Fetch! (It's Time to Set the Record Straight)

Welcome to the Fixing Separation Anxiety podcast, where it's all about healing your dog, regaining

your freedom, and getting your life back on track.

And now, here's your host, Julie May Smith.

My dogs love fetch, all three of them, and I love that.

It makes me happy, it makes me joyful to see them having so much fun, but sometimes I feel

like I might be swimming against the tide.

Occasionally, I will see posts, usually on Facebook, denouncing fetch as a terrible preoccupation

for dogs, something that we should absolutely not let them do, and this horrifies me.

So as somebody who cares about enrichment, because of the impact that enrichment can

have on dogs' brains, their anxiety and their stress levels, I'm absolutely passionate about

anything that can enrich our dogs' lives.

And that's why I need to talk about fetch, because there's so much misinformation about

fetch, and it's time to set the record straight.

Okay, so what is fetch?

Why do dogs play fetch?

Well, fetch actually has a function, and that function is completely natural and normal.

All animals have what are called fixed action pattern behaviours.

These behaviours are innate behaviours that basically are genetically pre-programmed into

the animal.

So the animal doesn't have to learn these behaviours, they just come into the world

knowing how to do them.

Unlike the fawn that can get onto its legs and run away from a predator or go and hide,

it doesn't learn that, it's just genetically wired to do so.

Now, with most animals, feeding is a fixed action pattern.

It would be really difficult to come into the world not knowing how to find your food

in the wild.

Obviously, humans are a bit different there, though we do come with our own fixed action

patterns too.

So as an animal, it's really helpful to come into the world knowing where your food is

coming from.

With dogs, we know that they source their food in two ways.

One is they scavenge for food, and the second is they hunt for food.

And hunting is very much driven by a fixed action pattern.

Here's where I'm going with this.

If you think about what goes into the hunting of prey, how dogs track, trace and eat their

food, a big component of that behaviour, that innate pattern of behaviour is chasing and

capturing the prey.

It's normal behaviour.

It's what animals who hunt for food do.

They chase animals in order to capture them, kill them and eat them.

So dogs come into the world knowing how to chase things.

Just because they're domesticated doesn't mean to say that they lose their fixed action

patterns.

They don't need them anymore because we're feeding them.

So they don't need to know how to hunt down prey because we're providing them their food.

But the thing about fixed action patterns is they can even remain in domesticated animals

who no longer need those patterns to survive.

A great example of that is the dog who resource guards.

Resource guarding is another example of an innate behaviour that's no longer helpful

to the dog.

Dog doesn't need to resource guard because for most dogs they get everything they need

from their owner.

But it's kind of their buggy software that hasn't quite adapted to the world of domestication.

And that's why you will see some dogs will resource guard while many others won't.

Some dogs will be mad for fetch where some dogs could not care less about chasing.

But when a dog does love to chase, it's just carrying out a really natural and normal and

instinctive behaviour, a behaviour that it was born predisposed to loving.

And that's another reason why I love seeing dogs play fetch.

Not only do I see the joy in the moment, but with that dog, the dog who loves to play fetch,

we are giving them an outlet for their natural dogishness.

And what happens to animals in captivity who don't get to do the things that come naturally to them?

Well, we have a lot of evidence from the world of zoos when it comes to animals who aren't

given outlets for their natural innate behaviour.

And what happens, and it happens in far too many cases, is captive animals can develop

a form of psychosis.

It's actually called zookosis because it's a form of psychosis that develops as a result of captivity.

And you might have seen the horrific pictures.

Just recently, I watched a very, very brief portion of The Tiger King, the Netflix documentary

that everybody was raving about.

I found it really difficult because I really struggled to see so many animals being kept

in such terrible for them conditions.

And what did it for me, the deal breaker, was seeing a tiny bear cub in a cage.

And this bear cub was just pacing up and down, up and down, but with great momentum.

So a very rapid pace, back and forth, back and forth.

And as it picked up the pace and as it worked its way backwards and forwards from one end

to the cage to the other and got quicker and quicker, it then started leaping at the cage

at the end of each lap.

