“You must be the alpha dog in your pack.” “If you’re not the alpha, your dog will try to take over that role.” You’ve heard these phrases before. “Alpha” is commonly understood to mean the top dog; the head honcho; the big cheese. But where did the term come from, and is it still applicable today?
David L. Mech has studied wolves for 50 years and is a seminal source of information on wolves and their behavior. He’s written several books, including “The Wolf: Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species,” which was published in the late 1960s. The book discusses the structure of wolf packs and the behavior of pack members toward each other. Mech included information based on a study done by Rudolph Schenkel, who had published his findings at a time when there was very little information available about how wolves behaved in the wild. At the time, scientists did not think as we do now of wolves as forming and retaining families, but as groups who came together in the winters in order to be more effective hunters.
At the time, to study wolves, a group was formed by combining wolves from various zoos. These wolves had no relationship with each other, so like any other social group, a sort of hierarchy had to be worked out. This was the situation that Schenkel observed before releasing his famous publication that described wolf behavior, pack order, and the “alpha pair.” Thanks to Mech’s book and other publications that then dispersed this information, the idea of an “alpha” trickled down to the general public.
Since Schenkel’s time, scientists have realized that the story of how wolves form and maintain packs is different than originally thought. The real story is this: A male and female wolf find each other, court, mate, and soon have offspring. The parents affectionately guide the offspring, teach them necessarily life skills, and keep them safe. Those pups, at about a year of age, become older siblings to the next litter, and like human siblings, dominate the new pups—but there is no “fighting for rank.” The rank is obvious. The parents are still in charge, period. Eventually, the offspring will disperse and eventually form their own packs.
Does any of this sound familiar? Does the accurate information about wolf packs sound more like wild animals constantly having to fight for rank, suppressing each other’s behavior, and rolling each other on their backs to prove dominance? Or does it sound more like human family structure? In the late 1990s, after David Mech lived on Ellesmere Island with a pack of wild wolves, he wanted to correct the information that now pervades our consciousness about wolf behavior, especially the ever-prevalent concept of the “alpha.” He published an article in 1999 in the Canadian Journal of Zoology and another in 2000 in the Canadian Field Naturalist, which discussed true pack structure. According to Mech, “The issue is not merely one of semantics or political correctness. It is one of biological correctness such that the term we use for breeding wolves accurately captures the biological and social role of the animals rather than perpetuate a faulty view.”
Since we have so many television shows, books, and other media which have, unfortunately, not only been perpetuating this faulty view, but basing training and behavior modification methods upon it, it is important that the public be made aware of the real truth of wolf packs. And if enough people know the truth, maybe we can eventually stop crying “alpha” and get back to training our dogs with affectionate guidance, as good leaders do.
To read the article “What Happened to the Term Alpha Wolf?” go to http://www.wolf.org/wolves/news/iwmag/2008/winter/alphawolf.pdf
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Thanks for the follow up
This is a great post on the science behind what I said earlier in the "Alpha" bits post. Thanks!
I saw that you are coming to Maine in the future. I look forward to meeting you in person.
Tail wags,
Marie Finnegan
K-9 Solutions Dog Training Inc.
http://k-9solutionsdogtraininginc.blogspot.com
I'm printing this!
I'm going to keep this article with me so I can hand it to all the people who look at me as if I've lost my mind when I challenge the alpha model.
It will also be helpful for those students of mine who worry that I'm teaching something subversive when I embrace the idea of dogs as children and owners as parents. No, they are not human children wearing fur, but YES our leadership role and relationhip dynamic should be much like the parent/child relationship.
As always...great post!
Cindy Bruckart, CPDT
Extended family, not a street gang
I am constantly explaining to my clients that the wolf pack analogy may not apply to domestic dogs; and that even if it did, most people have a misconception as to what a pack is. I remark that the majority of people I encounter - including many dog professionals - speak of a pack like it's some sort of gang hanging out on a street corner. The meanest toughest SOB establishes leadership through physical force and intimidation, therefore earning the right to impose his will on any other member without regard for what that individual wants. Usually they're nodding in agreement at this point. After I explain that a pack is truly just an extended family, it's not too difficult to get them to try out that model to raise their dog with.
Scott Fischer
www.trainedk9.com
Wolves, Dogs, Canids All
I don't know how many here have ever interacted with a wolf, let alone raised a wolf, raised a wolf with a dog or had a pack of wolves. I have with about 14 yrs experience after a life long love of training dogs. Dave is a super biologist but he has almost no interest in training, nor does he pretend to. My formal educational educational background has one effect on canid matters, I know how to do research, seek out the best minds and learn everything possible from them. Ian and some others are in that catagory.
I have said it before and I will say it again, "ALPHA", "BETA", "OMEGA" are roles withing a pack that change with circumstance and opportunity. Personality varies tremendously within each role, depending on the specific animal. There is too much painting with the broad brush. Broad Brush simplifies things as then we can pigeon hole and not have to think a lot further.
