Last week I wrote about canine thievery and made some suggestions about what to do when confronted with a dog holding a precious possession deep within the clutches of its formidable canines.
One suggestion was to calmly walk over to the cookie jar and call Fido over to receive a cookie for giving up the valued item.
An avid reader then sent me an email questioning this suggestion as she thought the dog was being rewarded for stealing the item and thus would begin to associate stealing items with getting a food treat and continue with the thieving behaviour.
This would indeed be the case if the owner of the thieving canine was completely unaware of both the dog's behaviour, their behaviour and who is training who.
You see, when a dog steals an item for the first time and an owner has to resort to a form of bribery to retrieve the item, the dog is actually teaching their owner a lesson.
The first time a dog steals something it is simply a mistake, both on the part of the dog and the owner. An astute owner would recognize this, begin enforcing proper boundaries for their dog and manage valuable personal belongings. They would also teach the dog a proper "leave-it" command to combine with the boundaries the dog lives within. A dog cannot steal something that is not there and, with a proper leave-it command, an owner can enforce the command the moment he or she sees the dog showing the slightest interest in any item the owner doesn't want the dog to steal. The end result is a dog making the choice to voluntarily leave items alone because it is not rewarded, but rather properly discouraged from showing an interest in the item.
The second time a dog steals something it is a choice. The dog made the choice to steal an item because the opportunity presented itself and it recalled the reward from the first time. Meaning, the owner made a choice not to learn from the experience the first time and has done nothing to proactively prevent it by enforcing boundaries and management techniques. The dog took advantage of the situation and was thus rewarded as the owner had to resort to bribery to retrieve the taken item.
Management of personal belongings is necessary because if there is no incentive to commit a crime, it cannot be committed. Therefore, the second time an infraction occurs, the dog is now teaching the owner to reward for stealing.
The third time a dog steals something it is now a habit. The dog has now begun to actively seek items to receive a reward. If an expected reward is not given, the dog may then become frustrated and destroy the valued item and will then be labelled as a destructive dog and a thief when it is really a creation of the owner's poor leadership.
Does this mean it is the end of the road for the dog and it will always be a thieving, destructive dog? Not at all! What it means is that the owner now has to really get their act together and work three times as hard at being a good leader to their dog by first picking up after themselves. Don't leave out items you are afraid of the dog destroying. Second, set some boundaries for the dog. This could mean placing the dog in a crate or behind an exercise pen when you cannot actively manage the dog's behaviour through proactive observation. Third, teach it a proper leave-it command. When I teach this command, it means the dog backs away from an item (or immediately drops it if it has managed to grab hold of it) and then goes into a down-stay or goes to its bed - in essence a time-out. The dog remains in that time out until it is calm, relaxed and may even fall asleep. It is then given a release command, or may be called over for a treat as a reward for going into a long down-stay on its bed.
If you have a dog that is constantly in trouble in your home, don't blame the dog but think about how you are rewarding that dog for its unwanted behaviour.
Joan Klucha has been working with dogs for more than 15 years in obedience, tracking and behavioural rehabilitation. Contact her through her website k9kinship.com.
