Alpha Female - Is She Playful? Or A Bully?

[Guest iLoveLucie]

I know enough about "pack behavior" to be dangerous. I'm pretty sure my brindle girl Lucie is an "alpha" and since we started fostering our first beta boy, it has become more apparent. Overall, she has been great with the addition of a second dog in her space. She is sharing her beds and toys, both dogs will drink out of the same water bowl at the same time, no problem.

 

She is little pushy when it comes to food. She'll jump in front of our foster to get her treat first. I can tell her to sit and stay and she will.. I can give our foster a treat while she exercises her patience and gets rewarded with a treat after. We've been putting out her food first otherwise she'll be too curious about what the other dog is eating. We get her going with her meal and then can feed our foster.

 

The other day we had a bit of an issue... After both dogs were done eating I pulled away the dishes to wash and when I came back there was a nice wet spot by the area where our foster eats, definately left by Lucie. She rarely if ever has accidents in the house, so I'm pretty sure she was marking her territory/showing her dominance. In speaking with our group they confirmed this is not unsual.

 

The bigger issue is when both dogs get playful and start running/romping around the living room. Our foster will happily play with the stuffy toys, but Lucie seems more focused on the dog vs. the toy. A few times she's gone in to bite him on the back of his neck. We shout "No" or call her name, and she'll snap out of it and run over to us, and the foster doesn't seem to be bothered as he'll keep playing happily. I think some dogs will "play bite" and wrestle, but do Greyhound?

 

Is the neck biting thing being playful - or being a bully? Should we correct the behavior or let the dogs work out their pecking order? She knows DH and I are the boss of her, but she might be trying to be the boss of our foster dog. Not sure if that acceptable? And we may be reinforcing that behavior by feeding her first, etc. Again, not sure if that is a bad thing.

 

In the meantime, we are not leaving both dogs alone unsupervised without muzzles to be safe...

[TheFullHouse]

Is she growling or snarling at him in any way. Greyhounds tend to play rough. I don't step in unless I hear serious growling or snarling or baring of teeth. Minor growling I don't usually step in unless I think it's about to escalate. If the male isn't paying any attention to her she probably won't get overly aggressive. When you will know for sure is if he turns and decides to reciprocate the play and she gets ugly, then I'd stop it for sure.

[Yamaha_gurl]

Going to keep an eye on this thread, as my Bella goes for a male greyhounds neck any time he is laying on the group during our weekly greyhound playdates (they are both muzzled).

[GreyhoundImage]

bye bye

Edited March 31, 2011 by Trudy

[Guest giantsfan]

Is it mouthing the neck? Our male does this to our female when he's trying to get her to play with him. It's definitely not biting, just his way to get him to chase/interact with him. Occasionally when he's running by he'll do this and maybe mouth a little harder than he intended and she warns him with a little growl. It's never escalated into anything other than them playing together - no fights, no fierce growling or teeth baring. Maybe this is what your female is trying to make happen.

[Guest iLoveLucie]

Is she growling or snarling at him in any way. Greyhounds tend to play rough. I don't step in unless I hear serious growling or snarling or baring of teeth. Minor growling I don't usually step in unless I think it's about to escalate. If the male isn't paying any attention to her she probably won't get overly aggressive. When you will know for sure is if he turns and decides to reciprocate the play and she gets ugly, then I'd stop it for sure.

 

Nope - no growling or snarling (she did do that once with a friend's over-the-top playful yellow lab). She just gets so focused - trying to stare down and stand up taller and "look down" at the male while he is playing and wanting to chase after him if he takes off, and then she goes for the neck. If this is "normal" play behavior I'd feel so much better; I was thinking Lucie is a big bully!

 

Is it mouthing the neck? Our male does this to our female when he's trying to get her to play with him. It's definitely not biting, just his way to get him to chase/interact with him. Occasionally when he's running by he'll do this and maybe mouth a little harder than he intended and she warns him with a little growl. It's never escalated into anything other than them playing together - no fights, no fierce growling or teeth baring. Maybe this is what your female is trying to make happen.

 

That is what I was wondering. She sometimes "mouths" at me when she wants to play, but never bites hard. I figure if she really wanted to bite him she would have broken the skin, but I don't want to assume anything. I especially don't want anything bad to happen with a foster dog in our care.

[TheFullHouse]

If there is no growling or snarling it's probably that she wants to play with him and he'd rather play with the toy. I wouldn't step in unless you see her turn aggressive and you'll know when that happens, the body language will be totally different. If you have a fenced in yard, muzzle them and let them out to run. Now outside you may hear growling but that's usually just play growling. You can put a stop to it if you see them rear up on their hind legs or one is really trying to jump on the other while growling. That can lead to a fight because the one being jumped on is going to take exception and you can't blame them. Usually though they'll chase each other until they're tired.

[Guest sheila]

My Sammy and Billy play like this once in awhile and it seems to be harmless. I call it 'playing bitey-face'. There is never any real growling or aggressiveness about it, it seems to me that they are enjoying it.

[greysmom]

If this was your own two dogs, my advice would be to let them work it out - to a certain extent. I wouldn't be allowing any unsupervised play, and definitely muzzles outside, but if they were going to be living together long-term they need to sort out their relationship. Lucie is a pretty confident dog, yes? I would say she is most likely just playing - roughly, but playing.

 

My Toni would love to wrestle like a lab if any of my others would join her! And she is constantly sounding like she's going to take somebody's head off - growling and snarling like Cujo! - but it's really all sound and talk. She has the best bite inhibition of my five and I rarely worry about her unless she's quiet!

