Protecting or Taunting?

[Leslie and Halas]

Halas loves playing with my mom's dog, Barley, and the feeling seems to be mutual.  Halas likes that Barley is smaller, and Barley has no problems rough-housing with a bigger dog, so it works out for them.  Halas hits Barley with his paws, Barley jumps on Halas, they take turns chasing each other, it's all good.  Halas prefers being chased over doing the chasing, so he spends a lot of time trying to get Barley to chase him.  Halas will come up to Barley, take a swat at Barley with his paw, and then run away hoping Barley is chasing him.  But when toys are involved, Halas does some funny things that make me wonder about his intentions.

For example, Halas has a Himalayan dog chew that he basically ignored for about 5 months.  Several weeks ago, Barley came over, and started chewing on it, and Halas kept distracting Barley from the chew, so that he could take it back.  Now, after 5 months of little, if any, interest, Halas thought that chew was great, and he had to have it back.  I recently ordered a smaller chew for Barley, and gave it to him when he was at our house the other day.  Halas tricked Barley into moving away from it, took it, went and found his own, and carried them both around in his mouth.  My first thought was that he wanted them for himself.  But he'll walk right up to Barley with them, make sure Barley sees them, and then run away.  I think he's using them to try to get Barley to chase him.  If he wanted them for his own, wouldn't he go hide them somewhere?  Or at least start chewing on one? 

He's also done it with a squeaky hamburger.  Halas has one that he loves, and Mom recently bought one for Barley.  Both squeaky burgers are at my mom's house.  The other night, I was at her house running on the treadmill while Halas and Barley played.  I came back upstairs to find Halas standing there with both squeaky burgers in his mouth.  Both sticking out perfectly, like he was just taking a bite out of each.  I tried to get a picture, but he wouldn't stand still.  He was again trying to get Barley's attention, so that Barley would chase him.

So when Halas hogs the toys, he could be protecting them, or he could be taunting Barley with them.  I'm now leaning more towards taunting in order to get Barley to chase him.  If Halas was protecting, he would probably hide the toys or growl if/when Barley tried to take them back.  But he doesn't do that.  If Barley catches him and tries to take one, Halas doesn't care.  He just lets Barley take it, and then works on another way to get the chase game going again.  Instead of being jealous of Barley for playing with Halas' toys, I think Halas is jealous of the toys for taking Barley's attention away from their game of chase. So I guess Halas figures that if Barley wants the toy, and Halas has the toy, Barley will have to chase him to get it.

Either way, it results in a lot of entertainment for us.  Do your doodles do this with toys?  Are they trying to keep the toys for themselves?  Or are they trying to distract the other one into a game?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Halas has a much more generous nature than JD. He must feel very secure about being your #1 guy!

[Leslie and Halas]

He does know that he's #1!

[Traci -Bexter & Maggie]

I have no idea, but it seems like to me that Halas is wanting to play, and that is how he is getting Barley to play with him.  I think it sounds cute and harmless.  Smart dog actually.

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Fudge loves to taunt Vern. It is hysterical. She does it a lot when we first get home and Vern tries to hog all the attention. Fudge grabs a toy, walks by Vern until he notices and then once it gets his attention, she comes to us for all the attention. LOL She also walks by him outside with a stick in her mouth, trying to get him to chase her.

[Barbara B., Sasha & Oliver]

Your description sounds exactly like my two doodles.  Oliver could ignore a toy for months, have no interest what so ever, the second Sasha picks it up Oliver must have it.  When I buy them both the exact same toy, Oliver must have both.  I am not sure whether he is trying to domonate over Sasha or not.  When they play in the back yard Sasha always trys to get Oliver to chase her more than Oliver trys to get Sasha to chase him.  They are the best of friends and love, love, love to play, wrestle, chase and do not like to be seperated at all.  If Sasha has something she really likes she will put her paw over it as to say "Oliver you better not even think about taking this away from me", she has given him warnings in the past and he has respected them.  Since there has never been any problems with them deciding on who gets what toy I usually let them work out their differences and not get involved - LOL.    I have even noticed in the past where Sasha will be quietly playing with a toy, Oliver will come over take it away from her, trun around walk a couple of steps and drop it and keep walking, he is so rude :)   

[cheryl & oliver]

Oliver loves his unstuffed toys, he must have 20 of them some with squeakers, some not.  We call them his babies and he loves them all.  He doesn't share them with our 15 yr old aussie, and I think that is because the aussie has no interest in them.  In general he will share his things, I have seen him do this with other dogs, but not his "babies", but he has never had to, he will share rubber toys, balls, etc. I will have to try and se what he does.  We do not take his "babies" out of the house, so maybe that is why he doesn't know to share them. He loves those silly animals and I have found that they really last, he can't destroy them..And he chews and throws them all over the house. 

[Leslie and Halas]

Halas loves those unstuffed toys, too.