# Defense Training (the young dog) Jerry Bradshaw...



## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

Another article by Jerry. about training defense in young dog..

*Defense Training in the Young Prospect
by Jerry Bradshaw
President, Tarheel Canine Training, Inc.*

NOTE: This article is intended for use by professional police K-9 trainers and professional
protection dog trainers. Neither Tarheel Canine training, nor the author assume any liability for
the use or misuse of any of the information herein. All protection training should be conducted
under the supervision of a competent professional trainer.

Many people interested in protection training or protection sports are confused about how to
begin protection training for their young prospects. They wonder, "should I train right away in prey
drive, or defense drive?" The answer to this question is often hotly debated, with some arguing
that only prey drive should be worked in young dogs, and to leave defense training for when the
dog is much more mature. There is some truth to this idea, that defense training is certainly
stressful for the young dog, and it is easy to push him into avoidance if the stress is brought too
high. Young dogs have a lower threshold for avoidance.

In my opinion, however, asking which drive to train first actually depends on the temperament of
the dog in question. Prey training is much easier to do properly, and rarely results in pushing the
dog into avoidance. In order to do defense training properly, the training helper (decoy, agitator)
must have an excellent fundamental understanding of drives. (see my article Protection Skills:
Preliminaries for an explanation of drives and their manifestations). To me, the most critical
concept in protection training is the concept of channeling. Channeling is the process by which
we develop the interaction of prey and defense drives, and teach the dog to comfortably shift from
one drive to the other. Defense drive produces stress, and too much stress can result in
avoidance. Prey drive is a calming, confidence building drive - the dog feels strong and in control.
Yet defense training is essential. It provides the power and violence necessary for a dog to
successfully fight a man. The hardness of the grip, the focus on the decoy, the all-around power
in the work comes from defense that is built and channeled properly. Our goal is to develop a
threshold for avoidance that is so high, nothing the dog ever sees on the protection field or on the
street will push it into avoidance.

Our goal then is to raise the threshold for avoidance. How do we accomplish this? We must work
the dog in defense and show the dog when he is pressed with threat, his proper response should
be to meet this threat with aggression, and he will surely win. Can we do this with a young dog?
Yes, but it must be done properly and with care. In my experience, some young dogs display
defense at a very early age. If your breeder has carefully done his job, you are starting with a
social, confident young dog. If your dog is not social and confident around people in normal
circumstances, your young dog or puppy will have an extremely low threshold for avoidance, and
any threat made could push him into avoidance. You cannot work a drive that is not available.
Lack of confidence gives you no room to work the defense drive without pushing the avoidance
threshold, so you cannot work this dog in defense. Your goal should be primarily confidence
building through socialization, and part of that can be simple prey training.

Some dogs will not display defense drive at all until they are older, and again you cannot work a
drive that is not in evidence. If you have a skilled helper evaluate your dog's defense drive and
the threat meets not with any signs of pre-avoidance or stress, and the dog looks at you with
confusion or simply attempts to play, again you have nothing to work with.

What kind of young dog can you work with? If your puppy does show signs of defense, barking
defensively at people in the dark for example, reacting to body postures that convey threat, then
you do have something to work with. Caution: in a young animal there is not a whole lot of room
to work in defense. Threats that bring a clear defensive reaction cannot be pressed much at all in
the beginning, and the dog must be worked properly toward our goal, making the dog comfortable
working in defense. This is done by channeling from defense into prey.

Example: My wife is working a young Malinois puppy. He is very bold and confident, but doesn't
show too much interest in rag play. He does like to bark at the action of other dogs working on the
field while he is back-tied. He brings out a nice defensive bark while watching. He barks
defensively when people come into the kennel area, too. This puppy's mother and father both
show strong defensive drives, and high levels of confidence. How do we work him? With the
helper at a distance, he gives lateral motion, then freezes and stares at the puppy. The puppy
brings an alert stance out at the end of the line, and barks. The helper immediately reacts by
running either laterally again or running away. The puppy moves at the end of the line with him,
showing the prey drive and experiencing the confidence of scaring off the threat. This is the
beginning of channeling, stimulate defense and channel it into a win for the puppy. We don't do
too much of this, for work in defense has a cumulative effect on the stress of the puppy, we do
not encroach on his space, everything is kept at the maximum distance needed just in order to
stimulate the drive. Over time, months, we will slowly press closer, to raise the dog's threshold for
avoidance, but only as he gains experience with winning these little confrontations. What is the
payoff? When we work the rag play after a couple of these little confrontations, the dog releases
his frustration on the soft leather rag, biting hard and more intensely than if we begin the session
with only prey work. This is done carefully and thoughtfully, by only the most experiences decoys.
Many new decoys, come too close to the dog too soon not being able to read the raising of the
stress in the body posture or bark.