So it would jump at the cage, go to the other end, jump, go to the other end, jump.

It was heartbreaking.

That is an absolute classic example of zookosis.

One of the people working for The Tiger King, who's responsible for this bear, is stood

in front of the cage and is asked, is that bear happy?

The answer, yeah, happy for them.

The bear has never known anything other than the cage.

So it's happy.

Nonsense.

It's absolute rubbish.

Fixed action patterns because they are genetic.

The behaviors that animals need to perform because they're hardwired into them.

It doesn't matter whether the animal has never experienced that.

It's not true that they can't miss something they've never experienced.

And that was a quote that came up too.

It is not true.

Animals cannot miss things they have never experienced.

If a baby was born in a prison cell and spent its life in a prison, it would miss all the

things that we as humans need to thrive.

So that statement, you can't miss what you've never experienced, is nonsense.

And it's especially nonsense when it comes to fixed action patterns.

So think about tigers.

Think about bears.

Bears are genetically programmed to roam for miles and miles and miles hunting and eating.

Similarly, large territories, lots of activity, looking for prey, consuming prey, falling

asleep after having consumed prey.

All of those things come naturally.

And when animals get deprived of doing the things that come naturally, that's when problems

start and that's why we see zookosis.

So let me tell you a bit about zookosis.

Zookosis is when we see what are called stereotypical behaviors.

And these are repetitive behaviors that serve no purpose.

So there's no reason for them.

Think about the bear that I described, running from one end of this tiny cage to another

and leaping at the cage from one end to another.

If you saw this bear, you would see this bear was not trying to escape.

This bear had just got caught in this pattern of throwing itself at either end of the cage.

Didn't look like an escape attempt.

So there was no logic to it.

This bear has just got caught in this repetitive, over and over and over again, this behavior

that it could not stop.

So zookosis or confinement zookosis is all about that repetitive behavior.

It's ongoing and it serves no purpose.

There's no reason for it.

Another key about these behaviors is they almost never appear in wild animals.

So when you observe a tiger grooming excessively in a zoo, you wouldn't see that level of grooming

in the wild.

So you almost never see these behaviors in the wild.

Interestingly, you know, I'm a separation anxiety geek.

Well, we definitely do see, as far as I'm concerned, stereotypies with dogs who've got

separation anxiety.

So remember, they're behaviors that are repetitive, but no longer serve a purpose.

And I think that when we see dogs barking and barking, even though the barking doesn't

bring the owner back, even though the barking goes on for eight hours, I'm almost certain

that we're seeing some type of stereotypy there.

We see dogs pace.

We see that all the time.

We see dogs pace up and down, up and down when their owner is gone.

Doesn't achieve anything.

There's no purpose to it.

They're not going anywhere, but it happens.

So those are stereotypical behaviors and they are not good.

I wonder sometimes if what we do when we see dogs playing fetch over and over and over

again, we're getting all muddled with tigers we've seen in zoos who pace up and down.

There is no similarity.

There is nothing the same about a dog who is genetically programmed to go and find food

and hence to chase and a zoo animal who cannot stop a repetitive behavior that has no function.

Now you might say to me, but fetch doesn't have a function.

It absolutely does have a function.

The function of fetch is it's part of the feeding ritual.

It's a dog enacting part of the feeding ritual.

And I tell you what, there are plenty of fun things that dogs love to do that are part

of their feeding ritual.

Some dogs love to chase, others love to be chased.

Some dogs love dissecting.

Some dogs love tug.

Did you know that tug is actually a cooperative activity?

And if you ever look at pictures of wild African dogs feeding on a carcass, you will

see that they're all tugging at the carcass.

So when your dog is playing tug with you, it isn't competing with you.

It's helping to dissect the carcass.

You two are working on the kill together.

It's a cooperative game.

It's not a game of you versus him.

Now back to our zoo animals, guess what helps with stereotypies?

Guess what helps stop those repetitive behaviors?

Enrichment.

So giving animals an outlet for their natural behaviors, giving them the things that they

need to do, giving them something that relates to their instinct.

