Have you ever noticed that most of the time, a dog’s fart is silent?
Often, we will be sitting around watching t.v. or working on the computer, when we catch the waft of a full bodied bouquet.
At first, it is unclear where this distinctive smell originates from, but quickly we trace it back to one More ...
Aggression is an overloaded word.
It can mean anything from staring, jumping, showing teeth, lunging, growling, barking, or the terrible B-word – biting.
Usually, aggression is used to describe dogs that overact to a stimuli (e.g. another dog, a stranger, food).
Reactivity is a new, perhaps less negative term, coined to describe the same behavior. More ...
Do you get embarrassed when your dog misbehaves in public?
When I first got Shiba Sephy I was constantly embarrassed by him. Being a Shiba, he is not very interested in being a model citizen, and more interested in doing whatever he wants.
I took him out on five 30-45 minute walks per day to get rid More ...
The Squirrel Instinct is present in all dogs.
Dogs are predators, and all of them have some amount of prey drive. Prey drive can differ significantly based on breed, upbringing, environment, and other factors.
The Squirrel Instinct often gets a lot of attention because a bushy tail dashing amongst branches on a tree can suddenly turn More ...
Many Shiba Inu owners will tell you that “mine” is the first and most favorite Shiba word.
Shibas think that everything, including food, toys, the house, the neighborhood, and even their supposed owners, belong to them.
If not properly handled, many Shiba Inus, and indeed dogs in general can get aggressive about guarding their resources. Shibas More ...
It is an old story.
Girl leaves boy. Boy gets lonely and depressed. Boy poops all over girl’s clean carpets.
Girl comes home and is angry and disappointed by boy’s actions. Boy gives girl a very endearing look, and many “apologetic” licks.
Girl forgives boy and the cycle continues.
So is it vengeance poop or something else?
Dogs, it turns More ...
I got an interesting comment from Mark the other day on my Shiba Inu Personality article –
Females are the alpha of this species, not the males. If there are two pregnant females in the pack, they will fight to the death. I think mine really is a cat in dogs clothing. She’s friendly to More ...
Operant conditioning does not mean reward training.
Operant conditioning actually encapsulates both reward and aversive training. In its simplest form, operant conditioning says that to shape a dog’s behavior, we can either add or take away a reward stimulus (positive reinforcement, negative punishment); or we can add or take away an aversive stimulus (positive punishment, negative More ...
Dogs are dogs, and they are not human.
This is a true statement.
According to Wikipedia,
Currently, the domestic dog is listed as a subspecies of Canis lupus, C. l. familiaris.
We humans are not part of that evolutionary tree, so it is true that dogs are not human. However, there is a tendency on our parts to More ...
Are bad dogs simply untrained or were they born bad?
Some people believe that certain bad dog behaviors are a result of bad breeding while others believe that they are wholly the result of bad dog training.
The truth, as always, is somewhere in-between.
Breeding and breed does contribute to a dog’s temperament and behaviors. Some dogs More ...
