“Some people prey upon other people. Whether we like it or not, this is one of the facts of life. It has always been so, and it is not going to change. The number of sociopaths in a stipulated population varies widely, but we can take a figure of one in one hundred, for simplicity’s sake, and not be far off. About one person in one hundred will, under some circumstances, initiate a violent attack upon another, in defiance of the law, for reasons that seem sufficient to him at the time.” – Principles of Personal Defense: Jeff Cooper
We live in crazy times, right? Not really. Times have always been crazy. People are people and a percentage of people are unsafe to be around. In my life, I try to stay away from troubled people who do, or advocate for, or believe in extreme responses to normal things. We have all made mistakes in life, giving these people more leeway than we should have, or not seeing the potential dangers they intend, or not knowing their history. Some people are good actors, and they can sometimes fool an unsuspecting innocent person into letting them into their lives and homes. Sometimes, a dog can alert you out of your complacency, letting you know that not everything is right about a person. Many dogs can sense that kind of thing, whether indicating discomfort being around that person, or alerting you of an imminent danger. I think it is important to accept the fact that there is always that chance you might encounter a bad person with bad intentions towards you. Your first line of defense is staying away from people with behavioral disturbances. The next step is asking what measures you can reasonably take to get away unharmed if ever confronted by these people.
This article isn’t about teaching you about self-defense. That isn’t my role as a dog trainer. What I can tell you is this: a dog can be a useful alarm, and maybe a defense, in case of danger. Dogs hear better than us. Dogs can smell things better than we can. Some dogs are very powerful, others very alert and talkative. Dogs can often be a deterrent to a bad person.
Here’s an example. A student of mine had a young adult Australian Shepherd, about 60 to 70 lbs. Most of these dogs are friendly to everyone. But a smaller percentage are suspicious of strangers, territorial, and confrontational if they don’t know someone. This was one of those dogs. This dog would bite a stranger if not properly supervised and introduced to guests. As he matured, he had become more forceful and needed supervision with guests.
I learned about these types of Aussies many years ago. I had an evaluation appointment with a student in North Bend, WA. She said the lesson was for obedience lessons. I greeted her at her gate, she let me in and led me to her large back yard. A large blur started running towards me, lunged for my face, and missed me by about an inch because the dog was on a 30-foot cable. The dog did snag my winter coat with his front teeth and tore open a silver dollar sized hole. This dog was 95 lbs. and had bitten numerous people before. She hadn’t disclosed this to me in advance. She said she decided not to tell me so I wouldn’t come to her place with a preconceived idea of what her dog was like. Let’s just say, I wasn’t happy about it.
Back to my example. One night, the dog lit up barking, and my student heard someone trying to force his way through the back door near his kitchen. He and his wife had a new baby, and his instinct was to go and confront him. He went out the front door with his dog off leash, he spotted the guy, yelled at him, his dog charged at the guy and the guy ran off.
The next day, he told me what had happened. He said he saw the marks where the guy had used some kind of tool to try and force the door open. I asked him, “did you look to see if there was another guy?” He said, “no”. I told him I would have not gone outside to confront this bad guy, and you can’t assume there aren’t multiple home invaders in such a situation. Also, what if the dog had chased an innocent person walking by at the same time? An untrained dog can make things a lot worse. Now the dog is going after the wrong person, and you are on your own.
His dog had done his job. He had alerted the man to the danger. My belief is that he should have not gone outside, should have kept the dog in with him and his wife, prepared for a fight if necessary, and called the police. He wasn’t equipped to fight off multiple attackers. He didn’t have the skills or tools. The dog wasn’t trained to fight. The dog would have been there to assist him in a fight or to escape, but if the bad guys had been prepared for violence, he would have been in over his head. Unfortunately, this student only did a few lessons, and didn’t complete the amount of training I recommended.
A small percentage of people are dangerous. Do your research, convince yourself of this fact. Recognize this as well: having a watch dog makes sense for some people.
For many people, a small barking dog is sufficient to act as an alarm. You don’t always need a big dog. For some people, they need something more, but some serious consideration needs to be made whether this is more dog than what they want or can handle. The bigger the dog, the more propensity the dog must fight because of the potential dangers in your life, the more training everyone will need. There are difficulties in owning a larger dog that is suspicious of strangers, territorial, and willing to bite. The dog and owner need a lot more training to make the most of the dog, and to keep the owner out of trouble with innocent bystanders. What you need depends upon your judgment of the risks you might encounter. Only you can decide what your needs are.
What might sound good might end up being a horrible choice as a pet. I have seen many people get dogs that were way too much for them to handle, regardless of the risks. My opinion, for most people, is smaller is better. More trainable breeds are better. Calmer dogs that allow you the decision to accept guests into the home are better. Extreme breeds, highly territorial and suspicious, meant for very specific roles in foreign lands, including some of the rarer large breeds, don’t do well in urban and suburban environments. Working K9 breeds also are not going to be any fun to live with since you most likely can’t take advantage of all their capabilities, and they will then make your life miserable as they are miserable being made to sit around like stuffed animals. You can get in a lot of trouble mishandling a K9 if you are a novice.
I think most people appreciate that their dog will alert them to strange noises in the night, or alert to the scent of a stranger is on the property. Most people can benefit from these watchdogs. For a few more people, they need a bit more. Very few people need the real deal, and even fewer are going to do what is necessary to control such a dog. The “more” dog you have, be prepared to spend more resources to make the dog work out with you being in charge.
Do you need a watchdog? Possibly someday. It is true that about 1% of the population is a bad guy, so the odds are you are going to encounter a bad person some time in your life. It’s nice having a companion dog that alerts you to strangers doing strange things. Most dogs will do this for you, regardless of the breed or mix.