If we only were to work the rag play in prey, he would learn from this that he can bite softly, get
distracted, and if we condition him to keep working this way, he will learn that this is the way bite
work is done. This is poor foundation training.

But experiencing stress is essential. It builds the dog's ability to handle stress confidently. I must
reiterate it is extremely gradual and the sessions are extremely short. Only once a week do we
work like this, the other training sessions he is brought out to watch the big dogs work (Do they
really learn anything from watching? Yes, there is a scientific term for mimicry behavior:
Allelomimetic learning, (see Campbell, W. Owners Guide to Better Behavior in Dogs, Alpine
Press, 1996). My retired competition dog Arrow of Tigerpaws, SchH 3, BH was trained in this
exact fashion. He had little prey drive as a puppy, but was easy to stimulate in defense. Arrow
was many times V rated in protection including 2 scores of 99 points, and a 97 at the 1996
National Championships. He plays schutzhund "for real". The channeling work from defense into
prey enhanced his prey drive over time to a very high level. The other side of channeling from
defense into prey is to also make the dog comfortable in the prey drive, because the dog learns it
is comfortable to work there. He learns to enjoy the relief from the confrontation, and he learns to
enjoy the power he feels after neutralizing the threat. He learns he is a winner.
In training a young dog or puppy, we must address that dog's strength, be it prey or defense. In a
highly prey oriented dog with little or no defense, we concentrate on developing this strong prey
response.* But we must always be aware of trying to elicit the dog in defense as he matures so we
can begin the channeling process. When the defense drive becomes apparent we must begin to
address it so that the dog learns to work confidently in this drive. **Be careful working too much
and too long only in prey. You will get a false sense of security in your dog's ability to handle
stressful confrontations. When he begins training and must work on new decoys in new places,
he will be easy to push into avoidance, because he hasn't been taught to handle stress. New
decoys and traveling will put your dog in defense. He must be confident to work there, or else you
may get a big surprise during the attack on handler, or the courage test. *All the bites in
schutzhund are defensive bites except for the escape bite in schutzhund 2 & 3. Your schutzhund
1 routine is all defensive bites.

The fact is that not all dogs have the strong nerves necessary to work in protection. Working a
dog only in prey during the foundation training and ignoring the defense training for fear that he
might not be able to handle it, causes you to put in a lot of effort, and in the end, if he is not of
strong character he will never make a good protection dog. A dog with weak nerves who may
appear to work well in prey will begin to show signs of breakdown as you put the control work intothe dog. 
The bark and hold is always dirty because there is too much stress in the confrontation,

and corrections from the handler (which puts the dog in defense, by the way) will display as
shallow nervous grips, chewy grips, and sometimes avoidance of the helper. Such a dog was
never given a chance from the start, because he was never taught to handle stress (read
defense) in his foundation training. A dog trained through channeling from defense into prey will
also work better in obedience, learning to handle the stress of correction with confidence. Those
of you who train obedience and use corrections without releasing the dog to a toy (or vigorous
play of some kind), build stress over time and never teach the dog there is a way out of the
stress. Result: slow, fearful-looking obedience. This is also true in tracking: Force on the track is
stress building, without teaching the dog how to release stress, your performance will be hectic
and nervous, lacking the concentration born of confidence. It all plays in together. To your dog
there are no distinct phases of training, there is only work. He must be taught how to work with
confidence. Start it in your protection training by understanding channeling!

A final note: It has been said that in the sport of Ring, for example, the dogs are taught only to
work in prey, and that prey "locked" dogs are good for the sport. I thing this is a
misunderstanding. The dog is what he is. If he can be stimulated in defense, surely he will be by
a Ring decoy, as the pressure is applied with the stick, body contact and postures over the dog.
From what I have seen, though, the Ring trainers that are successful make much use of
channeling to build the confidence of these dogs to such a high level that no defensive pressure
is seen to unnerve the dog. Over time the process of channeling makes the dog neutral to threats
of all kinds, so it appears the dog only works in prey drive, because of the extremely high levels of
confidence trained into the dog.

When schutzhund trainers work a dog in prey and introduce the dog to the stick, body contact,
touching the head and under the jaw as they work, they are using channeling, because these
things will provoke mild defensive feelings in the dog. But in my opinion, it is also important to
stimulate the defense drive without the sleeve present to get the full effect of the dog's defensive
drive in a "civil" (no equipment) situation. Here we really see the defensive drive in its purest form.
We see the dog's ability to handle true confrontation, and stress. This is what is must be
developed to make a powerful protection dog for any purpose.