Now enrichment doesn't completely stop the unwanted repetitive behaviors in zoo animals,

but it does significantly reduce it in a number of cases.

Some studies say it can reduce, that good enrichment activities can reduce the unwanted

problem repetitive behaviors by in the region of 50%.

So enrichment doesn't solve the problem, doesn't give them, it doesn't give zoo animals access

to the things they really need to do, but enrichment can help.

Feeding zoo animals out of puzzle feeders can help reduce these repetitive behaviors.

Yes, zoo animals get puzzle feeders too.

So we can give our dogs puzzle feeders and that's great because scavenging is one thing

that they do like to do.

Working on a puzzle feeder is kind of finding food.

It's a bit like scavenging, but if a dog loves to fetch because it's genetically predisposed,

if we stop that dog having, being able to play fetch, we're not letting it do the things

that it needs to do.

And if anything, a bigger problem with dogs isn't letting them do noisy, loud, crazy things

like fetch or tug.

It's the opposite.

It's warehousing dogs.

It's the captive comfort that we provide.

They're in captivity and just because they are lazing around on our sofas doesn't mean

to say that that calm behavior is a good thing.

Sure, dogs do spend a lot of time sleeping.

Wild dogs do, street dogs do, but they also spend a lot of time working.

So street dogs constantly looking for food, wild dogs always looking for food.

Yes, they sleep when they've eaten, but they don't sleep because there's nothing else to

do.

If there is a job to be done, if they need to go eat, they will go eat.

Just because our dogs are calm, that's not necessarily a good thing.

Bored isn't good for our dogs at all.

Boredom is far worse for our dogs than giving them outlets for their dogishness.

But then I wonder, why do we hate fetch though?

If we know it's natural, if it's something that many dogs are programmed to do, why does

it worry us so much?

Why do I see so many blog articles about it?

Why do I see comments on Facebook threads where people say categorically fetch is bad

for dogs without any reference to any evidence or any explanation?

Just this assumption, this belief that's out there that fetch is bad.

And here's what I hear people say.

Firstly, they'll say, I can't get my dog to stop playing.

All he wants to do is play fetch.

Well, you know what?

We've got a lot of things in our lives that we would do as long as we could, if we could.

There are plenty of people who love their sports, who would play their sports until

they drop.

There are plenty of kids who would stay at the playground and would not come home unless

you absolutely told them it was time.

It's not unnatural to want to keep going at something that you absolutely love.

A second concern I hear is, my dog isn't focusing on me anymore.

Well, yes and no.

If you're playing fetch with your dog, you're playing with your dog.

I would say that's hyper-focus.

I would say that's brilliant focus.

Your dog isn't wandering off and not coming back to you and ignoring your recall.

Your dog is with you.

Your dog is playing with you.

I would say that's pretty awesome focus.

And linked to that, people will say, but he's no longer playing with other dogs and that

makes me sad.

Well, here's the thing about most dogs.

Dogs are a bit like kids and humans in the way that they play.

And actually one of the reasons why, there's many reasons why we love dogs, but dogs play.

Unlike a lot of adult animals, dogs play.

Adult dogs play.

So I think that's one of the reasons why we love dogs.

One of the many reasons why we love dogs.

So if you look at adult coyotes or adult wolves, they don't play.

Adult dogs play.

But here's what happens to play with dogs and this is why it's similar to us.

When they're young, and you've seen this with puppies, they have a million friends, everybody's

their friend, even the big horrible dogs who don't want to be friends, everybody's

their friend.

They have no selectivity.

They want to play all the time and they want to play with everybody.

So they're like the four year old, the four year old in kindergarten who has every friend,

every person, every child in class is their best friend and they want to play all day.

So dogs are like that.

And as they get older, what happens is they play less.

They just want to play less and they play more selectively.

So they don't want to play with dogs as much as they used to and they have a more select

bunch of friends.

Doesn't that sound like humans?

We definitely play less as we get older and our circle of friends tends to narrow, certainly

the circle of friends with whom we play.

If it seems like your dog no longer wants to play with you, just remember that that

could be very natural.

