LGDs/other guard dogs and house guests

[DonyaQuick]

For those who have LGDs or other guard dogs protecting some combination of your home, land, and other animals...what is your setup and protocol if you have guests staying with you? How do you explain how to interact with the dog to guests, and what do you do if they don't follow the protocol?

I have a 1.5yr female great pyrenes who has done great work pushing out predators and even deterring trespassers I was having trouble with. She guards my chickens while they are out foraging, but otherwise she mostly guards the house and coop area next to the house (she doesn't live in with the chickens). She is a trusted coworker for me, not a kissy-poo, lovey-dovey sort of pet. She is quite obedient with me for a pyr, but a side effect of that is that she mirrors my mood in an amplified way. This is fine with neighbors, contractors, vets, etc. She'll bark at first with strangers coming onto the property, but then she ultimately cues off of me, follows commands, and tones it down. However, my husband has guests over right now and they will be here for a while yet; first time we've had house guests since getting a dog. I'm a very private person who gets grumpy at stupid things. Doesn't matter if I try to hide it, my dog knows what's up. For example...there were no ice cubes left one evening; I just stared silently at the empty tray for a moment and my dog immediately started growling at the fridge. She stopped when told, and nothing dangerous has happened so far, but there has been a tremendous amount of barking and whining and just a lot of dog confusion. It's turned into a crummy situation with a confused and upset dog clinging to me because she doesn't understand what's going on. I'm guessing part of the problem is I don't have whatever setup I should have had to prepare for this and probably botched some other introductory things I should have done (or not done), which is why I'm hoping others will share their setups and practices with dogs that actually have a guarding job of some sort. I don't know if I can fix the current situation, but I can try to do better for the future. I realize it might just boil down to "no dog in/around the house when guests are involved long-term" but that also kind of defeats part of the job my dog does which would be unfortunate.

 

[cassie]

It is a little late, but I think you need to work on socializing the dog. You also might try introducing the dog to guests, like you would to another person, so the dog knows they belong there.

 

[David61]

It is a little late, but I think you need to work on socializing the dog. You also might try introducing the dog to guests, like you would to another person, so the dog knows they belong there.

A working great pyrenes is not a social dog by design and need.
Tell your guest about the dog and to speak up if the dog is not subordinate. As for your attitude, be a better host when guest are about. Drink more wine. lol

 

[DonyaQuick]

Drink more wine. lol

I think you may be right there lol.

Now that the situation is passed though, I've done a bit of dissection on it. The initial introduction with the dog was actually pretty careful; dog got to see my husband and me interact with the guests first, then in a place where she's less defensive outside she got to meet them, we all went into the house together, etc. Things just gradually fell apart after the introduction.

While me being a grump was definitely not helping with the dog, it definitely also didn't help that my place was progressively treated more like an AirBnB rental than a regular house with the owners living in it going about their routines. Most of that got going after my original post. I won't go into detail but things got way too casual. No point trying to explain how to interact with an animal if the guests don't listen.

Anyway, next time, I will....

• Have a very small set of non-negotiable house rules to stop things from spiraling out of control as they did this time.
• Have some kind of outdoor dog setup...perhaps big enough that I can also sit in there and...
• Have some wine and...
• Hide the brand new cookware

 

[cassie]

A working great pyrenes is not a social dog by design and need.
Tell your guest about the dog and to speak up if the dog is not subordinate. As for your attitude, be a better host when guest are about. Drink more wine. lol

I had Komondors. They are a lot less social than Pyrenees which is why early socialization was so very important. Otherwise, they were as likely to take a chunk out of guests as not.

 

[Psyduck Girl]

A working great pyrenes is not a social dog by design and need.

If the dog is so attuned to their owner's emotions that being a bit miffed over an empty ice cube tray entices a reaction, wouldn't this hold true for any other interaction though, including with the visitors themselves?

I even introduce my most perceptive cat to new people so she feels more comfortable around them lol... she's swatted two guests that I was noticeably avoiding in the past, so a working dog that bases their behavior on the temperament of their owner should be on a whole different level. It doesn't have to be a social thing so much as a "these individuals are not a threat" scenario. Of course, if the guests aren't behaving themselves...

 

[DonyaQuick]

I had Komondors. They are a lot less social than Pyrenees

I think there are rather different strains of pyrs out there and also a lot of individual variation. Mine is very much on the far end of the independent/non-social side of the scale. As a tiny puppy she was a real challenge to train out of certain behaviors because she didn't care one bit about praise, didn't want to be hugged/petted, and she was actually quite happy to be left alone to do her own thing. That has changed to some extent over time, but she's still the most introverted dog I've ever interacted with.

wouldn't this hold true for any other interaction though, including with the visitors themselves?

Only if I'm standing right there with her. She would still be nervous but would just sit and behave if I was right there. When I was elsewhere, she didn't attack but made it very loudly clear that she did not like what these other strange people were doing.

Of course, if the guests aren't behaving themselves...

Retrospectively I think that was most of the issue. They are nice people, but they would just do stuff without asking and ignored requests to do/not do certain things.

The dog was fine right after introductions. We then explained on that the dog has a job and the lower floor of the house is her patrol zone at night (she monitors the coop from a window and does check it frequently). Should have been a red flag to us that their immediate response was something like "but what if we want a midnight snack." We said not to do that and to wait for one of us to get up and either crate the dog or take her outside in the early morning. I'm up very close to dawn for chicken chores, so this didn't seem unreasonable. A couple days later, they were up at a weirdly early and just charged downstairs on their own in their underwear and started bashing about in the kitchen. My dog didn't go at them thankfully but she was confused and terrified and basically started screaming at me up the stairs to come help while I was trying to throw on clothes to go deal with the situation. I think my original post was just after that event which is why I was asking about what protocols people use, but I guess it doesn't matter if the guests just do whatever anyway.

 

[LaFleche]

Sounds more like an invasion or hostile take over than house guests.