Posted by Jim Mora (Jim mora) on 5/8/2008, 11:16 am, in reply to "Can a dog have bad nerve in Obedience"

N.M.

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Posted by Leslie/Red (K9Trainer-Red) on 5/8/2008, 2:58 pm, in reply to "Can a dog have bad nerve in Obedience"

His website has his contact info. www.falawoods.com He'll be able to help you.

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Posted by Kevin Walsh on 5/9/2008, 5:20 am, in reply to "Can a dog have bad nerve in Obedience"

Hey Matt. First, let me say that I am not there to observe, but I have the utmost confidence in your ability to determine "bad nerve". Second, your training speaks for itself, so my answer is more of a general reply to what I have seen and found useful. Folks need to be thoughtful in the way that they condition their dogs to gunfire. Often the dog is introduced to the gun in bite work by, "shot,bite...shot,bite...shot,bite". Pretty soon the dog who had no association to a gun now sees it as a stimulus for action. This is reinforced in all the various gunfire scenarios of bite work. Then down the road the dog is put in a long down and hears a gun shot. Pavlov kicks him and he jumps up and looks around, or runs to be directed where to go. I've seen a strong police dogs do this at a SchH trial. As I said, maybe not your issue, but something to help others.

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Posted by Greg Williams (GregMK9) on 5/12/2008, 8:48 am, in reply to "Can a dog have bad nerve in Obedience"

It is possible and I witnessed it with Bam Bam. Everyone thatknows Bam Bam knows he was a hard hitting dog and would take just about any amount of pressure in the bite work. There were signs of nerve issue's in the bite work,but were ignored b/c he went through anything to get to the bite. Obedience was a whole different story. I kickd a beach ball one time and he ran and jumped back in to Rick's truck, not stopping for nothing. He seemed to be spooked easily in obedience. Now, the signs we ignored in bite work. The dog wouldn't out. Everyone though it was b/c he was hard and didn't want to out. Truth is, he didn't want to out b/c he was scared to death to let go. The other signs were constantly pulling away and heavy growling in the grip On the rare ocassion that he did out he would bounce around taking a countless number of dirty bites. I think what happens is some nervy dogs have so much drive it tends to get them to the bite no matter what is in the way. They just want it that bad. A drive overload if you will. Once you take the stimulus away that is causing this drive overload the dog has nothing to focus on to throw him into drive so the nerve issue's tend to show through in a much more exagerated form. As a side note, I'm not saying that the signs of nerve issue I saw in Bam Bam are the same in every dog. Just b/c a dog does these things doesn't make it nervy. Bam Bam is just a dog I witnessed myself and taken in to account ALL of his body language is what drew me to my final conclusion about Bam Bam.

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