I've just been reading JulieT's thread about pre-programmed lab puppies. Makes very interesting reading and I've a similar situation here with Molly, 12 weeks old. From day 1 she has been a totally different character from my old lab BJ. He was always cautious and at times slightly nervous, until he was around 4. Molly has appeared bold and very confident from her first day home. Yesterday, bearing in mind it was her first day out (post vaccinations), we had to take her into the city where I had an appointment, unfortunately no option, a drive of almost an hour each way. We spent a lot of time making sure she was as comfortable as could be in the car, bed, water, toys etc. and my husband spent all the time with her once we arrived. We were very concerned that she would find it daunting and would be nervous of all the noise, traffic and loads of people everywhere. Well, we couldn't have been more wrong. She was fascinated, welcomed everyone who spoke to her and watched every passing vehicle, person, dog with intense interest. Had BJ been in the same situation, he would have been fairly anxious at this age. I can only assume that pups are born with some characteristics hard wired as there hasn't been enough time for Molly to have been socialised beyond the absolute basics, us, our other animals and a couple of neighbours. She's been with us since 26th June. I'd love to hear anyone else's experience with 2 very different labs.
I've since become very good friends with the two other people that bought the girls from Mabel's litter. I have first choice when they were first available to be viewed. It was really interesting as Mabel was the bold super confident friendly one, Biscuit aloof and not interested in interacting with me at all, and Heather the runt and definitely the most quiet and smallest. She was half the size of the boys. When we had our first get together they were all outgoing and not fazed by anything and had all grown to be the same height and had the same brown coat. Now they are aged 19 months Heather and Mabel show an awful lot of the same characteristics, slightly crazy (Heather more so but I put that down to Mabel's ED), slightly nervous and fearful of all sorts of things not always logical!! They both have this expression of "really mum, I heard you but I'll do it anyway". Biscuit on the other hand although interested in her environment is nowhere as nosey as her sisters. All three have been correctly socialised and are equally loved and cared for. Biscuit is slightly smaller than her sisters and much darker brown, she almost looks black. Glad to say the three of them are slim, we all watch their weight, if not our own. Cake is always our priority after our girls of course.
Bold/shy is highly heritable (as is reactivity and levels of frustration tolerance) - according to Patricia McConnell, anyway, but we do not know how much of a role environment plays. If you are interested, I can recommend 'the art and science of canine behaviour'. I watched this DVD series, and wrote up the notes here: http://thelabradorforum.com/threads...-canine-behaviour-part-one.12533/#post-189431 Interestingly, she has this to say: Shyness: fear of the unfamiliar. It does not mean retiring, it does not mean hiding behind the curtain. Neophobic. Scared of new things. A lunging, barking dog can be a shy dog. Different dogs respond because of shyness in different ways. The general public does not see subtle signs of fear or shyness – dog owners are appalling bad at spotting the signs of shyness/fear. People deny their dogs are shy, and call them cautious. Whether a dog is shy or bold is very strongly related to genetics. Fearfulness and shyness is inherited - it has a very, very strong inherited component. If you socialise a naturally shy dog, you’ll get a slightly shy dog. If you don’t socialise it, you get a very, very, shy dog. Vice versa in a bold dog.
Mine had no shared ancestors at all but the first, girl, was very submissive, NOT fearful. Oban is bold, confident and outgoing. I've said many times that Jet was born trained, what pleased her most in life was to please me. She was the star of our obedience classes, their poster girl. Jet excelled at agility, surprising our trainers, but out in the ring it's just the owner and the dog and since she was only timid with strange people and strange dogs, not the obstacles, she racked up some ribbons. Oban is more the, "yeah? What's in it for me?" type. Oban still cannot control his energy without help. He was the only dog in our agility class to fearlessly charge all the obstacles first time out. Oban has had far more formal training, competition and titles on him than Jet because he needed the work to make him think and use up some of that energy. A bit surprising but Oban is the dog strange people gravitate to. Jet would hide behind me and look worried at strange people approaching and many recognized that and left her alone. Oban looks them in the eye, wags his tail and goes right up for his due of pets and gets them.