If your dog is 18 months, two years, three years, and you've seen the play decrease in

the last year or so, that's just your dog going through a natural development where

he wants to play less with other dogs and he has fewer doggy friends.

So I'm overjoyed when a dog who stops wanting to play with other dogs as much starts wanting

to play other games.

Because we all know how tired dogs get when they play with other dogs.

It wears dogs out.

So if you've got a dog who used to do that, used to love it, but doesn't love it so much,

what you going to do?

Give him something else to do that he loves.

And if he's a fetch head, let him play fetch.

And another complaint is they seem so amped up.

They are just on edge.

That can't be good for their stress.

That can't be good for their anxiety.

Fetch is just so bad for that.

Okay.

Think back to the evidence about zoo animals and what we know.

The problem that we have with zoo animals is that their stress levels rise when they

can't get to do their natural things.

It's not the other way around.

It's not doing the natural thing causes anxiety and stress.

It's not doing the thing that comes naturally that causes the anxiety and stress.

So if you think that, and I see plenty of articles saying that fetch causes stress,

it's the wrong way round.

It's not being able to do the things that come naturally that causes stress.

It's not doing them.

It's not doing them.

Go and look at the evidence about zoo animals and realize that it's not doing stuff that's

a problem.

Yeah.

It can seem like dogs struggle to calm down after a game of fetch.

Of course, if you've ever participated in any adrenaline sport, you'll know that, yeah,

there is always that degree of your heart rate still racing, you're still quite buzzy

from it, but the buzz wears off and you do get to a point where you just go, huh, I'm

just going to chill now.

And dogs do that.

The vast majority of dogs who play fetch can switch off.

It is not a bigger deal as the armchair experts make out.

And I'm going to come on to in a second what you can do if you really do worry about some

of these things.

And another complaint that I hear and often from people who walk dogs or people who go

to busy dogs, dog parks, is that ballplay causes dispute.

And yet it can.

And so any object, anything valuable can cause disputes between dogs.

However, I do understand, and it's not always great PR to be at the dog park with a dog

who gets growly and guards his ball from other dogs.

So I do understand that that can be a problem.

And then finally, and this to me is an absolutely valid concern.

It's no good for his joints, his back.

Not good.

All that jumping, the quick turning.

Really not cool for a dog from a musculoskeletal perspective.

And I really, really do understand that.

However, there are things you can do, both in terms of making the game safer by changing

the way you play it and also making your dog more fetch fit.

So if you've got any concerns about the physical side of playing fetch, then I highly recommend

that you talk to a canine physical therapist, physiotherapist to get some advice on playing

fetch with your dog.

So if you are worried about any of these things, let me share some insights and some tips on

how you can play fetch without concern.

So if you're concerned about your dog not being able to stop playing, then you should

think about starting to trade objects.

Now it's interesting.

Dog trainers do this naturally.

From the moment a dog comes into the world, from the youngest age, you'll see dog trainers

always trade when they take something off a dog.

So if a dog has a puzzle feeder that maybe is empty and needs to go in the dishwasher,

but the dog still has it, you'll see dog trainers naturally will trade for a treat.

And why is that?

Well, because we don't want resource guarding to develop.

Most dogs don't develop resource guarding, but we'd rather it didn't.

And we do this trade to remind dogs that they don't always get stuff taken away and

it's not always a bad thing.

Sometimes stuff gets taken away and a good thing happens.

So if you've got a puppy or even if you haven't got a puppy, just think about always trading.

Always trade.

Don't take the ball off your dog and that be it.

No wonder your dog's going to keep hold of the ball and not let you get it if every time

you take the ball, fun stuff ends.

And even after you've done the trade, so you take the ball off the dog, don't put the leash

on straight away because then we've got two things going on.

Not only has the fun ended, but now I'm going home too, so I can't play ball and we're leaving

the park.

Always end the game with a trade and then go for a little walk around the park.

So build in five, 10 minutes to let your dog go have a sniff because we don't want the

dog always thinking that when they surrender the ball to you, they are getting in the car

and you are going home with them.

Break that connection.

