Stress in border collies

[2 Devils]

I recently had someone tell me that female border collies seem to be more sensitive and stress easier. I have to say that I have known a few female bcs that fit this description and not nearly as many males but not sure I would say it is typical.

 

Have you guys noticed this or is it just a coincidence? And how do you deal with a dog that stresses easily but wants to please you but just does things with less gusto?

[Root Beer]

I have a male who stresses easily. Not so much after years of desensitization work, but it's still his underlying temperament to get stressed.

[mbc1963]

My male's natural tendency is to stress out in any situation where he feels overwhelmed - and then to move to fear/aggression.

 

I'm not sure how much I've helped him cope with stress vs. how much I've helped him trust me not to put him in those situations. He is more resilient than he used to be, but I do still need to watch him and make an exit when a situation overwhelms him.

 

Good luck!

 

Mary

[HighDesertSpice]

My male's natural tendency is to stress out in any situation where he feels overwhelmed - and then to move to fear/aggression.

 

I'm not sure how much I've helped him cope with stress vs. how much I've helped him trust me not to put him in those situations. He is more resilient than he used to be, but I do still need to watch him and make an exit when a situation overwhelms him.

 

Good luck!

 

Mary

 

Mary, may I PM you? I have a similar dog and would like to hear what you think has helped plus any resources you found useful.

[Liz P]

I've found no connection with being sensitive and being one sex or the other. Actually, I would say it is often the other way around. If your dog is really the "what makes you happy makes me happy type" just praising her like crazy when she pushes herself is the best thing to do. With a dog like that, if she obeys a command and you know that obeying it made her very uncomfortable you need to act like she just did the greatest thing in the world, praise her, hug her, get her really excited (if she likes that).

[Aquarius89]

Both of my stress easily, but react in different ways.

 

Mickey usually tries to get as close to any human as possible and trembles.

 

Molly gets antsy and barks/growls.

[WyoBC]

I only have one BC (male) and he falls under the fearful BC. For instance he is really afraid of my horse, but if I call him he'll walk by him, to get to me (my horse is on the other side of a seven foot pipe fence) He's doesn't like it, but he puts his fear aside if I ask him to. But I have worked on it for a long time, and it hasn't been easy. Baby steps is the way to go. Make sure their improving, but don't push them to hard either.

[mbc1963]

Mary, may I PM you? I have a similar dog and would like to hear what you think has helped plus any resources you found useful.

 

Absolutely, PM me!

 

Mary

[hoku's mum]

Mary and HDS, would love for you to have the conversation in a thread, as I go through a similar thing, and never connected the stress level to the fear/aggression (duh)...it's seemed random and doesn't happen very often, but I'm sure stress is the underlying factor...

[mbc1963]

Mary and HDS, would love for you to have the conversation in a thread, as I go through a similar thing, and never connected the stress level to the fear/aggression (duh)...it's seemed random and doesn't happen very often, but I'm sure stress is the underlying factor...

 

We'll, I'll tell you anything I can... I'm not expert at the general thing, but I'm an expert at the way my dog Buddy reacts to stuff.

 

Early on, I read a book that showed stress threshholds, and my trainer talked about them, too. For example, meeting one large, dominant dog raises Buddy up close to his threshhold of stress. He can cope and meet the big dog OK - but then if another stressor (even a kindly child, or happy oblivious jogger) goes by, suddenly he's over his limit and reacts with a snarl or lunge at the other dog.

 

This seems to be the easiest way for me to measure things - watch Buddy for stress, note the environment, and get him away from the stressors if they're about to push him over his limit. I sometimes get irritated when other people let their dogs just wander around, getting into anything, because I have to be so aware of my environment all the time!

 

Good luck!

 

My best books have been mentioned many times: "Cautious Canine", "Feisty Fido", "Other End of the Leash", and "Bones Would Rain From the Sky." They all have great advice. The info about threshholds is probably in one of them.

