How often do dogs defend their owners?

In My Humble Opinion
41

Two more quick things. First, I was a little hard on Syd earlier. While I don’t think she has a “fight” instinct in her entire body, she’s an excellent sentry. If someone’s coming up the walk, she’ll have a bark out and be at the window even before Bitz.

Another Bitz thing that I have no idea where she learned but has impressed me from the get-go: If someone comes to the door and I open it, she absolutely will not stay inside. She rushes out past the person and gets behind them.

At first I thought it was a way of getting some strange human love. I’m normally polite with solicitors, telling them I’m not interested and wishing them a good evening. One night I had a guy come to the door who thought I was fooling around with his girlfriend. The fact that I’d never heard of the girlfriend meant nothing to him.

I shot a look beyond him as he got more agitated and said, “Buddy, my dog is about to rip your kidneys out. I’d calm down, step aside and back away slowly.”

When he stopped hollering for a second, both he and I heard that unmistakeable Rottie (mix in her case) rumble coming out of Bitz. You don’t actually hear it, you feel it, like a beam of projected bassline malice, right in your gut.

He turned very quickly white and then very slowly around. She was waiting to carve herself a steak out of him. I stepped over to her, looped my fingers through her collar and told him to back very slowly down the walk and calmly get in his car.

He did. I fried her up some bacon.

42

We sure are. But dogs understand that and are cool with it.

43

Quoted for truth. And from that day on, he protected me like that. He knew that for that moment of confusion I felt unsafe and that he had “rescued” me from the threat. My husband worked nights and he would (every night) come to bed with me and cuddle, then lay at the foot of the bed on the floor near the door. About hourly or so, he’d get up, walk the house and then come back to the bedroom. I honestly can’t say that I’ve slept right since he passed away, I always felt SO safe.

Interestingly, one night my husband came home after drinking and was trying to sneak up the stairs. He’d been dropped off and entered the house quietly trying not to wake me. He got halfway up the stairs on tip toe when our Rottie heard him and investigated. I heard that tell tale “The Rott may kill soon” sound and hear my husband saying “It’s ME! It’s ME!” but that dog didn’t give a rats ass. He knew that there was something wrong- something off with how he was coming in and he wasn’t sure that he wasn’t up to no good. He absolutely refused to let him in. I had to go and see what was up and call the dog off and assure him that he was OK. And that was his daddy. That’s how I always knew that I was safe when he was here.

44

Some friends of my parents, the wife was just coming out of the house to put the trash cans out on the street or something, and some guy attacks her.

Within instants their two doberman had run out the door and attacked the guy. (Might be Portuguese Water Dogs, not dobermans–not that those are all that similar.)

Neither of the dogs had been trained to be guard dogs or anything, they were just your average pets, but apparently they were quite effective and had the instincts to do it on their own.

45

When I was a kid we used to have Saluki’s, not very common dogs so they used to get a lot of attention when we were out walking them…not to mention that anybody trying to walk three Saluki’s is quite a sight anyway!

One night my dad came home from work (he was a sea pilot before he retired) and had his bright orange work jacket on when he went into the kitchen where the dogs slept. We were all woken up by a sudden flurry of barking and growling, apparently the dogs had seen this person come in and weren’t used to seeing him in his bright work jacket and switched to defense mode…thankfully they realised who it was very quickly and looked incredibly apologetic!

If you know Saluki’s you’ll know that these dogs are very calm, but well able to protect if they want to. They also have a habit of “singing”, they don’t bark but they do howl like crazy at times. One of these times was when they heard my mum’s car backing into the drive as she came home from work. All three of them would start up on what was known as “the grand howl”. If I was in the kitchen I would occasionally walk over to one of them and put my hand around their muzzle whilst glaring at them, this didn’t stop anything apart from the howling was rather muffled, I think they just thought it was a fun game :slight_smile:

The other odd thing that one of the dogs had, my dad has a beard, he’s had a beard all my life and apart from one other person he’s the only person the dogs ever saw in the house with a beard. The other person was a relative who when they visited would be treated to one of the Saluki’s lying in one corner growling at him the whole time he was there…just a low grumbling growl, not particularly aggressive. The only reason we could think of is that Saluki’s are sight hounds and to her he looked pretty much like dad but didn’t smell like him…poor guy, she never got used to him.

