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Aha! Now we're to the root of it!
Yes, fear aggressive behavior -- in most cases, with most dogs -- is "just" a display. When it comes to effective livestock guardianship, it also happens to be a display that does 100% of the job, about 99.9% of the time.
In that rare instance where an aggressive display doesn't move a threat along, you're right...the dog has a choice to make.. The dog can either leave, or it can stay and see what happens.
These dogs don't leave. Perhaps that's where they differ from most fear-aggressive dogs you've had interaction with.. Perhaps you believe that even disqualifies the dog from being labeled as fear aggressive because it doesn't fit the idea you have in mind.. But understand that I went round and round and round with mine for days on end before he finally decided it was best if he simply went the other way when I came around....and I knew exactly what I was doing!
Have you ever known a standoff between two animals to last for DAYS and be that well thought-out? Of course not! Something either happens, or it doesn't, and it's usually takes but seconds.
See, what you've failed to take into account is that the threat also has a decision to make, and the LGD -- fearful though it may be -- will at the very least stand there in the face of the threat until the threat makes its decision. Period. If the threat decides to fight, it's ON...whether its defense drive or pack drive or whatever that takes over once the dog's actually in the fight is completely irrelevant to livestock guardianship at that point! Fear aggression is what brought it to face the threat, and when it comes to livestock guardianship, something clicking and causing the dog to get "ticked off" at a threat is what matters the most.
And, you're right...it's definitely an IF when it comes to actually fighting for most LGDs.. A good LGD will fight when necessary, but is happy to back something off without actually fighting. The ones who started fights -- especially in breeds like the Sarplaninac -- probably didn't last long enough to breed, considering they were used as defense against BEARS.
Talk about chlorine in the gene pool...a bear...are you kidding me?!?
So if the threat decides to leave, that should be fine with the dog as well. Yo the LGD owner, that's actually much preferred in terms of temperament. Like I said, a dog that seeks out threat and picks a fight immeidately is a dog you're going to have to replace and/or pay to have repaired.
But make no mistake -- these dogs don't leave in the face of a threat, no matter how scared they are at what they're about to go up against. If it happens to be a bear, and if the bear decides to fight...the dog will fight the bear. Hopefully, that never becomes the case. If it's a 60lb coyote that decides to fight a 150+lb LGD...well, that coyote won't lend its genetics to future generations, just as the bear-fighting-dog won't....which is, one could argue, why that doesn't happen very often at all.
I suppose one could say these things tend to work themselves out over time.
Seriously, though...does it make more sense now what I'm saying?
Aha! Now we're to the root of it!
Yes, fear aggressive behavior -- in most cases, with most dogs -- is "just" a display. When it comes to effective livestock guardianship, it also happens to be a display that does 100% of the job, about 99.9% of the time.
In that rare instance where an aggressive display doesn't move a threat along, you're right...the dog has a choice to make.. The dog can either leave, or it can stay and see what happens.
These dogs don't leave. Perhaps that's where they differ from most fear-aggressive dogs you've had interaction with.. Perhaps you believe that even disqualifies the dog from being labeled as fear aggressive because it doesn't fit the idea you have in mind.. But understand that I went round and round and round with mine for days on end before he finally decided it was best if he simply went the other way when I came around....and I knew exactly what I was doing!
Have you ever known a standoff between two animals to last for DAYS and be that well thought-out? Of course not! Something either happens, or it doesn't, and it's usually takes but seconds.
See, what you've failed to take into account is that the threat also has a decision to make, and the LGD -- fearful though it may be -- will at the very least stand there in the face of the threat until the threat makes its decision. Period. If the threat decides to fight, it's ON...whether its defense drive or pack drive or whatever that takes over once the dog's actually in the fight is completely irrelevant to livestock guardianship at that point! Fear aggression is what brought it to face the threat, and when it comes to livestock guardianship, something clicking and causing the dog to get "ticked off" at a threat is what matters the most.
And, you're right...it's definitely an IF when it comes to actually fighting for most LGDs.. A good LGD will fight when necessary, but is happy to back something off without actually fighting. The ones who started fights -- especially in breeds like the Sarplaninac -- probably didn't last long enough to breed, considering they were used as defense against BEARS.
Talk about chlorine in the gene pool...a bear...are you kidding me?!?