Mary

[hoku's mum]

I've been thinking about this stress issue a lot lately, as Hoku seems fine, fine, fine, over the edge and snarling. I've worked through a lot of it at agility by leaving the area between turns at first and doing tricks and focus exercises, and now he is much more comfortable and relaxed in that environment. But when we go into any new situation, such as this weekend when we took the dogs to my sweetie's parent's house, he seems to start at square one again (well maybe square 3.... ) I'm realizing that I just have to watch him so closely, and I need to get better at recognizing his stress signs. Here is an interesting article about dog stress thresholds and the signs.

 

I have found that the clicker is a great tool when he is stressing (if he has not gone to far to the dark side...) I'll try and get him to a quiet spot and just run through his solid and favorite tricks, and it seems to refocus him. This weekend we walked off leash in the East Bay Hills where there are just tons of off leash dogs. His meet and greet skills are not the greatest (we live out in the sticks and he does not get that much dog interaction) and I was a bit nervous, but had to 'detonate' him somehow so he could be calm back at the in-laws house. I watched him closely at the start of the walk and would let him do a quick meet and greet, then call him, click when his attention went from the dog to me, he would come over, praise, praise, praise, and then send him off again. It worked great, as he did not get much of a chance to build stress over the greeting, and then everyone was one their way. Very soon he was just greeting and moving on all on his own, so I stopped using the clicker. But I did notice that by the end of the walk (4.5 miles and probably 50 dogs later) he was winding up and starting to get a touch snarly in his greetings, and I had to go back to the clicker. Just as Mary noted, the stress seems to build up (thanks for sharing your observations, it really is helpful).

 

Our biggest challenge is greeting other dogs on leash, he just turns into Cujo, and I just want to avoid any such situation, which just makes it all worse. But our agility teacher is going to work with us on this issue this winter (agility stops with the wet weather....boo-hoo), so we are helpful to continue making progress with him.

[mbc1963]

Our biggest challenge is greeting other dogs on leash, he just turns into Cujo, and I just want to avoid any such situation, which just makes it all worse.

 

Yes! That's the same problem I have, especially in the local park we use every day, which Buddy seems to think is "his."

 

Originally, I was doing the walk-curve-avoid thing to destress Buddy, and simply not having him meet dogs in stressful situations. Eventually, I taught him to step aside to a down-stay when we saw dogs who were scary - and he got very good at that, but seemed to think it meant he was 100% safe. So, if another dog approached him while he was in his down-stay, he was much more Cujo than he would have been if he weren't lying for me.

 

Lately, to avoid this backhanded result of my own training, I've been trying to let Buddy meet dogs on leash, but telling the other owners to leave some air space between the dogs. This gives Buddy a chance to meet dogs safely while on leash, and the tiniest bit of space between him and the other dog seems to make him feel safe. I think this is a better training decision than my previous one - or maybe just the next step. I may have needed to go through the previous avoidance/curving path/safe distance steps to get him to where he can be near a strange dog and not freak out.

 

And definitely my watchfulness with him on leash sends him signals. If I see him start to get too tense, I pull him back a bit, at which point he goes ahead with his snarling even if he might not have snarled without the leash pull. It's a tricky balance.

 

Live and learn!

 

Mary

[hoku's mum]

And definitely my watchfulness with him on leash sends him signals. If I see him start to get too tense, I pull him back a bit, at which point he goes ahead with his snarling even if he might not have snarled without the leash pull. It's a tricky balance.

 

Yep, exactly! I do not know how to let him go up to greet a new dog on leash, and not be tense myself, since he has a history of being a snarly grouch on leash. I really think my tension just runs down the leash to him and he picks up my un-ease, which just ramps up his fear. I've read to always keep the leash loose, but that is so hard when I just don't know what he is going to do. When he is off leash, the problem is (almost) gone. We are going to meet with our agility trainer this weekend (who knows him really well) and work with her bomb-proof dog on leash manners, so we'll see how that goes.