And another way you can do that is you can stop and start the game during your outing.

So you might play five minutes of fetch, do the trade with the amazing treat, take

the ball, go and wander around the dog park, get the ball out again.

So again, your dog is learning that when play stops, it's not the end of everything and

it's not time to go home.

You can also do this in front of other dogs too, and that's going to help with the issue

of guarding.

So if you want to stave off your dog getting all guardy and worried about its ball being

taken off it, just do a trade in front of another dog.

So the dog will see that other dogs being around is not a threat to them.

Yes, you've just taken the ball off them, but hey, they just got an amazing bit of chicken.

So that's another way that you can start to mitigate the dog's concern that when the ball

goes, when the dog takes a ball from him, when you take a ball from him, everything

fun stop.

Now, there are certain conditions, it is true, where dogs do get so preoccupied with a behavior

that it almost seems like it's obsessive.

And I hear, I will hear people say, my dog plays fetch obsessively, a couple of things

going on here.

First of all, most likely the dog isn't surrendering the ball.

So if you've got a dog that isn't surrendering the ball, you definitely want to start getting

into some trade exercises.

Do them at home, do them without the, do them when you're not playing fetch, do them using

another object, not the ball, but start to make your dog realize that when you take stuff

off them, it's okay because treats happen.

There are some dogs who do find it almost impossible to stop, but they are few and far

between.

When you describe a dog as being obsessive, it is true that dogs can develop obsessive

compulsive disorder, but let's be really clear about what obsessive means.

It links back to that whole concept of stereotypes.

Obsessive compulsive disorder in a dog is when a dog carries out a behavior over and

over again, but with no focus.

It's not the right behavior.

They are, there's no outcome to the behavior.

Dogs that stare at the ceiling, dogs that chase their tail.

So they're doing things that have no sensible objective, but I've explained, I hope that

fetch does actually have a reasonable objective.

It's a replica of the feeding process.

It's chase.

It's normal.

Chase is normal.

Chasing your tail over and over and over again isn't normal.

Chasing prey over and over and over again is.

So when you describe your dog as being obsessive, just be careful because obsessive is very

specific.

Obsessive also means it's very hard to stop the dog doing it.

Now I have seen dogs at the park who seem like they are obsessed and it would be impossible

to stop them.

I've got one of them myself, but most dogs can be interrupted.

Most dogs will stop the game and get into the car.

So it isn't true obsessive behavior in the way that obsessive behavior in dogs is defined.

If the dog has a purpose, if it's the right objective, if it's an appropriate objective,

it is not obsessive.

It's enthusiastic.

It's focused, but it's not obsessive in the way that we use obsessive to describe dog

behavior.

So yeah, let's be careful with our terms because terms do matter.

Now if you're worried about your dog not settling after playing fetch, then that's definitely

a time when you should think about breaking the game before you go home.

So go for an extra 10 minutes after the end of the game.

And if your dog's one of those dogs that brings you the ball at night, put the ball away.

Put the toys away.

If your dog starts crying at the door, start doing some rewards training with them.

I've seen that.

I have seen that.

I do have a dog that does that occasionally.

He'll sit and whine at the cupboard where, for him, it's his squeakies, where his squeakies

are kept.

So we'll just call him over and we'll start doing some fun treat training.

We'll do paws up, we'll do downs, and we'll do sits, and we'll do cute stuff that breaks

that focus for him.

So there are absolutely things you can do if your dog playing fetch is concerning you.

But I implore you, I beseech you, please let your fetch-loving dog play fetch.

It's normal and it's natural.

And you know what, best of all, it's joyful.

You're letting your dog be a dog.

You're giving your dog an outlet for its natural instinct.

And seeing a dog being able to be a dog, isn't that something to be celebrated rather

than something to be feared?

And instead of worrying about all these dogs who find things they love to do, let's worry

about the ones who sleep all day long, who are bored, because all we're doing is keeping

them in comfortable captivity.

That's it from me this week.

I will see you on the next episode.

Bye for now.

Thank you for listening to the Fixing Separation Anxiety podcast with Julie Nae Smith.

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