There may be more causes of dog fear. And the first step to eliminate it is to find out its origin and cause.
Innate fear
The so-called innate deprivation is a form of fear which appears mainly in wild and semi-wild dogs. In everyday life, you encounter it most often in animals from puppy farms, which particularly the Eastern Europe is infamous for. Puppy farms are a world where the law of the pack applies, dogs breed here and grow up without any human oversight. In these individuals, an important role is played by the nature of the dog parents. Since shyness can be inherited even after several generations.
Dogs with innate deprivation are adapted to a life in a pack. They don’t care for human contact, they don’t know it, they shiver when touched by a human and they try to avoid it, often even by biting. They don’t respect humans and that’s why they also don’t listen. Even such dogs can be socialised under the hands of experts, but it’s a lengthy and a very stressful process for such dog, that doesn’t always work.
There are organisations around the whole world, that take dogs that aren’t placeable to families in to spend the rest of their lives there. They are put into a pack and they can live in peace in a fenced area outdoors.
There is a greater chance of socialisation of dogs with innate fear in puppies. However, you have to start early and the dog doesn’t always lose its fear completely.
Acquired fear
In addition to innate fear, dogs can also have acquired fear. That is such, that the animal obtains through torture, shock (a bad experience) or bad socialisation at puppy age. Between the sixth and twelfth week of age, the dog creates patterns of behaviour that it then uses for whole of its life. Therefore, it’s necessary to make it familiar at this age with as many things and situations as possible. If the dog is kept in isolation, it won’t get experience with people, other dogs and other animals, situations, smells, sounds and the like. In the future, it will react with suspicion, fear or aggression.
Fear can be acquired by a dog even from bad upbringing, unconscious behaviour. If the dog is, be it from any reason, timid, it needs a firm support from its master. That is a fearless and unquestionable leader of the pack. It’s important not to calm and stroke the dog in a situation in which it’s afraid. This would strengthen its belief, that it’s fear is justifiable. Such dog will most benefit from clear rules, training of basic controllability and a self-confident master.
Have you encountered fear in a dog? How did it look like and how did you handle the situation?
Although it might appear that the cat doesn’t give a tail about you and it is indifferent towards you, maybe you will still find some displays of affection in its behaviour. Do you know how cats show such affection towards a person?
Cats love grass. They nibble at it if it's to clean their belly from hairs or just for fun. In addition, if you get a cat its own flowerpot, you can hope that it will leave your other plants alone :).
Whether you remove a tick from a dog’s or cat’s fur the right way might affect whether the animal will become infected with Lyme disease or another malign disease transmitted by ticks. Have you got the right technique and tools?
Just like with people, also in dogs, Lyme disease is a very grave illness. There are an estimated 20% of ticks infected in the Czech Republic. And because despite the use of antiparasitic agents, your dog might get a tick from time to time, it’s good...
I’ve already written about cat mint, today, we’ll take a look at another, lesser known drugs. Since not all the cats respond to all of them and they don’t respond to everything the same way. Therefore, if you didn’t succeed with cat mint, maybe you’ll...
Every cat owner has certainly already heard of cat mint, catnip or catswort. Under all these names hides a herb that makes most of the cats “high”.
When your family grows by a new (human) member, it isn’t necessarily a happy event for everyone. For many dogs, it’s very difficult to come to terms with such situation, therefore, it’s better to start preparing them already before the baby is born....
I’ve already written about the fact that you’re not supposed to leave your dog closed in a car on summer days or on how to prevent hyperthermia in cats and dogs. So you have mastered the prevention already. But it is also necessary to know how to...
Without a question, chinchillas are beautiful and cute furry animals with large ears, a long tail and distinctive eyes. Do you know where they actually come from, what their name means and that we almost succeeded in nearly exterminating them before...
You have probably noticed that cat tongues are quite unique. They are rough and somehow scratchy. It seemed weird to American biologists and therefore they decided to look deeper into it.
What should I say, the cats are simply different. Since the time immemorial, they have been surrounded by mysteries and secrets. Most of them behave as if they were the master of the world and as if they don’t need the human at all. A couple of...
It can be quite a task to choose the right pet food precisely for your cat. To even understand the contents... That’s why we’re going to take a look today what to focus on, what to look for in the contents and what you should rather avoid.
