Dog: The Definitive Guide for Dog Owners - Softcover

Bruce Fogle, DVM, MRCVS, is internationally renowned for his expertise in animal health and behavior. He is the world's leading author of pet care books, which include New Dog.

Excerpt from the Introduction

This book is about dogs, those noble, honest, and immutably faithful companions so many of us feel compelled to live with. It's about how and where they evolved, why we let them live with us, what roles they have played in our lives, and how we have changed their colours, shapes, attitudes, and abilities. It's about the dog's cycle of life, from birth through a surprisingly short puppyhood and sometimes exasperating adolescence into calmer adulthood, and inevitable geriatric decline. It is also, needless to say, about us, about our enduring relationship with our canine companions.

As I've lived with dogs all my life, you'd be right to assume I like their company. Even filled with people, my home feels sterile and empty unless something covered in hair is stirring up the air. During my life, many dogs have arrived, matured, aged, and eventually died. Recently, the life of one of my dogs ended and another began. At the time of writing, I have a young Golden Retriever named LL Bean, and for the past few months I've been a bystander once more to the fascinating early development of a dog's responsive behaviour. Let me introduce Bean, as an example of just how well dogs and humans understand one another.

After I showered this morning Bean ambled over and licked my leg. I said "No", and she stopped. Later I prepared Bean's breakfast, and she lay quietly on the floor, intently watching each aspect of the food preparation routine. As I mixed it, Bean stood up so I gave her a hand signal -- pointing down. She sat back down until I put her food bowl on the floor and said "OK", and when she heard that, she got up, went across to her bowl, emptied it, and licked it dishwasher clean.

Sometimes I take Bean for her morning run in the park, and sometimes my wife, Julia, does. Bean may be no more than a pup, but she easily "reads" when I'm not going to take her for her walk; on those days she just lies there looking mournfully at me. (Your dog doesn't practice that doleful look in front of a mirror. It comes naturally, and we're all suckers for it.) Today she knew I was going to take her out. She ambled into the hallway, picked up her lead, pranced back to me with the pride of the best-trained Lippizaner horse, went to the front door, and waited for me to open it. Like all dogs, she's superb at watching what I'm doing, reading my "intention movements". This morning she saw me put on my walking boots rather than my work shoes, so rather than the despondent routine; there was joy in her eyes. Dogs read us well, but we're pretty good at reading their feelings.

My veterinary clinic is in town but I write in the country. This morning, because I'm writing, I took her for a walk in the adjacent fields and woods. The local farmer has ploughed deep furrows in preparation for potato planting, and Bean burned off some of her pent-up energy by using one of these furrows as a race track, attempting (unsuccessfully) to break the land speed record. With that out of her system, we walked through the next field, where potatoes were planted last year. Bean found an absolute treasure, one of last year's rotten potatoes, and started to eat it. I took a step towards her, to get near before telling her to "drop it", but seeing me move, she ran away, her normally horizontal tail waving excitedly at twelve o'clock high. I didn't want to turn this into a game, so I turned my back and walked away until I could hide behind a tree, then I called her name. Because Bean 's a sociable creature, she came running, and I rewarded her with some roughhousing.

Back home, seeing me sitting at the computer, Bean has climbed onto a comfortable chair (I'll sort that out later!) and gone to sleep. She's read my intentions again, knows I'll be here for some time and, sociable individual that she is -- and dogs are amongst the most gregariously sociable of all species -- she's decided to doze off.

Everything Bean and I did this morning stems from our mutual ability to read each other's body language and intention movements. Don't look for anything more complicated than that simple fact to explain the relationship dogs and humans can develop. We don't need words, and neither do dogs. A mute understanding of each other is at the very core of why people and dogs have been "best friends" for millennia. I don't say that simply because I'm a dog fan. Of course I appreciate dogs, but I didn't appreciate them half as much when I started working with them almost 40 years ago. My admiration for their skills has simply increased year on year, as I've met more of them and seen what they're capable of. Science backs me up.