Dog Behavior Blog

The Dog Bark Controversy

Are dog barks just meaningless sounds designed to get attention? Or do the barks contain information that other dogs can use about the context of the bark or the identity of the caller?

Two articles have been published recently that address this controversy. One article says that barking contains no information, but is a way of dogs grabbing attention for the purpose of mobbing, a cooperative behavior that is used by a variety of animals to repel potential predators (Lord et al. 2009. Barking and mobbing. Behavioural Processes 81:358 -- 368). The other article says that dogs can incorporate information about the context of the bark and the identity of the individual dog who is barking (Molnar et al. 2009. Dogs discriminate between barks: The effect of context and identity of the caller. Behavioral Processes 82:198 -- 201).

The article by Lord et al. presents a lot of the acoustic characteristics of dog barks and says that these acoustic characteristics are similar to the kinds of signals produced by birds and other mammals when they are mobbing a predator. Typically these calls have a raspy sound to them, have a lot of noise, and generally sound very harsh to our ears. On the basis of this kind of similarity, the authors suggest that there is no meaning incorporated into the calls. This follows the theories of Raymond Coppinger (one of the authors of the Lord et al. article), who has argued that dog barks have no meaning beyond conveying excitement or general arousal.

The article by Molnar et al. approaches this problem by doing experiments. The authors collected barks from five Mudi dogs, Hungarian sheepdogs. The barks occurred in two behavioral contexts: when the dogs were barking for a stranger, and when the dogs were barking because they were left alone. Then they used another group of 30 dogs in a technique called habituation -- dishabituation. In this technique a dog is played back a sequence of three barks for the same context, and then played back a bark for a different context. The experimenters assess how much time the dog spends looking at the speaker for each of the playbacks of the barks. If the dog cannot detect any difference between the sequence of the first three barks and the last bark, the dog should spend a shorter and shorter amount of time looking at the speaker after each playback, by habituating to the barks. If on the other hand the dog can recognize the difference between the first three playbacks and the last one, where the last one is a bark from a different context, then the dog would spend more time looking at the speaker after the fourth playback than it did looking at the speaker after the third playback.

This is exactly what the authors of the study found. Also, when they played back a sequence of barks recorded from the same individual dog, and then a bark from a different individual dog in the same context, the dogs listened more to the bark of the different dog, suggesting that they can tell the differences between barks from different dogs for the same context.

The Molnar et al. study follows up on an earlier study by Yin and McCowan in 2004 where those authors  analyzed the acoustic structure of dog barks in three different contexts: a stranger ringing a doorbell, a dog who is isolated from her owner, and a play situation where two dogs were a dog and human are playing together. The statistical analysis of the acoustic structure of the different calls showed that the calls could be grouped into different contexts, and also that the calls from individual dogs could be identified (Yin, S. and B. McCowan. 2004. Barking in domestic dogs: context specificity and individual identification. Animal Behaviour 68: 343-355).

The two studies, Molnar et al. and Yin and McCowan, support each other in their findings. The Molnar et al. study provides experimental proof that dogs behaviorally can detect the differences between contexts and between individual dogs. The Yin and McCowan study shows that there are distinct acoustic differences between dog barks for different contexts, and also between dog barks from different individuals.

This gives increasing support to the idea that dogs can incorporate meaningful information into their calls. It also suggests that when one dog is barking, another dog can probably know who that dog is, just the same way that we can identify someone by their voice, even if we only hear them on the telephone.

-- Con Slobodchikoff

I Really Love Kong Toys

I have a Kong key chain. I give my friends with dogs a Kong toy when they have a new baby. (I also give a gift for the baby, FYI.) I use Kongs when I train dogs, including working with dogs who have aggression issues, those with separation anxiety, and those that simply need to learn better manners in a variety of situations. Naturally, Kongs are a big part of playtime with the dogs in my life. I have a huge box of brand new Kong toys in my living room right now because I’ve run out of room in our storage room. In short, I love Kong toys.

 

The original Kong toy, which is red and looks a bit like a hollow snowman in general form, is made of a tough rubber that is indestructible for most dogs. I’ve heard dogs who actually can chew through these Kongs called “one-percent dogs”. This nickname refers to the fact that 99% of the dogs are unable to destroy Kongs, but one percent of them can. For most of that one percent, an even tougher version, called the “Extreme Kong”, is a wonderful option. These black versions of the Kong are extra tough and very few dogs have the strength of teeth or jaws to harm them.