I love Ian and have learned so much from him that I will be forever grateful but I have to part with him on wolf behaviour not being applicable to dog behaviour. Simply put, yes it is. Dogs have subsets of juvenile wolf behaviours. Unlike wolves, most dogs do not mature in behaviour like a wolf of over 5-6 years old.
The other interesting aspect of having a dog (Golden R)with wolves was to watch the dog quickly re-learn his distant racial memory of wolf-language/behaviours. Rocko was a young rescue who had looked to not have had any relationship with other dogs and ditto for interctions with humans, so he was pretty much a blank slate.
Further, my current Czech GSDs have wolf traits/behaviours that most dog trainers would likely completely misdiagnose. But knowing wolves, these are easily recognized & dealt with easily & appropriately. In retrospect my old long gone furry family members did things which I wish i understood then as I do now. Yes wolf packs in captivity & the wild where they are "natural" packs have the breeding pair as the leaders of the younger ones but even that is subject to change. There is a lot to learn and I try to learn something new every day.
When learning stops, it is time to pull the dirt in over your head.
L.A.
Regardless...
We are humans, with bigger brains and control over resources. What wolves do amongst themselves in a group doesn't really apply to the human/domesticated dog relationship nor to how to go about training a dog.
Kelly Gorman Dunbar
Editor, Dog Star Daily
The Man Who Cried Alpha
With all respect to L.A., who has apparently worked with wolves, Dr. Mech has made some very important points. One is that groups of unrelated wolves do not have the same relationships among them that free-ranging wolves in a family pack do. Another that I would point out is that managing any species in captivity inevitably deranges the social systems of that species. Most important are probably the changes that come from being provisioned instead of having to hunt or forage for food (depending on the species); and the changes that come from limited real estate, so that captive animals are no longer afforded the ability to hide or sequester themselves when they need to seek social distance from other animals.
In any case, it's very unfortunate when we decide that whatever social system we are observing in animals is also inclusive of us, at the same social level as the other animals in the group. I remind my clients that it's all about the dogs, not us, and our job is to figure out what is motivating them and turn it to our purposes in a humane and ethical way. My cardinal rule is: the dog behaves toward me as he does toward other dogs because he is a dog, and his behavioral repertoire is limited by that fact. I won't engage in any flights of fancy to the effect that he behaves toward me as he does toward other dogs because he considers me an equivalent of the other dogs in my house. As Kelly just said, I'm a human, and I have the ultimate power over what happens to him, daily, and even finally, if I should choose to surrender him or have him euthanized. As far as Rocko was concerned, I'm not sure what that story has to do with dog training, as presumably the wolves were not trying to induce Rocko to sit and stay, or not to jump up or run away. I would also be very careful about thinking of any animal once it has left the womb as a blank slate. That animal carries the memory, and the behavioral consequences, of every experience it has ever had, and it's well to remember that. If indeed Rocko had never had any relationship with dogs or interactions with humans, which would be very unusual, he was still just trying to figure out how to exist in the situation in which he found himself, living with humans and wolves, more than he was trying to relearn a distant racial memory. After all, if he learned how to exist with his human family, we would not say that was the recovery of a distant racial memory.
Last, I have read Dr. Mech's newer book, and I've been impressed with all the things that free-ranging wolves do that we would consider dog-like, such as playing and barking. I've never gone in much for the concept that domesticated animals are somehow juvenile wild animals, and none of the arguments that I've read have changed my mind about that one. One factor that is often ignored when people make claims like that is that wild animals' behavior is constrained by their energy resources. Most predators live in pretty difficult circumstances, and they don't have energy to burn as do many domestic dogs. But in the best of circumstances, they do play, alone, with each other and with their young; it takes long and painstaking observation to document that, however. I wonder how many of us have adopted an ill, malnourished dog or horse that was quiet as anything, and sober in its behavior, only to be amazed and maybe dismayed to see how its behavior changed once it was no longer ill, and no longer in a negative energy balance. Most of us have certainly counseled clients who have made this discovery. The idea that domestic animals are defective versions of wild animals (I'm not talking about things like brachycephalic or chondrodystrophoid dogs, here; just about behavior) is a very old and somewhat romantic notion wearing a thin and ill-fitting cloak of science.
Alison Seward
Re Regardless
With all due respect, I totally disagree with much of your statement. The innate behaviour of the species is completely relevant to how we should train. That knowledge has made my training much quicker, easier and far more effective. What basis of "wolf" knowledge do you use to make your assertion?
L.A.
Re Re Regardless - Discussion Tone
Upon reflection, I think the tone of discussion I intend might be misunderstood. I mean it as educational, expansive of outlook and stimulative of more discussion & discovery. I am rather passionate about canids. I recall that Ian took a lot of heat about the ability of hyenas to be trained. He stuck to his guns & proved that he was correct. Knowledge is power.
