Get 'Em Under Control with ... Play?

It occurred to me today that I had looked at something repeatedly without ever seeing it.

If you own multiple dogs, you will have looked at this, too. If you've SEEN it, bravo!

Ginger (my rock-solid example of nearly flawless leadership--I miss her intensely) and Lila (possibly the world's most aloof dog) had such a close bond, that when given the opportunity to play with other dogs, would still choose to play 90% of the time with each other.

Lila and I have a relationship, there's no denying it, but nothing like what Lila & Ginger or Ginger & I had.

Ginger & I played. LOTS. Our primary interaction was tug or retrieve play. Hard, rough, intense, occasional bruising of the human from collision with feet, WOO HOO, wild-ass play.

Ginger & Lila played. LOTS. Their primary interaction was wrestling. Ginger never really had the stamina for chase play, so they wrestled. Chest-to-chest, I-throw-you-down, I-throw-myself-down (auugh... I'm dying, kill me!), all-the-books-say-don't-let-em-do-it, ROUGH play.

Lila & I do not play. I can bribe her to retrieve, but it's an exercise.

Until today. I decided that since Ginger taught me everything I know about everything else, I'd finally just go along with her ideas on how to manage Lila.

So, on today's off-leash romp, after one of her famous "see ya later" sprints, we wrestled. Not alpha roll flattening, but the best imitation I could do of the self-alpha-roll?, initiator belly-up, Lila on the top romping I could do.

I have never seen her stick so close to me.

And, that was when I got it. The thing that I have looked at hundreds, probably thousands of times, by dogs everywhere and I never saw.

Dogs use the idea of rewarding undesirable behavior to excellent effect.

Think about it. Watch for it.

Dogs want each other to pay attention to each other, engage with each other, play with each other, communicate with each other. Awareness of "each-other-ness" is the essence of being social, isn't it?

Therefore, separation from, or "distraction" from each other would be an "undesirable behavior" that is "extinguished" by the use of play reward.

Now, don't get me wrong. This is a MODEL of the behavior. This is not how it works, this is just a way to make our human minds evaluate, observe, and assess the interactions that take place without much serious cognition on the part of either canine!

But watch your dogs. Watch your neighbor's dogs. Watch dogs at the dog park. And let me know what you see!