Will your dog bite? The Speed of Aggression

“He just snapped.”

“The bite came out of nowhere.”

We hear statements like this quite a bit in our business. As trainers, our job is to help people deal with the aftermath of traumatic instances of aggression from the family pet.

Communication between dogs and people is wrought with missteps and misunderstandings. Never is this more clear than when we deal with a dog who has chosen to put his teeth on a person, or worse, a child.

The goal today is to clear something up: very seldom does a bite incident with a family dog happen out of the blue.

Oh, the bite itself is very, very fast. But in fact, it’s likely the dog believes they have been left with no other alternative than to use their teeth. It’s a snowballing problem that usually has built over time to the breaking point.

Believe it or not, this is good news.

Good News? What do I mean?

The good news is with proper education, you can avoid potential problems well before the dog breaks skin. Many times when we deal with a dog that has bitten and dive more into the history of the dog, we learn things people don’t see as relevant. Such as:

  • The dog would avoid conflict and run and hide from certain situations
  • The dog would snarl softly occasionally
  • The dog would lift its lips when pushed
  • The dog snapped at other animals in the house
  • The dog would get very still, nearly statue-like in certain situations

Do any of the above guarantee a dog will bite? No. But it does tell you the dog is uncomfortable with facets of their environment and will eventually have to deal with that discomfort in some way. If you don’t teach them how to deal with it, they choose. And sometimes they don’t choose in a productive way.

Fight or Flight

In nature, we often talk of the fight or flight instinct. Fight means what it implies, but flight implies avoidance. When we come to aggression, this is the primary decision the dog has to make. Confront the threat, tell it back off forcibly, or avoid the threat entirely. Some dogs will choose flight 99.99% of the time. Others won’t.

Threat, in this context, could mean any number of things. It could mean a hoppy, skippy child singing and attempting to give the dog a hug. It would mean a dog or human trying to take away an object of high value (bone, favorite toy, food or water). It could mean a new person ‘invading’ the family home. It could mean any number of things.

This idea of fight or flight also helps explain why some dogs that appear vicious on a leash (the option for flight has been taken away) play just fine off leash.

“He’d never actually bite.”

Dogs aren’t robots. Even super-duper well-trained dogs aren’t perfect. They make mistakes. The best thing we can do as dog owners is be educated about the warning signs our dog isn’t comfortable. How can you tell your dog isn’t comfortable? Remember that list?

  • The dog would avoid conflict and run and hide from certain situations
  • The dog would snarl softly occasionally
  • The dog would lift its lips when pushed
  • The dog snapped at other animals in the house
  • The dog would get very still, nearly statue-like in certain situations

Many times people don’t mention the fact their dog has growled because they don’t see it as relevant. It seems so far out of the ballpark for their sweet pup to bite, the fact that he has growled doesn’t rate as important information. But it is. Very important.

Let’s take a look at a situation and see what the dog does and offer what some human equivalent of such as action might be, for clarity. After all, we’re only human.

Scenario: You are sitting on the couch with your dog. You’ve spent endless evenings with your dog on the couch. Your husband approaches the couch and then…

Dog Action What he might say, if only he could speak English
Growls and retreats further onto your lap Hey, I don’t like this.

…Well, you think. That was odd. That’s never happened before. You put it out of your mind. The dog was probably having a bad day. He was over tired. He just had his vaccinations two days earlier. Your husband stepped on his toe earlier in the night and he was still ‘mad.’ [Insert excuse here]

This happens several more times, not every night, but with increasing frequency, over the period of two months. Then…

Dog Action What he might say…
Continues growling but now does not retreat and begins to hold his ground. What is this guy’s problem? Doesn’t he understand this couch, this human, are MINE?

Another two months have gone by, and the growling has increased to become a nearly normal part of the evening routine. You and your husband know he’d never bite, and your husband is getting sick of being growled at, so he starts scolding the dog, wagging his finger at him. Now the dog lifts his lip and lunges at him, then retreats to your lap. This behavior is getting annoying. But the dog would never actually bite, so it’s not a problem, just an inconvenience.

Dog Action What he might say…
Growls every night, with lunging when challenged. I can’t believe they aren’t getting the message. THIS IS MY COUCH. I will NOT be scolded. I may have no other choice but to show them I mean business.

One random night, your husband sits down, and immediately the dog lunges toward his face and bites, drawing blood.

Dog Action What he might say…
Lunges and bites I tried to tell him, many, many times. I had no other choice, to get my message across.

This may seem like a crazy example, or maybe not. I can tell you we hear stories like this all this time, but we have to dig for the truth. Usually we hear, “He’s such a sweet dog and he’s never done anything like this before. He wasn’t provoked at all, he just snapped!”

Dogs don’t often go straight to using teeth and force. Not often, but sometimes. Nine times out of ten when a dog has been in a stable home and aggressions ‘pops’ up it follows a pattern similar to the above. Sometimes it’s not so crystal clear, sometimes people just don’t see it until it escalates.

Will your dog bite?

When people approach our dogs to pet, they often ask, ‘will they bite?’ It’s a loaded question, because I can only answer the question within the context of the situation. Is my dog comfortable? Is her body language relaxed? Is she willing to go meet the people?

A different situation, a different day, a different dog, with different people? I would have to go through that evaluation each time before answering the question to the best of my ability.

Though, realistically, you can never 100% say a dog wouldn’t bite. Fear, pain, mental deterioration with age, hormonal fluctuations are all potential reasons a dog may choose to use their teeth.

If you see any of the above issues cropping up with your dog, please consult a professional trained to deal with aggression in dogs…like us!

We can help.