Is Your Dog a Resource Guarder?
Resource guarding is a term used to describe behaviour displayed by dogs that are protecting precious resources. The dog has something of value to them and typically, they have learned from past experience that someone (person or dog) approaching means that they are likely to lose that resource. Genetics can play a role in how likely a dog is to resource guard. In resource guarding, the dog will do whatever they perceive as necessary to make sure the threat goes away. When obvious, this involves behaviours like: taking the item and running away, giving a hard stare, freezing, hunkering down over the item, growling, snarling and snapping. Less obvious signs can be subtle tensing of the body, flattened ears, lip curls, eating faster, etc.
Anything a dog values can trigger resource guarding: food, bully sticks, bones, toys, places (like a chair, bed, or crate) and people or other animals. Dogs can also learn to resource guard contraband (anything they randomly pick up from the ground) because they know we will try to take it away from them. Resource guarding is a survival instinct – in the wild, canids may need to vigorously defend their food to avoid losing it to other animals. Guarding is NORMAL.
So, while resource guarding is normal and understandable, it is a concern for family pets. Resource guarding is a common cause of bites, especially to children. Resource guarding can also trigger fights between dogs. It can make it difficult for us to get something dangerous away from our dogs. We can teach out dogs that it is not necessary to guard their stuff. Ideally, we start the process when they are very young puppies. We want them to learn to surrender items happily, in joyful anticipation that we are going to give them back something equal or better in value.
If you have an established resource guarder – it is important to seek help from a positive reinforcement-based training. Punishing resource guarding or using dominance-based approaches will tend to suppress the warning signs and push the dog into more dangerous behaviours if they are pushed beyond their ability to cope. Resource guarding prevention exercises need to be modified if your dog is already showing established resource guarding behaviours.
If you have a young puppy, now is the time to work on resource guarding prevention exercises. Here a couple of exercises aimed at helping your dog have happy anticipation for something nice in return when they surrender a valued resource.
TRADE: Teach your puppy to happily ‘trade’ one item for another. Wait for him to pick something up and approach with a treat in your closed hand. Cue him to drop the item with a verbal cue such as drop, give, out or mine, then slide the closed hand with the treat in it close to his mouth and pause for him to sniff the treat – at which point he will likely open his mouth and drop the item. Use a verbal marker or click and open your hand to let him take the treat. Repeat 5-6 times and then do the same, using the same hand gesture but with NO treat in your hand. When he drops the item, mark (verbal or clicker) and then give the treat. Keep working the exercise and gradually fade away the closed fist under the chin. When your dog immediately drops items when you give the verbal cue you can start fading the visual cue of your fist beneath the chin
EXCHANGE GAMES: Teach your puppy to anticipate something great if you reach for something he has. Start teaching this with low value items. You want to have two identical items (toy, low value chew, bowl with a handful of cheerios etc.). Let your puppy have one of the items and hold the other behind your back so your puppy cannot see it. Let him enjoy the item for a while, then gently remove it, pulling it away to one side. Immediately slide in the other item from the other side. We are trying to establish a predictive sequence – when you take something, I can expect something of equal or better value in return. It is important that your puppy does not see the new item until immediately after the first item is removed. Work with low value items until you can see that your puppy is anticipating the return items as soon as you remove the first. Typically, this will be manifested by the puppy turning his attention away from the first item and looking in the direction that the new items comes in. Once you have this you can start building up slowly to more valuable items.
UPGRADES: While your dog is eating, walk by them and as you pass toss a special, high value treat into their bowl – or as close as you can get it. Make sure it is better than what is in their bowl. Once you have tossed, keep moving on.
Other things to consider:
While we want our dogs to happily surrender items to us on cue, we also want our dogs to be able to enjoy special items undisturbed. Teach children and other family members to leave the dog alone when they are eating or enjoying special treats. If you want to give special items to multiple dogs in the household, establish separate areas for them to enjoy these items without another dog trying to take it away from them.