L.A.
The Man Who Cried Alpha
Replying to L.A.: Other than time spent hanging around the local wolf refuge, which is profoundly disheartening, my wolf knowledge comes from researchers like Dr. Mech, as I stated. I may not have made myself clear. I was not disputing that the behavior of a species should be taken into account when trying to train that species. I was disputing the idea that dogs are pack animals, as well as the idea that wolf packs are just groups of random animals who sort themselves into a linear hierarchy. To support my claim I cited Dr. Mech, as well as the fact, documented for many species, that captivity, with limited space, depauperate environment, and provision of food and possibly artificial shelter, deranges the normal social systems of captive animals. I was also unconvinced that one needed extensive knowledge of wolf behavior to train dogs; knowledge of dog behavior should be sufficient.
Additionally, I was questioning whether any animal was a real blank slate, however limited its experience, and that Rocko was recovering a distant memory of wolflike behavior as he tried to learn to live in your household. I thought that he was adapting to his environment, learning to live with you and your other animals, not trying to call on a remote ancestral memory. Interestingly, the investigation by Dr. Elaine Ostrander and her group into the history of dog breeds shows that most modern breeds have been developed in the past 200 years, with a few exceptions; so, though there are apparently things about your German shepherds that remind you of the wolves you've worked with, they are far removed from wolves evolutionarily.
I'm surprised that there was controversy over whether hyenas could be trained. Anything with sensory apparatus and a nervous system that has synaptic plasticity can learn, and so can be trained. In the light of the fact that a lot of the basic science of learning has been done on Aplysia ssp. (sea slugs), it's clear that they can be trained because they have the basic requirements for learning. Surely people in zoos and refuges train all sorts of species in husbandry behaviors, which are critical to their being able to be properly cared for. The behavior of those species must be taken into account in order to be successful, as you say, but they can certainly be trained. So it's not surprising to me that a hyena can be trained. The impediments to training non-domestic animals aren't all that different from the impediments to training domestic animals, and include problems with the skill and knowledge of the trainer; as well as problems with fear and reactivity of the animal.
Alison Seward
Dogs Pack Animals? OR Kill All The Coyotes !
Granted dogs do not have as strong a pack instinct as wolves but dogs will pack-up once the number is more than 3. That has certainly been my experience. Even my Black Labs & Goldens were no exception. An anecdote to demonstrate.
A few years ago, a rural area here had a rash of sheep slaughters. Not killings for food but mutilated bodies & slaughter. That should have been a clue but it wasn't. The sheep owners went on a rampage tracking down & summarily executing every coyote possible. Strange thing - the sheep killings did not decrease.
Finally, someone with a working brain decided to do some observation at night, when the killings were happening. Darling little fluffy the sheep owner's own dog was meeting up with 12 to 16 of her friends after their owners had put them out for the night. They formed a pack and set about to slaughter and maim sheep en mass. At dawn, they would disperse back to their homes reverting to their roles of the loving family dog. There was a mix of large dogs, medium dogs and very small dogs. Breed or mutt made no difference. Draw your own conclusions.
I have said for years that:
One Dog Is A Joy
Two Dogs Become Interesting
Three Dogs Just Decided That Your Training Is Subject To Veto
Again, I have had many dogs & some wolves that were actually my animals that I raised & lived with, not that I visited and left.
Regards,
L.A.
The man who cried alpha
That's an interesting story; I have no words for people who let their dogs out to roam at night, and I'm amazed that that is tolerated in a rural, livestock-raising area. I don't think it would fly in our farming areas here in Pennsylvania. But this is pretty much my point. This kind of behavior comes under the heading of social facilitation, or perhaps emotional contagion, like the behavior of groups of teenagers after a high school basketball game. Despite the fact that the sort of teen behavior is often referred to as pack behavior, that is also social facilitation/emotional contagion. A random collection of owned dogs decimating a sheep flock is in many ways the opposite of pack behavior. Pack behavior is purposeful and directed to survival of the individuals and the pack they belong to. This is a form of aberrant play behavior, or prey behavior misdirected; border collies who run through sheep grabbing at them in a state of uncontained excitement come to mind. This is what would be expected from random assortments of dogs unsupervised with a confined prey species. I wonder if anyone got video of the behavior. I'm surprised that there were no signs of this when the dogs were brought back inside in the morning.
I've lived for nearly 20 years in a multidog household. There are typically at least 10 who live in my house till the end of their days. Every day is a little dog to dog behavior lab. I see that a lot of conflict is between pairs of animals, not among several. I also see that the dogs may all run toward the same stimulus in alarm, but they certainly don't do anything at all that I would ever characterize as pack behavior.