“Splitter”, “Hip Checking” and the “Evil Eye”
I was privileged enough to have Dr. Patricia McConnell, an Ethologist and Certified Applied Animal Behaviorist, and her blog readers analyze one of my videos. I’ve watched this clip many times; at regular speed, in slow motion and with/without sound. Even though I know all three dogs better than anyone else, I was fascinated by what others with fresh set of eyes were able to see things I didn’t. (Read her blog post and watch the video here)
Here is a little background on these dogs.
Some of the readers guessed that the BC was female, the pup (white/black) and the lab were males. They were spot on. Was it that obvious? (I’m curious to know what you all think of that.) The lab (Cooper) and BC (Jazzy) are mine and the pup was my foster I had for little over a month. My dogs don’t play physically with other dogs unless toys and humans are involved. (I’ve always encouraged my dogs to be that way) They are very human/toy oriented. They tolerate puppy licking and jumping in their faces as long as the other dogs don’t “chin-over” “mount” or paw on their backs. By the way, I would not have put Jazzy in this situation 5 years ago as she had little tolerance to pushy or “rude” dogs back then. I’m quite pleased to see how far she has come through months of counter conditioning. The pup was around 10 months old and was intact when rescued. He did not always get along with new dogs right away but he “hip checked” the dogs he liked, including my dogs on a regular bases. Jazzy “lip licks” frequently when excited, stressed, nervous or tense.
Jazzy had corrected the pup a couple of times in the past, when he crossed the line by pawing at her back (with the intent to mount) and mouthing on her throat once. As some of the readers noted, these past interactions helped getting her point across without being physical with him. All she had to do was giving the “evil eye” which he had paired up with the corrections. Obviously Cooper has a higher tolerance with puppies than Jazzy. All he cares about is when he gets to play. Jazzy often “splits” when any of the fosters becomes invasive towards the lab. I don’t discourage it because by the time all dogs are allowed to be loose together in the yard, I had made sure the new dog is no threat to my dogs and that I had enough bond with the new dog. There was an exception with one particular foster she became very bonded with last year. If I may anthropomorphize what I observed, I saw Jazzy “taking him under her wing” and playing the “mentor” role.
This foster was timid, nervous and did not like Cooper’s energy level at first. Jazzy always stuck by him, lay by his crate and even solicited his licking, which she doesn’t enjoy from other dogs. When this foster became more comfortable with the lab and attempted to play with him, she “splited” the two in a very different but obvious way. To me, it looked like she was controlling who her “protégé” hang out with = only her. But it was gentle and almost sweet. (There goes the Anthropomorphism again) Some might label Jazzy being “jealous” or “controlling”. Maybe? With the rest of dogs, it was usually resource guarding the lab and controlling the situation. Why control? Who knows. Because she can and it’s reinforcing? Or was she just being a good little Border Collie?
BC splitting the foster from the lab. The third clip was her being a fun police when two of my fosters started playing.
By the way, one of the comments on Dr. McConnell’s blog gave me a chill. Bobbie said “good to have a vet look at the Lab” because of the pup’s reaction after sniffing the lab. I don’t know if it is relevant at all, but the lab ended up with an urinary infection after the video was taken. It’s not easy to see due to the angle, but watch the video again @30S where the pup tastes the Cooper’s genital. While capturing the video I saw him taking a sample, then looking as if he ate something bitter. It was almost like a cat with flehmen response. Interesting, yes? We’ll never know if they were connected at all, but it is good to be aware of behaviors that are out of place, especially when they could potentially detect health problems, right?
Bordernerd 
Aki, thank you so much for the background story. And congratulations on helping your BC around other dogs, what an amazing job you have done. It was such a pleasure to watch her appropriate intensity of signals, and the younger BC’s equally appropriate reactions. And I too thought that the older BC was a female and the others male, although I have no idea why. Interesting! One comment I haven’t made yet about the interaction between the lab and the youngster. Although the lab was being ‘tolerant,’ he was also not acknowledging the greeting behavior of the young BC in any way. I wonder if this is why the young BC continued to lick/mouth etc etc… just to get SOME kind of reaction? I wonder about the motivation sometimes behind the dogs who ignore and tolerate… are they also communicating something else besides tolerance?
Trisha, good point! The pup seemed to want ANY kind of reaction from both of my dogs, good or bad, and just be acknowledged. The lab got annoyed at one point, and ended up giving a big “woof” at the pup’s face. And that was the end of it.
Thank you again for this wonderful opportunity. I learned more about my own dogs through the observations of complete strangers!