I do miss having Saluki’s around, they are wonderful dogs…I just don’t have the space or the time for them at the moment.

46

Our neighbors used to have a dog they called Sheba, a little mutt not much more than 20 pounds. Sheba always got along with all the neighborhood kids, never causing any trouble. However, there were two times that my kids had visitors over, and they all went outside to play tag or whatever. Somehow in all the running around and yelling, Sheba got the idea that our visitor was a threat to one of the kids in Sheba’s family. She didn’t bite hard, but it was clear that Sheba wasn’t going to allow any stranger to mess around with her kids.

47

My dog is very protective. It is actually to the point of being a problem at times. He is small (around 15lbs) and thinks he is ten foot tall. I am HIS human and in his little mind his job is to protect me. He follows me around the house and is always a step or two away at all times. The poor thing even cries when I get home from work and often has a breathing attack from excitement. He sleeps facing my bedroom door.

While walking Maxwell, if a stranger is walking across the street, no problem, if that same person approaches me, he will pull the leash, growl and snap. When my ex husband came over recently to help my son with something, Max went after him when he got too close to me. Even when my current husband appears quietly in the room, Max will growl and bark at him until I order him to stop.

He is very cute and people want to pet him but fortunately, most ask and I will say no. I learned that one the hard way. I found out he was like this when a little boy tried to pet him while we were walking and he snapped at him. Fortunately the child had quick reflexes.

However, when my daughter takes him out he is perfectly fine with everyone. It is odd how he has appointed himself my protector. If I had never seen this side of him, I never would believe it.

I have never had an animal like this.

48

My ex-dog was a worthless, untrainable, sloppy, snoring, lazy, good for nothing English Bulldog. The ex-wife brought him into my life, my life and the life of my cat. Both exes are gone, the cat is still here.

We had a big deck, and the cat liked to lay on it and under it. One day the dog was up on the deck and the cat was below, and the neighbor’s two sweet black labs came bounding over to play with either the cat or the dog, they didn’t care, they were just very nice and playful guys. As I watched through the sliding glass door, the bulldog, “Moose”, moved faster than I had ever seen, actually leaping up onto and over the bench seating surrounding the deck and landing between the cat, “Scooter”, and the oncoming twosome, obviously protecting him. I was stunned.

49

Yeah, IME once a dog decides something is a member of their pack, they won’t hesitate to defend it. My mum’s aforementioned dog Poppy hates all cats and will chase them on sight - with the exception of mum’s cat, who she will ferociously defend from all comers. Not that she gets any thanks for it, the cat’s only response to her is to bop her on the nose whenever he sees her.

50

I grew up with a wire-haired fox terrier who was my mother’s first “baby.” Some people told her to get rid of the dog once I came along, as she would be jealous of the attention I got and try to hurt me, but quite the opposite.

As a wee little one, sometimes I would sit in a playpen and play with toys; this was a wood-barred playpen. Being a fairly small dog, she figured out that there was a single pair of bars that she could fit through, and she would run around the playpen, trying each set in turn, until she popped through the correct pair and would sit in the playpen with me, watching over me and occasionally licking me. If my mom put the playpen against something so that the side with the gapped bar pair was blocked, she would run back and forth trying accessible bars, then whine endlessly until my mother gave in. I was told I would sometimes grab her ear between my fingers, and she would only whine loudly for Mom to come rescue her, but that never dampened her eagerness to be in the playpen.