So if the threat decides to leave, that should be fine with the dog as well. Yo the LGD owner, that's actually much preferred in terms of temperament. Like I said, a dog that seeks out threat and picks a fight immeidately is a dog you're going to have to replace and/or pay to have repaired.
But make no mistake -- these dogs don't leave in the face of a threat, no matter how scared they are at what they're about to go up against. If it happens to be a bear, and if the bear decides to fight...the dog will fight the bear. Hopefully, that never becomes the case. If it's a 60lb coyote that decides to fight a 150+lb LGD...well, that coyote won't lend its genetics to future generations, just as the bear-fighting-dog won't....which is, one could argue, why that doesn't happen very often at all.
I suppose one could say these things tend to work themselves out over time.
Seriously, though...does it make more sense now what I'm saying?
So if your LGD is in a large field and a wolf comes to attack the flock/herd/group of ________ animals the dog has two choices. It either decides the threat to ITSELF is too great to act and leaves or its insticts/genetics (whatever you want to call the inbred desire to guard) kicks in as a guardian and it threatens-chases-attacks (or some combination of those actions) to make the wolf go away.
Yes an LGD or other type of guarding dog should act aggressively to a threat. Acting is one thing, doing is another. However not all aggressive acts are fear driven.
Wow.. See, now I think we've actually been on the same page the entire time. I think it was that one little sticking point that held us up that entire time: what constitutes "acting on a threat."
I was approaching it from an LGD owner standpoint, where acting on a threat means showing aggression to it and trying to make it run away.. You were looking at it as when an actual altercation begins to take place..
All makes perfect sense now.
What I couldn't get my head around, and what I still can't get my head around when other people -- not you -- simply refuse to admit that these dogs are, in fact, fearful yet will say they're "wary" and "act on threats." If the dog was fearless, it would never be wary... If the dog was fearless, it would never feel threatened...
That never made sense to me except for one explanation: LGD owners are shy to call their dogs fearful because it makes them seem "lesser" than they are.
I just don't think that's true, though. I think my adult LGD is an edgy, wary, scaredy fraidy cat in a 150lb Molosser body who doesn't know what it means to run away or presever himself. He's wired wrong; if his forebearers weren't massively gigantic, he wouldn't exist today. Period. If his forebearers had been border-collie-sized and had that same temperament, challenging wolves and whatnot, his whole line would have been wiped out centuries ago.
Who cares?!!?
All that matters is that, to a coyote or some random neighbor mutt trying to come over and kill my goats, his size and "bad wiring" makes him a serious hazard to their health..
And for that, to me....well, he's just the best dog in the world and I love him to pieces. I also feel like, knowing his temperament and knowing that he's basically a sensitive, high-strung stoic, I know how to handle him a little better. And I think that makes me a better LGD papa.
Yes an LGD or other type of guarding dog should act aggressively to a threat. Acting is one thing, doing is another. However not all aggressive acts are fear driven.
Wow.. See, now I think we've actually been on the same page the entire time. I think it was that one little sticking point that held us up that entire time: what constitutes "acting on a threat."
I was approaching it from an LGD owner standpoint, where acting on a threat means showing aggression to it and trying to make it run away.. You were looking at it as when an actual altercation begins to take place..
All makes perfect sense now.
What I couldn't get my head around, and what I still can't get my head around when other people -- not you -- simply refuse to admit that these dogs are, in fact, fearful yet will say they're "wary" and "act on threats." If the dog was fearless, it would never be wary... If the dog was fearless, it would never feel threatened...
That never made sense to me except for one explanation: LGD owners are shy to call their dogs fearful because it makes them seem "lesser" than they are.
I just don't think that's true, though. I think my adult LGD is an edgy, wary, scaredy fraidy cat in a 150lb Molosser body who doesn't know what it means to run away or presever himself. He's wired wrong; if his forebearers weren't massively gigantic, he wouldn't exist today. Period. If his forebearers had been border-collie-sized and had that same temperament, challenging wolves and whatnot, his whole line would have been wiped out centuries ago.
Who cares?!!?
All that matters is that, to a coyote or some random neighbor mutt trying to come over and kill my goats, his size and "bad wiring" makes him a serious hazard to their health..
And for that, to me....well, he's just the best dog in the world and I love him to pieces. I also feel like, knowing his temperament and knowing that he's basically a sensitive, high-strung stoic, I know how to handle him a little better. And I think that makes me a better LGD papa.
