Give Your Opinion: Is This a Fight?
Give your opinion...
I captured this on video today, what do you think? Is this a fight between Nio and Cho Cho?
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I captured this on video today, what do you think? Is this a fight between Nio and Cho Cho?
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Comments
What happened before you starting shooting the vid? Were they playing together? It seemed like Cho Cho just walked up to the Kai army and Nio didn't want her there lol. And poor Batgirl trying to get out of the way lol
Snf
What's your take on it, Brad?
I agree, it's not a fight, but it's a pretty bad disagreement. I also agree that it's not something one wants to see and one should try to prevent this type of thing from happening, tho I'd be lying if I said something like this doesn't happen here every now and then. I'd say we have a disagreement like this every few weeks or so. It's just part of having a large group of dogs who are managed the way we manage them. Obviously we do our best to manage in a way that reduces these types of confrontations, but sometimes it still happens.
They were all playing before this happened, having a great time. I was trying to record the play, not this. :oT
If you look very closely, you can see why the disagreement starts. Nio has a blue toy, he picks it up right at the start of the video. Cho Cho sees this, and charges him. I'm guessing she wanted the toy. When she gets to him, the toy is dropped and Kumi moves in to get the it. Also, if you look closely Cho Cho is clearly the one that continues the disagreement. Just after the initial confrontation Nio tries to walk away, but Cho Cho goes him. Then again he tries to leave but Cho Cho goes to bite him in the face. At that point Nio corrects her (harshly) by putting her on her back and then she leaves the scene.
I don't want to get into an argument of breed vs breed here, but in my personal experience with our Shikoku Ken and Kai Ken, this type of situation almost always involves one of our Shikoku Ken. For us, with our management style, this is a very typical situation: One of our Shikoku over-reacts to a situation and causes a disagreement.
I've found that the management solution for this is to reduce the amount of time the Shikoku are allowed to have "free-range play". For whatever reason our Kai Ken can be outside (free-range) most of the day and have very few issues like this, but our Shikoku Ken can only handle this type of "free-range play" for about an hour or two (for Kaiju I would say it's more like 30 minutes). The adult Shikoku we have don't usually have these issues, but I think that is because they are old enough now that they don't play as much. So, perhaps one cane say that Shikoku grow out of this type of thing.
Anyway, that's my take on the dynamic.
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@StaticNfuzz - Yep, I checked them out, no scratches or punctures or anything. I also separated Cho Cho after it - gave her some "nap time" in her crate. My bad for leaving her out longer than I should have.
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@McYogi - I hear about that type of thing a lot, where other dogs jump-in to a fight. I have never seen that happen here.
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You're right, of course, to be cautious about arguments about breed, but it is interesting that there are certain tendencies/differences. Of course it varies from individual dog, but it's still interesting to observe.
It continues to amaze me how well you know your dogs, and are able to observe their behaviors and manage them....it's really cool.
Thanks for the video it does help us watch other dog's interactions with each other and see what happened and how things escalated and to learn more about dog's body language. At least I'm still learning. With a household of only 2 dogs, I don't see much or any disagreement like that, but I do see rough play a lot like that haha!
It doesn't happen too often though since most toys are all old and not exciting..
If the Shikoku can tolerate less than an hour of free play, what sort of diversion or activity do they need the rest of the time? Crating, inside time, seperate yard time? Kinda curious about their management needs.
@ayk - When it's between 2 Shikoku it usually is very loud and needs to be broken up. Those tend to end with injury, which is one reason you rarely see Cho Cho and Kaiju outside together without us out there with them.
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There are times where mine will push my Shiba to the limit and he's full on gone from irritation to extremely annoyed. I break this up most of the time, but other times (like 1 in 10), I will let it play out and watch the 35+lbs Shikoku get manhandled by the 23lbs Shiba as he revokes her puppy pass. Other times I spare him but oddly enough, when I put her on timeout and let Ichi have his time without her, he begins to engage in nipping and inviting play with me! Weirdo dog. I am still watching them and fortunately for me, my two have yet to get the way those two have in your video. It's usually 1 gets annoyed and essentially says, "Stop gnawing on my leg! Go away! You're annoying me!" and the other one is, "ok, ok, I'll tone it down, but we're still playing right (gnaws on other leg)?" (I'll leave you to guess which is which).
Jesse
The rest of the dogs didn't seem too bothered, and I enjoyed getting a glimpse of my sweetheart Haru staring in the direction of the commotion. How's she been doing recently?
Conker is easily pushed into fight-mode with dogs he knows really well. He was playing with me in the house one day, Sasha (Border Collie/Labrador mix) walked through the doorway he was heading for and he ran full speed into her face. She didn't like that and growled at him. He was already worked up so he growled back then began to nip and bite at her. She again didn't like than and put him on the ground, which caused him to get even more worked up and into full-fight mode...
I broke it up when Sasha put a hole in Conker's ear. But even after I pulled him off her he wanted to keep fighting so I had to put him in my room. Sasha on the other hand, as soon as he was off her she acted like it had never happened.