I only remember one tale of her defense of children. My mother has a sister who had a baby several months after I was born. This aunt came over to visit one day, was greeted by Mom and dog at the door, and put her baby to nap in a baby buggy in my parents’ bedroom. They had their visit, and then when it was time to leave, my aunt got up and went towards the bedroom to pick up her baby. Our dog rocketed into the bedroom and parked herself inside the doorway, turning into a snarling, threatening beast. Even though she had easily accepted this visitor’s presence and been friendly, she wouldn’t tolerate a move made towards this strange baby! My mother had to go pick up the baby and hand her over to my aunt, which calmed our dog down and everything was OK again.

I have no doubt that this little dog would have gone berserk if anyone tried to hurt us kids, and probably for our parents too.

51

I currently have 4 dogs, one which would have made an excellent schutzhund prospect. He has a strong protection dog drive and strong pack instinct. Unlike my other dogs, he recognizes threatening posturing (from humans) and will respond aggressively (while remaining under control) to threat. Because of this, he is not exactly the kind of dog you’d want a novice handler to have. He can be the most loving, sweetest, belly-rub-loving lick-your-face-til-the-cows-come-home guy, he’s my Service Dog, but if you ask him to guard something, he knows what he has to do.

Some dogs are hardwired for protection work. Others aren’t. Those who have that “serve and protect” instinct WILL have it kick in when push comes to shove. Most pets will flee in the face of danger, though. :slight_smile:

52

I had the strangest experience once, looking after a pit bull belonging to a friend. I was taking her on her evening walk, which followed a square path around a block near my house. The dog was one of those ones that constantly pulls ahead while walking. We set off on the first edge of the square (to the east) and the dog absolutely refused to go. She put her four paws down and would not budge. I scratched my head about it and headed north, and she proceeded ahead of me in her usual impatient way. We went east, then south, then it was time to turn west (down the same stretch that she’d refused to go down before). Once again, she absolutely refused to go. She was having none of it. I didn’t want to let the dog win this power struggle again so I dragged her down the street. She followed way behind me, very timidly and clearly freaked out. When we passed one particular building she was extremely interested in one of the doors, and as soon as we passed it, she bolted off ahead, once again in quite the hurry.

Not exactly protective, I know (but she wasn’t my dog), but it certainly was an insight into the secret minds of dogs.

My own pittie is the least protective dog I’ve ever seen. He ignores or welcomes strangers or other animals when they approach, and if my partner or I come home at an unexpected time, he might deign to lift his head from the couch when we actually enter the room, but he’ll never get up to see who’s at the door.

But once, my boyfriend and I were goofing around and he ended up sitting on the floor. As part of the goofing around I pointed at him and said to the dog “Get him!” - and the dog (not playing) made a dash for him! I stopped him as soon as I realized what was happening, and no damage was done, but it scared the daylights out of both of us and we don’t play that way any more.

But it did make me quite confident that he’d step up if I needed it.

53

Apparently I’m Capt. Postalot for this thread.

When I was a kid I always loved visiting my Aunt Eva and Uncle Fred. They lived in the country outside of Detroit and had 2 great dogs: A border collie mix named Freckles and a pug named Max.

Max was lots of fun to play with, but Freckles was my buddy. As soon as we rolled up, Freckles was by my side and wanted nothing more than to hang out with me. He, along with my own childhood mutt Sparky, are the reason I love dogs so much to this day.

We were visiting one summer, I think I was about 8 or so, and I went to bed. Did I ever hear stories in the morning. I slept with the door open in the room nearest the top of the stairs. Over the course of the night, everyone else in the house (five people or so) came upstairs to go to bed. Every single one of them, including my aunt and uncle, got a warning growl from Freckles.

My uncle was incredibly confused, since Freckles was an absolutely gentle goof who delighted in play play play every possible waking moment. Other than barking to announce a car coming down the long driveway he’d never shown anything close to a protective instinct.

Fred decided to investigate. He carefully took a step toward the doorway of my room. Freckles growled louder. He took another step and Freckles stood up into a low crouch, growling louder still. Not being a stupid man, Fred backed off. Freckles laid back down and turned the volume down on the growl.

