Doggone Etiquette —

Animal Lingo

By Bardi McLennan

A Word to the Dog:

If you’ve been paying attention – and I am sure you have – no doubt you’ve noticed how often language is your biggest problem in trying to communicate with your People Who Must Be Obeyed. You don’t have access to a computer, a cell phone, or any of the other marvels of the age, so it’s those spoken words that are the problem.  There are so many words that sound the same, or even are the same, but mean different things. We’ve been over the ones like “get” (get down, get off, get in, get out, get the ball, etc.) and others like “watch” (watch out, watch it, watch me, watch your head, etc.)                              

Don’t think about moving to the North Pole. Dogs in every country in the world have the same language problems. So when you hear a word, or words in a strange combination, just do a very nice Sit and stare up at the person saying it. That sometimes is enough to help them make the message clearer. If it doesn’t work, feel free to ignore them and go about your business.

A Word to the Dog’s Owner:

We’ve been over this a dozen times, I know, but dogs only understand one-word instructions. Or two words, but said as one. We all talk to our dogs, and that’s perfectly okay, so long as you don’t think that a long conversation about not chewing the carpet is going to instruct Rufus never to do it again. In normal chit-chat, dogs listen to the sound of our voice, not the words. That’s how they know when we’re upset, sad, angry, happy, or just plain busy.

The one-word connection can extend to quite a large canine vocabulary if you’re willing to work at it. It all starts with simple obedience, but dogs used for hunting learn the appropriate command words, as do dogs trained for agility and other sports. The easiest way to teach a word is to catch the dog doing precisely what it is you want him to connect with the word. So, if Rufus goes to the window every afternoon to watch for the school bus, as he trots over to his place, say, “School-bus!” in a friendly, somewhat excited voice. When he has caught onto to it, you’ll find you can quite casually say, “Is that the school-bus” and he’ll respond by racing to the window. Tie in one word with ordinary everyday activities and your dog’s vocabulary will astound you. Just remember, he will pick up on that one word when you use it in a sentence. For example, if you say, “I must speak to the school bus driver,” there may be a mad dash to that window!

Did you ever stop to think how many words are connected to our animals? Here are some: piggyback, kitty corner, hotdog, hush puppy, puppy love, wolfing food, under dog, top dog, pussy foot, whole hog, busy bee — the list goes on and on. Of course, we know that “dog tags” are merely licenses worn by people. There are even floral tie-ins: dogwood, cattails, pussy willow, skunk cabbage, to name but a few. A well-known foreign dog breeder quite seriously referred to the lovely springtime blossoms on our “dog bark” trees – and if you stop and think about it, he wasn’t that far off!          

The important thing to remember in teaching Rufus our language is to be sure every person in the household uses the same word to mean the same thing. Variations only cause confusion in the poor dog’s head. In addition to those elementary obedience commands, Rufus will easily catch onto words like bed, crate, ex-pen, walk, dinner (food!), wait, plus the names of each person in the family. It’s a lot more fun for you to teach, and for Rufus to learn, than to go through endless corrections because he didn’t understand what you were saying.

Until next time – Be good!

- Bardi

Bardi McLennan bred, trained and showed Welsh Terriers for 30 years during which time she wrote a monthly column on canine behavior in Dog fancy Magazine. In addition to contributing to numerous dog publications, she has written 15 books on dogs, the latest being Rescue Me! which received the ASPCA Humane Issues Award this year.