 

So, besides being hard to chew up, what’s so great about Kongs? There are oodles of answers to that question. Dogs love them, both as toys and as food puzzles, so they can help keep dogs’ quality of life high and can be used as reinforcement in training. They are a great way to provide enrichment for dogs by giving them a chance to work to get food out of them, or a chance to play with them. Many dogs love the erratic way that they bounce, which makes them a higher value toy than balls. Their use as food puzzles can be great for any dog, including dogs who are injured or not as active as usual for whatever reason. Mental exercise can go a long way to make up for a temporary lack of adequate physical exercise.

 

Kong now has tons of toys beyond its original. The Aqua Kong floats and has a rope for tossing and tugging. The Kong Wobbler is a food puzzle toy that can entertain a dog for ages while it eats what pops out of the small opening on this large toy. Many of the toys are soothing, especially the fleecy Wubba toy that has become so popular lately. These squeaky, fleecy, stretchy, bouncy, and rubbery toys are designed to be fun and practical.

 

Have you tried Kong toys? Which ones do you and your dog love?

 

--Karen London

What Makes A Good Kennel?

A couple of weeks ago I was picking up my Standard Poodle, Raja, from a boarding kennel where I left him for a week while I was traveling on a business trip. As I was picking him up, a man and his wife were dropping off their dog. As we all walked into the parking lot toward our cars, they started telling me how much they liked this particular kennel and how much their dog enjoyed staying there. This mirrored my experience. While Raja is never pleased to be left for an extended period, he is always happy to go to this kennel, with his head up and tail wagging. 

So I started to think, what is it about this kennel that makes Raja like it? To try to answer this question, I interviewed the kennel owner,  Joel Oestmann, who together with his wife Jana has owned Bark N Purr Kennels in Sedona, Arizona since 1976.

Here is the gist of the interview:

Con: First of all, can you describe your facilities?

Joel:  We have 47 indoor-outdoor runs for dogs and 11 indoor-outdoor runs for cats.  The indoor part of each run has radiant heat underneath the floor so that each dog or cat can stay warm. If the owner doesn’t provide it, we provide bedding and blankets.  Each run has a door that opens to the outside, so the animals can go out whenever they want during the daytime. At night, we close the doors.

Con: How many people work here?

Joel: Jana and I work here 7-8 hours a day. We also have two full-time people and two part-time people. In addition to the boarding, we also do grooming. Some customers want their dogs to have a bath before they go home, or want their animals to be groomed during their stay.

 Con: What is the daily routine?

Joel:  First thing in the morning, starting around 5 a.m., the kennel doors are opened, and our staff picks up anything that has accumulated in the runs overnight, as well as cleans and washes the bedding.  The dogs are then taken individually to a grassy exercise area for 15 minutes of walking or running while their kennels are washed with disinfectant and then rinsed thoroughly with water so that no disinfectant remains to irritate anyone.  The dogs are rotated through the exercise area. Meanwhile, the dogs in their runs are fed a diet of premium food, or are given the food that their owners have provided.

Con: How do you keep track of special needs?

Joel: We have whiteboards everywhere, and we write down what every animal needs in multiple places, to make sure that no animal’s needs get neglected. Some animals need medications, and we want to make sure that everyone of our staff knows what to do with each animal.

Con: So we got through the morning activities. What happens next?

Joel: Once we open in the morning, animals start to be dropped off and other animals are picked up. So we have to allocate time for these activities, which last throughout the day. However, by 3 p.m. we start to do the evening feedings. Throughout the day, we do spot cleanups in case accidents happen inside the runs. We try to match the food that the animal is fed at home. Sometimes we add WD to the diet if the stool is runny. We have found that premium foods work best for both us and the animals. In the evening, the run doors are closed for the night.

Con:  My dog enjoys staying here. What do you do to make that happen?

Joel: One of the things that is necessary for someone to work here is a willingness to accept that different animals have different needs. We try very hard to make each animal feel comfortable, and recognize that different things will matter to different animals. It might involve just sitting with an animal for a while until they settle down, but we individually tailor our environment to each animal to get them comfortable. Another important thing is for all of our staff to like animals, and to care about them as individuals.

Con: Well, I think that that caring attitude shows up in how the dogs respond to their stay here.  Thank you, Joel, for the information you have provided.

In summary, I think that over and above the facilities, the clean conditions, and the premium foods, the thing that resonated the most with me was that the staff really cared about the animals and really liked them.  I have left Raja at Bark N Purr Kennels many times. Each time, the staff tell me how he did, ask about how he is doing in general, and clearly see him as an individual rather than as a generic cog in a kennel machine.  Maybe all of these things are what contribute to making a good kennel.

--Con Slobodchikoff