The next day Fred told me about it and everyone else confirmed. He said something to the effect of, “Seems that dog’s more yours than mine. If it’s okay with your folks, he can go home with you if you want.” I tried, but Mom and Dad decided we didn’t have enough room at our place for a country dog like Freckles and I agreed since I wanted him to be happy.

He lived until I was 12 or so, and every time we came up, I was always his boy. More than 20 years later and I still can’t help but smile every time I think of him.

54

I think it all depends on the breed. I have a goofy chocolate lab who I’m pretty sure wouldn’t even know how to protect me even if he wasn’t inclined to automatically love everyone and everything that he meets. That said, if you get a breed that was developed for the purpose of being a guard dog, some kind of mastiff lets say, you better believe they’d throw themselves in front of a bus for you.

55

We had a mutt (Arf) for many years. He would bite the percieved attacker in any situation. So what my brother and sister and I would do was grab the siblings arm and pull their hand over to our body and at the same time yell: “ow, ow,ow, ow.” Arf would percieve that the person whose arm was outstretched must be the attacker and bite them.

56

I just remembered the other time my dog was protective … in a moment of poor judgment, I invited this guy over to my house who I hardly knew. I’d met him once before and he seemed pleasant enough so I thought why not have him over for dinner.

The guy was a little strange. At first I didn’t think too much of it, some of my favourite people are a little strange, but it became less endearing as the night went on. And for some reason my dog absolutely would not settle down. It was most uncharacteristic behaviour. He was always trying to climb in my lap, or running around and playing, or sitting and whining, and generally making a pest of himself. I was getting a little tense trying to control the dog, and I was becoming increasingly creeped out by the strange guy in my house. Eventually, I realized that the only time the dog was calm was when he was physically in between me and the guy. As soon as I realized what he was up to I smiled and relaxed, and he relaxed. The guy was still creepy, but I wasn’t freaked out any more, and I was able to extricate myself from the situation without any trouble.

57

My GSD growing up once protected a friend and I from 2 (known to be aggressive) huskies. The huskies had killed another neighbor’s Samoyed and had also bitten a child. The dogs were still pending investigation, so the owner was supposed to keep them in a locked kennel.

The dogs got loose and came at us (me, my friend and my leashed dog). Honey took a big chunk out of the one and it died before it could be treated at the vet. The other husky was pretty torn up as well.

Honey came out with a bunch of stitches only.

The cops came and thankfully we had neighbors who witnessed the entire thing. The living husky was euthed and the owner had to pay all our vet bills. He tried to have our dog classified as “dangerous” but that never got anywhere.

58

My Rottie/pit mix’s favorite position is upside down, expecting tummy rubs from everyone. If she is not receiving enough attention, she limps.:rolleyes: But if she’s in the van with me alone or walking with someone, she is guard dog to the extreme. No one touches me or gets near me without the rumbly Rott sound.
However, for sheer insane territory guarding, nothing beats my flock of African geese. We had to go pick up any package that needed delivering. They were 20 - 30 pounds apiece, and went into evil, slit-eyed rage at any stranger.

59

Same thing with our Salukis. I come in wearing a ballcap, they don’t recognize me. Thing is in my experience at least, they are wonderful watch dogs but not so good at guarding. Their attitude is, “I’ve told you of the intruder. Now I’m retiring behind the couch while you deal with him.”

But . . . but that’s the best part about owning Salukis. It can be a bit overwhelming if everybody’s indoors but outside, being serenaded on your return home is one of the higher points of my day. One Saluki is pretty quiet, two will sing a little bit, three you get the full effect. I think they egg each other on.

QFT. We have a half acre and that’s the minimum. There’s a diagonal path worn from the back door to the farthest corner as they make the longest straight run possible when released in the morning.

60

Geese are historically very popular watch-animals, because of this sort of behavior. They’re not only pretty vicious in flocks, but also very alert and noisier than hell.