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## Edward Egan (Mar 4, 2009)

This is Dwayne Baker working my dog. He's trying to channel drives, and gives a brief explaination half way though the video. 

http://youtu.be/DpcjfxOdVIs


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## David Frost (Mar 29, 2006)

I'm forwarding these to my new ass't trainer. I really like for her to experience and read about training from someone other than me. The department did bring my old assistant trainer back for a period, as I've been unable to work for a few weeks. She's learning from him as well. He and worked together for well over 20 years.

DFrost


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## Lee May (Jan 8, 2012)

Great read an right on point. Thanks for posting.


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## Travis Ragin (Apr 10, 2010)

Nice article! I've read that through before.......think this is the most important sentence in there.



Joby Becker said:


> In my opinion, however, asking which drive to train first actually depends on the temperament of the dog in question in question.



IME.....this is a dead giveaway as to whether you're dealing with a *dog* trainer......or if you have someone who is a *system* trainer.

The system trainer(or internet training era person) needs a dog that responds and conforms easily to the system of training that they have been taught,and the sequences/steps that they learned them in....& then they blame the dog or it's genetics if it doesn't respond to them like they're "supposed to"

They'll usually soon after suggest to the owner that they just go buy a Malinois or some Euro-bred GSD.


A dog trainer just trains the dog in front of them.



,
t


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## Lynda Myers (Jul 16, 2008)

That was a very good article! It actually brought some clarity to couple things I've wondering about. Thanks for posting it Joby.


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## Brett Bowen (May 2, 2011)

Read that before, but now that I read it again, I know exactly when my dog's handler avoidance started during bitework. I remember it so clearly it's scary. Why does hindsight have to be 20/20?


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## Britney Pelletier (Mar 5, 2009)

Hey! I know that guy 




Brett Bowen said:


> Read that before, but now that I read it again, I know exactly when my dog's handler avoidance started during bitework. I remember it so clearly it's scary. Why does hindsight have to be 20/20?



I think we've all been there, Brett.. live and learn, my friend. Live and learn.


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## Terrasita Cuffie (Jun 8, 2008)

Bradshaw's articles are always a great read. Many years ago, I printed off a bunch of Bradshaw's articles to deal with one of my herding dogs. Nice to revisit it. One of the key points he makes is how a handler can put his dog into defense. I think this is classic ala Winkler/Reiser training but how many training decoys are there and how many can apply this theory? So for me, especially with a young dog, its better to err on the side of prey work. 

T


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## Britney Pelletier (Mar 5, 2009)

Terrasita Cuffie said:


> but how many training decoys are there and how many can apply this theory? So for me, especially with a young dog, its better to err on the side of prey work.



You're absolutely right.. there are very few. I don't think you are wrong to err on the side of prey work, but I have also seen the after effects of doing so with some folk's dogs that have come out to our club seeking help and had exactly that done with them. When the dogs are 18+ months old, it can make it very difficult for them to acclimate to working in a different, more defensive mood after that. 


Needless to say, it's been very interesting to see! But, I think it's better to have to work through that (too much prey), than it would be someone who brought us a dog that had been worked by a "training helper" that thought they knew how to work a dog defensively and completely put the dog in avoidance altogether.

So funny, we were having this very discussion with some people after training this afternoon until almost 9pm!


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## Joby Becker (Dec 13, 2009)

It is important that the people know what they are doing, and have an aptitude for it, and have the ability to "read" a dog.

I am not sure what very few means, but you are right, there are certainly fewer than there should be...

why is that?


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## Nicole Stark (Jul 22, 2009)

Brett Bowen said:


> Read that before, but now that I read it again, I know exactly when my dog's handler avoidance started during bitework. I remember it so clearly it's scary. Why does hindsight have to be 20/20?


Consider it a gift. I've had the opportunity to see work (that is repeated over and over, dog to dog) without the benefit of hindsight so I welcome those moments when I realize that I've been enlightened by something in particular but certainly agonize when I cannot otherwise see things any other way.


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## Britney Pelletier (Mar 5, 2009)

Joby Becker said:


> why is that?



Lots of "forgotten knowledge" from back when he started in Schutzhund 20 years ago, things were VERY different back then according to the author of that article.. training the dog in front of you and actually "reading dogs" has gone the way of the Dodo bird, it has been replaced by "systems" and "system trainers".. the problem is, many dogs don't fit a system. Doesn't make them bad dogs, just makes them dogs.


