Reading Your Dog’s Body Language – The Key To Communicate and Understand Each Other.
There are ways for us to read into our dog’s minds. Dogs have a language and express themselves with their body. To read a dog’s body language takes a little bit of experience but once you are familiar with common dog behaviors, you will be able to:
- Better understand your own pooch.
- Read situations in a pack of dogs
- Avoid conflicts and fights
- Get better result with your training
Confidence versus Fear
Signs of confidence include
- Standing erectly,
- Tail pointing straight up or
- Wagging in a slower sweep,
- Ears pricked up or completely relaxed
- Smaller pupils.
Signs of fear or concern include
- A lowered stance,
- Tail pointing down or tucked under their body, wagging franticly,
- Eyes diverted and dilated pupils.
- Another more outward sign is excessive barking.
Dogs often bark out of fear in an attempt to distance themselves from whatever is causing them concern. If your dog has hair standing on end over his shoulders and his tail, your dog is on high alert. Not every dog has all of these symptoms of fear or confidence so get to know your dog
Dominance versus Submission
If your dog is asserting his dominance he is probably standing over another dog, tall and calmly accepting another dog’s lick at his lips. Sometimes mounting or humping another dog can be dominance, but not always.
By contrast, a submissive dog will have his head lowered and will allow other dogs to stand over them. A submissive dog will roll onto his back and tuck his tail as a sign of obedience.
Note that among dogs, the hierarchies are usually maintained and demonstrated very casually and almost always by more submissive members of the pack. Very high-ranking animals very seldom demonstrate their rank. Most demonstrations and almost all fights that occur over rank are done by the middle-ranking or unconfident members.
Play or Fight?
Puppy play time can be confusing to put your finger on since it can sometimes appear like fight time. But a pooch in play will be bowing, pawing the air, lips will be covering their teeth, and they may let out a high pitched bark.
All of these are signs that the “growling”, biting, tugging and running around that your dog is doing is all about having a good time. Dogs may even mount one another in play but it is a more relaxed mounting that may signal a turn of events in play time.
Stress versus Calm
Dogs can feel stressed in situations of frustration or fear (including during class or learning a new task). Look for clusters of stress signs: Shaking, whining, “submissive” urination, ears back, pupils dilated; rapid panting with corner of mouth pulled back; tail down; body lowered; sweating through paw pads, scratching at self; sudden interest in sniffing; yawning; blinking eyes; licking of lips or nose, or stretching tongue forward; looking away or turning head away; shaking body.
Frustrated dogs often bark (this is especially seen in “fence fighting”, when two dogs on opposite sides of a fence bark at each other; another easily-observed example is dogs in a shelter watching other dogs walking by; dogs that must pass each other on-leash often bark in frustration).
Of course all of these signs in any of the above behaviors need not be present in your fur baby. Your dog may exhibit one sign and none of the others or may show a special little trait of his own. The important thing is that you know what important body language behaviors mean so that you can use it to properly train your dog to overcome whatever is plaguing him.
Spend some one-on-one time with your pooch and get to know what his behaviors mean. I promise that your time will be well-spent!
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