Understanding your Greyhound's
Emotions and Reactions
©Dr Karen Dawson BVSc Hons BSc, Pet Behaviour Clinic
Like us, our greyhounds experience a wide range of both positive and negative emotions. Their body language can help us to understand how they are feeling. They do this through the use of “displacement behaviours”, which indicate that the dog is in a high level of emotional arousal.
Examples of common displacement behaviours in greyhounds include:
- Averting their gaze
- Panting with tightly retracted lips
- Yawning
- Trembling
- Teeth chattering
- Blinking
- Freezing behaviour (inhibition)
- Tucking their tail
- Lowering their head
- Scanning the environment
- Lip Licking
- Shaking off like they have had a bath when they haven't
- Stretching/play bowing
- Licking at their genitals or between their groin and elsewhere
These are all very clear signals that your greyhound's emotional ‘sink’ is approaching full. Displacement behaviours function like the overflow hole at the top of the sink. It is believed that they may allow stress levels to disperse in an attempt to prevent a full scale flood of emotion (fight/flight). (@ Sarah Heath 2016) However, if the dog is unable to resolve its distress, the sink will inevitably spill over leading to avoidance (flight/panic/escape), repulsion (fight/aggression/growling) or inhibition (freezing). Dogs also use appeasement behaviours when they are concerned. This is a way of gathering information from you and the environment. Signs of appeasement include licking or leaning on you or rolling over. These are often misinterpreted by humans as signs of affection. However, they are collectively signs the dog is in emotional distress.
The hormones released during the accompanying stress response rise rapidly in preparation for fight/flight then slowly dissipate over several days providing the dog is not exposed to any further fear inducing situations. If they are; the stress response is usually compounded and they are at great risk of becoming more fearful with subsequent exposure rather than less. Think about this in context of a dog that is fearful of other dogs being walked every day; its sink will always be close to overflow which can impact on how it copes in other situations throughout the day.
It is also important to remember that individual dogs will respond differently to stress. This will depend on their genetics, their past experience and their current situation. However, given pet greyhounds are exposed to a lot of new experiences very quickly, it is important to understand that even the most emotionally resilient can easily and inadvertently become profoundly overwhelmed.
The number one thing you can do to help ease the transition of your greyhound into the family is to initially make their world smaller not bigger. This may seem counterintuitive; but they can only learn from an experience if they are in a positive emotional state. Less is definitely more. Start small and working as a team, slowly build things up depending on your dog's ability to cope. Use displacement behaviours or a lack thereof, to help you determine how your dog is feeling about a situation. Please avoid situations that cause your dog distress (i.e. they are showing inhibition or displacement behaviours). Bypass bustling cafes and busy parks in favour of quieter options. Walks should enable the dog lots of opportunities to sniff and gather information about its new environment rather than merely focusing on brisk exercise. This helps to give them a mental workout; an excellent way to help reduce stress. It lets them check their “pee mail”. Urine marking tells dogs who, what, when and where was around their neighbourhood. Reward calm behaviour with food or ideally quiet praise (whisper good dog).
Although socially obligate, meaning they need other dogs (or people if they are socialised to them) for survival, this is a very highly motivated behaviour; to seek out company. However, many greyhounds may not have been effectively socialised to humans or indeed other dogs, during their earlier life. This can lead to emotional conflict as they remain highly motivated to gain access to social contact, but may be somewhat fearful of us at the same time. Many will also be stressed at losing the social contact they had with other familiar greyhounds, who may have be more valuable to their social seeking systems than people. For these reasons, please try not to be overly affectionate with your dog. They may find it overwhelming. Pat them if they approach you, firm strokes behind the head rather than short, abrupt movements around the head. Don't approach them in their bed for these reasons. This will all help the greyhound to understand that you are listening to them. In summary, being more hands off will pay dividends in building your dog's trust. Dogs do not have hands, so hugging is not part of their behavioural repertoire.
Give them what they need, rather than only taking what we want and always look at it from their perspective, as it is the only one they have. NEVER punish your dog for signs of stress. Remember that this is the dog communicating how they are feeling. If you punish a dog for growling, it may choose to instead escalate its response to make its intention very clear via a bite, now without the warning.
Did you know?
When dogs roll on their back and expose their abdomen they are not soliciting a pat from you. They are in fact offering you information from their inguinal scent glands; hoping you will take it from afar. Dogs don't understand we cannot smell their messages to us and are probably perplexed that we repeatedly take this opportunity to reach into their very exposed, vulnerable groin.
Why is my greyhound a kleptomaniac?
This is a very good question; the simple answer is we do not really know why some collect lots of things. Based on emotional systems, it could be due to their comfort seeking or care system as mentioned above. It is definitely not resource guarding, unless they do not allow you near them after they have collected. In this instance you must seek advice from a veterinary behaviour consultant as these dogs have an emotional disorder and will not improve via desensitization and counter conditioning. If not, then it is not something you need to discourage as it may offer them comfort and reassurance. Just another one of their quirks.
Below is Chloe with her impressive array of collectibles. Chloe has no anxiety as she was raised domestically from a pup, but loves to collect and sleep amongst her rubble. It is normal behaviour for her, but she would become distressed/frustrated if she was not allowed to do it. When we invite other species into or lives, it is important to allow them the opportunity to express their natural behaviours. Sometimes, you just need to pick your battles. We just sigh, and pick it all up at the end of the day, but we have a very happy and content dog, so it is worth it.