You never get a cautious Guide Dog puppy! The litters are assessed at 6 weeks old and each pup is given a colour as to their characters and traits. Any nervous or cautious pups don't get into the programme - they are called 'purple pups'. Us puppy walkers never get to know the colour our pups were given, neither do our supervisors - so that we don't make assumptions in training. So all my pups are bold, adventurous types! My own dog, Tatze, is more cautious 'tho not nervous. ...
Thanks for your replies and observations. I'll certainly watch that DVD and read the notes, thank you for the link. It is interesting reading about all your lovely labs
My number 1 Labrador is like this and both his sister and his brother, it came down from his Father. It was made more difficult because he had to be crated from 16 weeks (broke his elbow) for a month solid, apart from poo and pee and then in one room for a month and then very limited exercise. He is 10 now and much better! No 2 Lab is his nephew and there is a smidgeon of the same behaviour but a completely different nature thank heaven.
What happens to the high energy pups? Our friend became a handler of the local office of Natural Resources first Detector Dog. She was a guide dog reject because she was so high energy it was thought a blind person would not be able to handle her. She was a wonderful Detector Dog. Our friend sure trimmed up and got in shape training her (they trained with our Provincial Police) and keeping up with her.
They are puppy walked but will be withdrawn if they are very easily distracted by smells etc. Only 3 out of four pups make it to become guide dogs. The withdrawn pups are first offered as other service dogs as all other jobs are easier than guiding. Some become sniffer dogs. It's only the shy ones which are withdrawn at 6 weeks 'tho as many grow out of their high energy distracted puppyishness. I felt sure Twiglet wouldn't make it to school as she was so very distracted by pigeons. I spoke to her trainer this week and he says he's noticed no bird distraction at all! He said the very clever, high energy pups often just need more challenges to keep them on track, once they are working they use all their energy in the right direction - like clever children ...
I'd love to go back in time with what I know now and see what my pups were really like. Willow always seemed absolutely bomb-proof to me, a very confident little lady that I had to work hard at with checking in on walks. She lapped up early socialisation, met loads of people, several dogs, all sorts of farmyard animals, and didn't bat an eyelid. Shadow, on the other hand, stuck to me like glue and was very nervous of anything new or loud, traffic, people etc. Now they're grown, Willow is really very nervous of certain experiences - some, but not all, loud noises, she gets stressed very easily and I have to manage her carefully. She sticks to me really well on walks where she'd once be a lot more interested in her environment. How much of that is training, though, and how much down to her being more nervous, I couldn't say. Shadow has the outward appearance of being very confident. He certainly is in training situations, and throws himself into activities with great gusto. When on walks, I have to manage him more because, left to his own devices, he'd roam off hunting. However, he can still be very jumpy with unexpected noises, and is quite fearful of other dogs. They are litter mates and have been brought up in the same manner, except that Shadow didn't come to us until he was 14 weeks. The one thing I will always wonder is, did having Willow spayed exacerbate her nervousness. I will obviously never know, but I do beat myself up about it and wonder if I could have coped with an entire male and female in the same house. I really don't think I could, but I would have done anything if it meant her not being so nervous of things now.
@snowbunny, I have had 5 bitches spayed and it didn't alter their personalities one little bit. I have been spayed as well and it hasn't changed me Though of course I kept my overies so cannot really compare! You would have felt worse if both dogs had been really miserable when Willow was in season, Willow would have been frustrated and she may well have ended up with pyometra and/or mammary tumours. So look on the bright side and don't beat yourself up.
Again, thanks to all who've replied, this has been very interesting. Snowbunny, your experience with litter mates is fascinating and the fact that Shadow didn't join your family until he was 14 weeks. I have wondered about the 'move' time with Molly too. She was ready to leave almost 2 weeks before we were able to collect her and I do wonder if that critical time has had an effect on her that we souldn't have seen if we'd collected her at 8 weeks.
Do you think that it might be anything to do with them being littermates brought up together? Obviously, I know they are both fabulous dogs, and you should be immensely proud of them both, and they are far from being characterised by 'littermate syndrome'. But I do wonder whether living with a littermate might be a more powerful influence than a spay - which wasn't exactly 'early', not like some bitches are spayed ridiculously early. I don't mean to be critical, I saw your decision at the time and your immense commitment to separate training etc. but, still, just wondered.