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## Tony Hahn (May 28, 2011)

Having had some involvement with both LE and .mil, I may have a partial answer. This is something I’ve noticed in other areas of life, so I don’t know why dog training would be any different.

We Americans (and perhaps others) have a general tendency to put “Police” or “Military” employees, tactics, gear, vehicles, training, etc, et, etc, on a pedestal. LE and .mil generally are looked at as “real”, and other tactics, gear, training, etc, etc, tend to generally be viewed as “play” “sport” or “wana-be”.

For example, if a salesman points out that the .mil uses his gear many folks will automatically consider it good gear based only on the fact that the .mil used it at one time or another; without any understanding of whether the gear was actually liked by the Joes or how well it performed. 

This crosses over to trainers also. If Joe Snuffy can make a legitimate claim that he was an Armorer, Instructor, Dog Handler or XYZ in the Military (or Law Enforcement); many folks will automatically consider him to be a “Professional” whose opinion is more valuable than Mr. Smith’s 15years of civilian experience. 

There is some legitimacy to this line of thinking. All the scenarios and hardcore sports in the world cannot substitute for actually seeing the elephant. But life everything in life, there needs to be critical thinking before jumping to a conclusion. 

The Military and to a lesser extent Law Enforcement, are tasked with training large numbers of people who either 
a) Have heads full of mush (misconceptions, myths or bogus “knowledge” in general)
or
b) Know absolutely nothing about the subject matter they are being trained in.
Either way, a “system” is mandatory for training large numbers of green individuals. You have to be organized with a doctrine and the lesson plans to convey the doctrine to students. “Today you 50 knuckleheads will learn to _________”. Tomorrow they will be taught _______. Some effort is made to help slower people through remedial training, but there are relatively few resources available for tailoring training to individuals. For the most part, 50 knuckleheads WILL learn to execute xyz in the prescribed manner or they will be cycled into another MOS/fired.

There are of course exceptional people in every field. Within Law Enforcement and the Military you can find true experts who really know their shit, whether it be operating a crane or training dogs. In some cases the opinions and knowledge of these true professionals will exceed that of their civilian counterparts because they have experienced things that generally only come with .mil or LE jobs. 

You can see the problem that arises though when Joe Snuffy is placed into the same category as a true professional just because he was .mil (or LE). You see this association happen all the time whether it’s a person, backpack, optic or training tactic. 

IMO, during the last decade or so civilians have been too enamored with all things .mil or LE and have failed to screen the true experts apart from the Joes whose knowledge & experience is limited to a few years of a specific system/doctrine. There has also been a failure to adopt only the things that make sense in the civilian world. A goal and understanding of how to achieve it; some sort of method to the madness, is necessary. However the civilian world can accommodate a much higher level of individualization than .mil/LE. An automatic assumption that all things .mil/LE are the best is less than optimal thinking.

People can be quick to misconstrue an alternative as disrespectful to .mil/LE, or accuse the messenger of having an ego issue and that exacerbates the problem. Noting that there may be a more appropriate way should not be construed as disrespectful. 

Other folks are free to disagree, but I believe this has at least contributed to the direction training in many areas has taken during the recent past.


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## Peter Cavallaro (Dec 1, 2010)

Sane post, I blame to many cop worship television shows and soldier saviour heroes blockbuster movies. 

My cuz was in electronics, thought he would know all the cutting edge shit not known to the public.

Spent his service maintaining vietnam era technology, I said eprom and VLSI, he said what lol.

Makes a good living now fixing photocopy machines.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Britney Pelletier said:


> Lots of "forgotten knowledge" from back when he started in Schutzhund 20 years ago, things were VERY different back then according to the author of that article.. training the dog in front of you and actually "reading dogs" has gone the way of the Dodo bird, it has been replaced by "systems" and "system trainers".. the problem is, many dogs don't fit a system. Doesn't make them bad dogs, just makes them dogs.




Thus the mindset today of "Any dog can be trained with (name it) method".


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## Nicole Stark (Jul 22, 2009)

Tony, I think you are on track with your line of thinking. Hey, I heard you might stop by for a little while in May. I hope we get to see you again.


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## Tony Hahn (May 28, 2011)

Hi Nicole!!

I'll be in your neck of the woods roughly three weeks from now. Really looking forward to seeing you guys again and (hopefully) getting Chris to work Remy!


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## Nicole Stark (Jul 22, 2009)

Sounds good Tony, we're looking forward to having you guys back out to train with us. See you soon.


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