Golden Mountain Dog Solutions

Yesterday we hosted our nearly 5 month old niece Alyssa as a guest member of our Pack, something that is a fair bit beyond simply “baby sitting”, and that is the inspiration for this article.

The picture at left captures a moment in which Milo and Minnie are sniffing Alyssa while she calmly watches them. Alyssa has been exposed to dogs almost from birth and in our house never reacts in any other way to their presence. We’ve never even witnessed anything more than a look of concern on her face after she’s just been startled by a dog suddenly barking nearby. Babies function on a more primal level than older humans who tend to overthink experiences and formulate responses based on what they think is going on rather than what is. Like dogs, babies respond to the world through smell, sound, sight, touch, and taste; and like dogs they can learn to react in unbalanced ways when unstable energy, either from an unbalanced human or dog, is permitted to enter the experience.

Calm and quiet presided over by unwavering vigilance form the foundation of what this is about. A family with one or more dogs should be starting this process as soon as they discover they’re pregnant by including their dogs in preparations for bringing the baby home. Dogs are gifted with an incredible ability to recognize patterns of behaviour while humans are similarly masterful at projecting them. Most people are creatures of habit to the point where large portions of their daily activities are performed on autopilot because, like dogs, people find comfort in routine. Your dog knows when something has happened to change the normal flow no matter how good you think you are at hiding it, and it invites no small amount of unneeded and unwarranted stress for everyone if the canines in the house are treated as disinterested parties; particularly in a life changing situation like the arrival of a baby.

We always stress the mantra, “Never miss a chance to train!” Normally this means keeping your eyes and ears open for even momentary opportunities to reinforce desired behaviours in your dog, but it also applies to making your pack a balanced and healthy place for all its members. Even people who have children but no dogs, and people who have dogs but no children, will encounter situations where the two meet and interact, and people in each category have a responsibility as dog handlers, parents, and leaders of packs to mold a favourable and sustainable outcome before things go pear shaped. This therefore means training children from the very earliest age in what is and is not appropriate dog to human and human to dog interaction.

Most people will be familiar with the “fire triangle” which is a graphic representation of the three elements that are necessary for fire to exist. For those who aren’t, we’ve provided a specimen here. As the diagram shows, fire requires three critical elements to be present simultaneously or it won’t happen: a source of oxygen, heat, and fuel. If you don’t have all three and you’re trying to start a fire you’re dead in the water. If you already have a fire and you remove any one of the three the fire will go out.

There is a similar equation that governs interactions between children and dogs:

DOG + CHILD + EXCITEMENT = TROUBLE

If you are preparing the nursery for the baby that will arrive in a few months time, don’t miss an opportunity to train! Dogs need to know from your behaviour that the baby’s space is a sanctuary of peace where noise, play, and boisterous behaviours don’t belong, and that to even be near it requires a calm manner. When the baby arrives, or someone else’s baby is present, dogs need this same rule of calm to be required to even be in the same room as the baby, let alone close enough to touch it. They can tell as much using their senses from ten feet away as you can from a distance of inches.

The baby cries so does this not introduce excitement? Of course it does, but balanced dogs that are properly led will shun such behaviours and leave the matter to their leaders to handle. In the recent example of Alyssa’s visit, the dogs left her vicinity to play, were unfailingly calm in her proximity, and avoided her like the plague when she was fussy; all because calm is the norm where the baby is concerned, and while they can’t control her they can control themselves. That’s balance, but no matter how balanced the dog, no child of any age should be alone with any dog without competent adult supervision. To permit such a thing is irresponsible and unfair to both the child and the dog, and every year dogs are removed from homes or, worse euthanized, because parents missed some critical point of interaction and just “can’t take another chance”.

Gloriously, children who are groomed to lead dogs through demeanor and energy rather than voice, who grow up coexisting in balanced harmony with those that follow, are likewise being groomed to cultivate in their lives all the best that Nature has to offer. And what’s better than that?