three years of age. He was 11 weeks old!
There is nothing like living with a special needs dog and monitoring his body language. Over the years I have taken many pictures. The one I am showing here has many pieces of information.
Parents, this is very important body language that Kodak is showing. If you see your dog exhibiting this look, do NOT let your children of any age near him/her!
He is showing the whites of his eyes (whale eye) and his pupils are dilated (his fight or flight system is activated). His paw is on top of the roll. There is a slight wrinkle of his upper lips spreading out his whiskers. As well, there are wrinkles between the eyes. At this angle you cannot see how tense the rest of his body is. If approached, there is a very good chance he would bite since he is so anxious.
This is where I have two choices, take a picture and leave him to chew one of his favorite things, cardboard, or try to take it from him. Obviously, I chose to back away; thereby respecting his body language. The adorable tail wag was more than worth it!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ooh that look is so familiar! My old cocker (she died last year) used to have possession issues too. The very worst was when my dad would give her a huge raw knuckle bone from the butchers. She would freeze and hiss like a snake if you went anywhere near her. She was a lovely dog though and I miss her a lot.
ReplyDeleteNice blog, by the way. I've just happened upon it when I was googling photos of starlings.
Ok, just read your post on bones! :(
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