 

But since this is not your dog, and is foster in your home, I would be *much* more careful of what I allow and what I stop. For the foster's protection and Lucie's and you and the groups. If Lucie gets too wound up when he starts playing, I would probably separate them if I couldn't guarantee there would be no accidents. Or muzzle them both. Even a play bite/nip can quickly escalate into hundreds of dollars in vet bills.

[GeorgeofNE]

George plays VERY rough--actually, he doesn't really have the chance because I don't have a yard, or another dog, but we have another Greyhound in our complex, and when George tries to play with him, his owner FREAKS out! He wants to pounce on him, and rear like a horse, etc. The other dog is such a sweet, passive, young dog he just stands there!

 

And when George tries to play with me, he makes a LOT of noise, and tends to grab at me--which I do not permit.

 

So, I conclude if given the chance to really let loose with another dog, his behavior would be similar to what you're describing.

[Sambuca]

I would muzzle them until you know how they play better. I do know a greyhound that goes to the dog park and plays rough and wrestles with the labs and she has a blast, so she could just be playing. Muzzles never hurt and I have seen dogs play with and unstuff stuffies with muzzles on so the foster can still play.

[Jackandgrey]

My Jilly always would "bite" the backs of both Jack's and Joshy's necks when she was excited in play. Never ever hard and they never cared. In fact you could almost see the eye rolling. After the first flush of excitement passed she would stop. If I thought she was too rough I would break it up.

[Guest mirinaaronsmom]

I'm glad you posted this. Miri does the neck biting on Mojo when I get home from work and they're all excited to see me. She does growl and bark also, but usually only when playing. She does have a potty mouth (she must swear like a sailor), so I don't correct her unless she gets too wound up. I was kind of wondering if I should intervene immediately. Mojo doesn't seem to be bothered by it at all (he's definitely the boss of her).

[Guest Desonia]

I have my greyhound, Marty, about a month now, and my little so small whippet, McFly, does the same thing to Marty. Jumping (cuz she's smaller) and bitting his ears and neck. Each time he wakes up at night and moves she gets up and start doing that. We were sad for Marty, poor him arriving here and get bullied by a small whippet... some people told us not to let her do that. So we don't and now it's going better and better. It would be different if they were playing, but they aren't, it looks like McFly wants to control every moves he makes.

[Guest FastDogsOwnMe]

Greyhounds play by nipping at the neck when running- so do many Whippets. I wouldn't read too much into it.

[Guest Wasserbuffel]

My Jayne plays the same way with my inlaws' dog when they visit. She just loves to chase and bite at him, but she's not being aggressive at all.

[Guest Desonia]

FastDogsOwnMe, thanks I really didn't know.

[TheFullHouse]

Usually when the hound that is the victim of a bully stands up for themselves and gives a little back, the bully learns to back off. Dogs are great at telling each other off when they get mad.

[Guest sheila]

Usually when the hound that is the victim of a bully stands up for themselves and gives a little back, the bully learns to back off. Dogs are great at telling each other off when they get mad.

 

agreed. When Jane and Billy met for the first time they got along fine until Jane tried to hump him. Twice. Billy is a somewhat submissive hound, but he let Jane know in no uncertain terms that the humping thing was 'NOT OK' and Jane has never done it since.

[JJNg]

My female grey Willow plays rough, and the only one of my dogs who will play with her is my mixed breed Corey. I've included a video below of one of their rougher play sessions. She will try to get my male grey Wiki and whippet Ollie to play with her by jumping at them and biting at their neck and head, but they refuse to join in.

 

Wiki just ignores her and walks along like she's not there. Ollie gets a little intimidated sometimes but just hunkers down and takes it or tries to get away from her. If he would stand up for himself and tell her off, she would stop bugging him, but since he doesn't, I have to intervene to give Ollie some peace. While Willow's motives are play, I do feel this type of behavior borders on bullying when the other dog clearly doesn't want to reciprocate and she persists.

 

Here's the video. They really are playing in it. When Corey does get upset, he doesn't hesitate to let Willow know, and Willow immediately respects that and acts really submissive. This rarely happens, though, as Corey loves playing rough. A couple of his best friends have been boxers.

 

Btw, I really don't see anything in your description to indicate that Lucie is an "alpha". But then I'm one who don't think dominance theory applies much to natural dog behavior. Behaviorists and biologists are really moving away from using dominance theory to describe canine behavior, although trainers seem committed to hanging on to what may be an outdated theory.

 

One of the early wolf researchers who first used the terms alpha and beta has essentially retracted his interpretation once new information indicated the majority of natural packs are family groups and the "alpha male and female" were actually just the parents of the rest of the pack. As this was one of the original sources of info from which dog trainers decided to apply to dogs (the fact that dogs are socially different from wolves is a whole 'nother topic), I find it interesting that many trainers still insist on using dominance to explain just about everything dogs do, when the wolf biologists no longer believes it is true for wolves.

 

A few sources for anyone who might be interested in some additional info and reading:

"Whatever Happened to the Term Alpha Wolf?" article by David Mech

Nonlinear Dogs - website of animal behaviorist Alexandra Semyonova who proposes an alternate theory to explain dog behavior and social organization

[Guest iLoveLucie]

Thanks all for the info - especially that video. We don't have a yard so all the playing happens in our living room where there isn't much room for things to get too out of hand. And since I'm not a huge fan if dog parks, the only time I've seen lucie play off leash is at greyhound events where everyone is muzzled.

 

So Lucie just wants to play rough. Well keep her in check with fosters around. If/when we adopt a second we can do more to let them 'work it out.' Since it sounds like some play biting a growling might be fine. And if one is ignoring that even better