When he gets into a fight with Juneau or Sasha I usually stand there and watch for a bit to see if it's an actual fight or a disagreement, then break it up if I know Conker will get his butt handed to him (which always happens, but I'd rather avoid vet bills).
Fights between Conker and Sasha are always Conker's fault. She's really chill and doesn't care what he does unless it affects her. Fights between him and Juneau are 50% Conker's fault, 50% Juneau being stupid and trying to stop him from playing with me.
He'll get snarky at other dogs if they run into him or get a bit too rowdy at the dog park but has never fought with any of them. Just Juneau and Sasha.
I agree with K, looked to me like Cho Cho was trying to prove something and Nio wasn't bothered really. When he corrected I don't think he was out of control or likely to escalate anything. Its a bit of a decent tussle but considering how rough the 2 breeds tend to play I don't find it too surprising. Still wouldn't want to see that happen much if one of them were my dog.
So, I think (IMHO) that it is the difference of having only a pair of dogs (male/female) vs Brad, who has more dogs. I wonder if that heightens the shikoku reactivity more? I could see that as a strong possibility. Maybe, unlike Kai, they do not have the social skills to "remain cool" when lots of dogs and activity is going on.
I find our Shiba to be much more reactive than our Shikoku.
Brad - how old is Nio? I know Cho Cho is 8 months and 3 days.
- Look at Kumi, she's all egging them on. Like the kid in school that would yell "fight fight". Kumi is such a gritty little tank. Instead of "raised by wolves" she's "raised by Ovcharka". lol ... She runs across the yard to get the toy too. Such an opportunist.
- Note Ayu and Akashi, they're like "just stand still".
- Notice the tail posture of Cho Cho vs Nio.
- They all go back over and smell the area. I think one of them may have expressed their anal gland (i noticed it too when I went out just after the video).
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@Edgewood - I agree, I think the issue is with the number of dogs and not the Shikoku. From my experience, our Shikoku seem to do better in smaller groups. It's like they get over-stimulated in a large group.
Also, Cho Cho and Kaiju are getting to where they can be together for longer periods of time, but when they were younger they were always getting into it.
Like I said, the older ones rarely have issues like this either, and can be out with large groups for longer periods (4+ hours)... So, I think it's also very much an age thing with Cho Cho and Kaiju.
Your male being a good 2 years older than than your female (correct?) helps a lot too (I think). Kaiju and Cho Cho have had no issues with Ahi and Loa.
Really tho, I am not trying to compare the 2 breeds - that was not the point of the video. Cho Cho does very well for longer periods with the Kai and adult Shikoku - way better than Ahi would have been able to do at Cho Cho's age.
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@kaikenone - We've never had a situation where other dogs jump into a fight that didn't involve them.
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@JessicaRabbit - I posted this for you. ;o)
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@downright - Nio is just a bit older than Cho Cho. I think he's like 10 months now (I'll have to look in his file for the exact DOB).
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@TheWalrus - Haru is doing great! I think she is just now starting to get totally comfortable with us. She's got a lot of energy! lol... I love to hike with her and Kona, she loves to run around in he mountains. I need to get a video of her and Taka, she gets nuts with Taka, it's pretty funny.
Haru and Kona spend a lot of time together, I think they're sick of all the "kids" (younger Kai Ken). Even in this video, you see Kona way out in the back and Haru way in the front. Haru has this look like "jeez, you kids, get over it".
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It is interesting to see the dog dynamics. And the way mine play, they are so loud, that someone might think they are fighting when they are not. My husband calls them Tasmanian Devils (if you ever watch TD's, they are really noisy with each other) and also says that someone must think we are raising "dog fighting dogs" because of their noise level.
Here's a video of mine where Kuma gets a bit PO'd at the end. I don't have a video of stronger disagreements, but they make more noise and show more teeth, then stop and trot off
Having experience mostly with western dogs that have been highly engineered for service or dedicated work roles (apbt, rotts, gsd's etc) when I watched stuff like this at first I was pretty shocked by the noise. NK really do behave a lot different and make a lot more noise than most western breeds I've been around. Most of the times I've seen situations like this between NK, the dogs don't seem to get out of control even if another keeps egging them on. It seems that they play pretty hard as youngsters and I think that really helps develop the 'cool under pressure' attitude. I'm sure there are a few NK in the world that are not as composed as the member's dogs we see on here though.
With the Shikoku's having the reputation they do I still can't really imagine them getting into a full blown fight as a result of them starting it. When I see a video like brad's in the OP I think 'that Shikoku must be bored'. I don't see it as much as a disagreement than an appeal for attention or just venting. I haven't met one but having read a lot of posts from owners and such, they really seem mentally active and have a high demand for stimulation. It wouldn't surprise me if they just get bored that easily and look to blow of some steam by starting crap with another dog.
Plus, I have seen what a bored Shikoku acts like. It looks more like this...
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I showed the (disagreement) video to Jen and she had a different take on it. She thinks Cho Cho was going to play with Nio and it startled him. He then acted defensively, and Cho Cho just couldn't let it go after that. I can agree with her assessment too.
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