All dogs should be comfortable with all types of touch, but
its especially important for working dogs to accept a variety of touch from
their handlers and others. We use the term “body handling” to mean any sort of
touch or manipulation of body parts. Some examples include petting, cutting
nails, and body manipulation used in typical vet exams. Additionally, touch can
be rewarding and therapeutic, so we want our pups to love it! When dogs enjoy
handling and touch, it can release the hormone called oxytocin, which helps
calm the dog. If a dog finds touch to be calming and enjoyable, it can be used
to help diffuse a stressful situation, which we may encounter with the extra
socialization that we give our Southeastern puppies.
Over the next few months, we will explore different body
handling techniques and ways to build our pups’ tolerance and enjoyment of
being handled.
Primarily, we want to use “counter conditioning” to teach
our puppies that body handling is enjoyable. Counter conditioning is a part of
classical conditioning (such as the Pavlov’s Dog experiment), which replaces an
unpleasant emotional response (such as fear) to a stimulus with an enjoyable or
desired emotional response (such as happiness). We will discuss more about the
steps to counter conditioning our dogs to touch in an upcoming Blue Cape
Journal entry. Most dogs have areas that they enjoy touched and areas they do
not enjoy being touched. Your goal, as a raiser, should be to get your puppy to
enjoy all parts of their body being touched and handled.
Initially, you want to assume that all areas on your pup are
“no go” areas and take your body handling slow until you understand where your
pup enjoys being touched and what areas need work. Use a gentle 2-3 second
“quick touch” where you gently place your hand or just a few fingers on the
body part. By using quick touch on our pups, we can start to build their
tolerance and enjoyment of touch. If your pup pulls away or leans away, then
you will need to break your quick touch down into smaller slices. For example,
if you put your hand on top of your pup’s paw and they pull it away, then the
next time you touch it, only put your hand right above the paw. You can then
build up to being closer and closer to touching your pup’s paw, which will
eventually build to holding, squeezing, clipping nails, etc. If your pup DOES
pull away, do not make any sort of negative noise or say “no.” We want our pups
to trust us and let us build up to conditioning the touch.
Print the outline below and color in the body parts with
green, yellow, or red as you do quick touches on different parts of your pup. A
green area will mean the dog enjoy this being touched and shows no adverse
reaction. A yellow area will mean the dog might freeze or pull/lean away a
little, but is okay with a second try or a slightly smaller sliced type of
touch. A red area will mean the dog is very uncomfortable with this body part
being touched and will drastically pull away, not let you touch the area, jump
or growl. Keep your chart handy as we get ready for the next entry on
Intentional Body Handling!
