First, Meet Their Needs

Scene: my living room, evening. A mug of hot chocolate, steaming, is on the table. Six dogs are laying around in their beds in various positions, snoozing.

One dog is not.

Timber goes from snoozing dog to snoozing dog, being a pest. He paws Datson in the face. He noses LuLu* into a brief play session. He innocently smells Walter’s teeth, pushing up Walter’s lip, which then starts to go up all on its own, if you get my meaning. He whines and stamps his feet and backs up and marches forward, like the little steam engine that really could get on everyone’s nerves.

Well, you’re probably saying. And you’re probably saying it with a bit of satisfaction, because you have erroneously assumed that as a dog trainer my dogs are wonderfully well-behaved. Well, you say again. Aren’t you a dog trainer? Fix the dog!

There is a long list of things I could do here, absolutely. I could put Timber in another room and shut the door. This would be a so-called ‘management’ solution: when he doesn’t have access to the other dogs, he can’t be pestering them. I could also train Timber to do a down-stay, in order to earn delicious treats. In this scenario, he would lay on his bed for ever-increasing increments of time. When Timbers are laying on their beds, Timbers aren’t innocently smelling another dog’s dentition. Or I could use negative punishment, which means Timber would learn that when he pesters x, y, or z dog, he earns a short stint away from them in the bathroom. Since Timber gets a big kick out of being near dogs, this penalty-box approach actually produces results, because Timber will work to stay with his crew. And by work, I mean change his behaviour.

But I’m not going to do all that. First up (and this will be no surprise to anyone who knows me) I happen to be lazy. I do use time-outs with Timber to protect Datson, who finds him overbearing and even worrisome. And Timber absolutely does know how to do [mumble mumble] on cue due to all of my…uh…my training work. But the main way I prevent pestering Timber from harassing his housemates every night?

I meet his needs.

When Timber is active, unsettled, unmanageable, and annoying, he isn’t communicating anything in the typical way we think of communication…he’s not telling me anything on purpose. But his behaviour speaks volumes: he still has a pocket full of ya-yas. He is not tired, he is not satisfied, he is not feeling settled and snoozy and serene. And the way to get a Timber into that somnolent state (and trust me when I say it’s a beautiful thing), he needs for me to meet his needs. He needs for me to meet his exercise needs and his enrichment needs; he needs for me to meet his play needs and his hanging-out with the humans needs. He needs for me to meet whatever is on his biologically-inscribed to-do list. And I can do this, I can provide this for him, most of the time. I meet his needs with a good long loose walk, tromping through the snow, during which he plays hard and runs hard and practices recalls. I meet his needs by tossing out new toys and cardboard boxes and toilet paper tubes for him to dispatch. I meet his companionship needs as I hang out doing my thing, writing articles about him while he rests comfortably nearby. I offer him solutions that work for me and keep the peace in my home.

And when life intervenes and I have to be gentle with myself, and Timber doesn’t get a check mark in each of those boxes? I don’t blame him for being stompy and unsettled. (I don’t blame myself, either…we are all doing our best.) I know that relief is right there on the horizon, though: a stuffed Kong toy (or two [or three]) for now, and a bit more of my attention and time tomorrow. A snoozing, sighing, satisfied Timber is worth it.

* LuLu, being the whimsical creature she is, just won’t play with any other dog or in any other location, so when Timber and LuLu play right in the middle of everything, we simply have to let it happen.