All three of our Labs have been reasonably confidant, and not fearful of other dogs, but there are still a lot of differences. Tilly is the least cuddly, and also the least assertive. She was always the first to roll over with other dogs. Cooper was the runt of the litter, which as many of you know has little to do with how big they will end up. She is 85# of very rough and tumble dog. She routinely flattens the Samoyeds that used to roll her when she was smaller. Cooper, Tilly and Ginger generally acted like any dog or person they met would be friendly, unless they gave off bad dog vibes. Cooper can be a little bit spooked by dogs she hears, but can't see. Occasionally when we are out in the woods, she will come running back out of a thicket, looking like something spooked her, and we usually have no idea what it was, if anything. None of our dogs are (were) related though they all came from field lines. At least we know Tilly and Cooper did, Ginger was a rescue but looked and acted like a field dog.
Snowbunny, I wonder if Willow takes her cue from Shadow to some degree and whether his wariness has taught her to also be a bit wary of some things in the world. Knowing your dogs, what do you think?
Again, things I have pondered on long and hard, obviously. If only we were in a world where we could try out different scenarios and roll them back if we didn't like what happened... sometimes, computers are a lot easier than real life! I don't think she takes her cues from Shadow, no. Because the things she is scared of are not things that he is scared of. SWMBO thought that maybe Shadow being around would help her with her fear of shot, and so brought him near, but she was not calmed by his complete ambivalence to the noise, and moved away from him, rather than towards him for security as we thought she might. If we're all out together and she's scared, it's me she runs to, or sticks with; she doesn't give two hoots what Shadow is up to. On the flip side, when they were small, if a truck scared Shadow, that didn't impact on Willow. If I'm walking them together in the street and Willow barks at something (indeed, if she barks at a noise from a neighbour etc when we're home) then Shadow will join in, but that's a very different bark and body language to the one he has when he's alarmed by something himself. To anthropomorphise horribly, it's like he's going to the aid of a damsel in distress, puffing his chest and being protective, even though he doesn't have a clue himself what the "threat" is. If he reacts to something if we're out together, she's not bothered by it. She just behaves normally. But whether it's something to do with LMS, it's certainly possible. Anecdotally, it does seem that there are plenty of reactivity issues in siblings. When I saw the behaviourist, he was very impressed with the bond the dogs have individually with J and I, because they are siblings. Other than the rough way they play together, which is becoming less and less frequent in recent months, they have very little to do with each other. They don't ever sleep together, they don't look for each other when the other is out, they don't follow each other around. Most of the time, you wouldn't put them down as having much of a bond between them at all. I think I can put the lion's share of it (children, dogs) down to my fault not giving them enough ongoing socialisation past the "window". Which is something that's easy to try and justify by saying "we live in the back and beyond where we don't see children or dogs from week to week, let alone day to day", but I could definitely have made more of a continued effort past the first few weeks. Not trying to make excuses, but with so little time in the day, trying to work on basic training and giving them one-on-one time took priority over driving a 40-minute round trip to try to find kids and dogs, which still wouldn't be guaranteed. Again, if I could go back, I'd chuck away all the initial training and just work on that. I probably do put too much emphasis on her spay, swayed by several people who have sucked their teeth at me for having it done before her first season. Thinking back, I believe she had started with her barking behaviours before her surgery. I still would wait next time, though, just in case! As it is, I'm loving the dogs I have. Of course they're challenging - aren't all dogs? - and I'd much prefer to be able to spend my time working on the fun stuff rather than stuff that upsets them. If I look to the silver lining, every session we can have where I'm working on their fears increases our bond and the trust they place in me. Speaking of which, it's time to take them out on their training sessions
This is our second set of litter mates & we had litter mates whilst I was growing up and have never had reactivity issues until now with Milly (with external factors not Monty). I think simply that each dog is individual; some are outgoing, boisterous & some shy nervous etc just like us. This, in my opinion, is not the same as the potential LMS that in my understanding is reactivity issues between the siblings not necessarily reactivity issues with other dogs/people/things. You shouldn’t beat yourself up about having had her spayed. I too have had people tut & judge my decision to neuter the dogs – however we all make our decisions based on our research/ information/personal situation etc & what we believe is best. What is right for one is not right for all. People should respect individual decisions but they don’t have to agree.
