It’s important to match the right playstyles to have success in your groups. Remember there is no right or wrong playstyle. The important thing is to match appropriate play styles together with dogs who are similar in size. The styles will generally overlap. For instance, body-slamming may turn into neck biting or cat-like play may turn into a chase. Most dogs use one as a primary style but can often play in other ways as well. Let’s go into detail of what the 4 main play styles are and what to look for.
Chasing
With the chasing playstyle you really want a dog that likes to be chased and one that enjoys chasing. The biggest problem with this playstyle is the dogs can get very excited and become overly aroused. You really want to make sure that the dogs don’t get too revved up during this type of game.
Here is a great example of appropriate chasing.
Neck Biting
The neck biting form of play is a wrestling type of game where dogs grab each other by the neck. You’ll often see this when they start wrestling, flop onto the ground and continue rolling around grabbing each other’s ears, head and necks. This can be an alarming playstyle to watch because you’ll often see teeth, but it’s usually a benign playstyle. If the dogs are actually going to fight, they would have to get up first.
Here you see some examples of the teeth display and neck biting of this type of playstyle. Notice the loose bodies of the dogs even though you can see teeth and open mouths.
Cat-Like
The cat-like play is common in the smaller breeds. This is a style where the dogs want to bat each other around gently with their front paws or spin in little motions around one another without really making any body contact. Dogs that have this cat-like playstyle are best matched with either small chasing dogs or with other small dogs that like cat-like play.
Again, here are some examples of dogs gently pawing other dogs and a guinea pig in an effort to play.
Body Slamming
Body-slamming is a very physical playstyle and it’s the playstyle of choice for most of the sporting breeds such as Labrador Retrievers. There is sometimes wrestling involved and it might turn into neck biting, but only after some rough and tumble slamming around. Dogs with this style can actually damage the walls of your facility by running into them or hurt other dogs if they are playing too rough. It’s important to keep your knees bent when you’re supervising this type of play so that you don’t topple over if the dogs accidentally slam into you. The biggest issue with this type of play is making sure the arousal level of the room doesn’t get too high. You want to intervene frequently and slow down the play. It’s best to match the body-slammers with dogs of similar weight and size so you don’t end up with injuries.
Here you see some of the rough action associated with body-slamming playstyle.
Play styles are often fluid as you can see in this photo. Remember dogs have unique play styles and they need to figure out the best playmates for them. In this photo the black Labrador is displaying cat-like pawing behavior. The Great Dane looks as if he’s about to body-slam the Husky, and the Husky is a little bit undecided. He may be getting ready to body-slam with the Great Dane. Your job is to supervise the dogs and determine which play styles will work out best together.
Green Play Behaviors
As you’ve seen with other behaviors and gestures, you can identify the play behaviors with the traffic management signal chart. All of the signs of good play are listed in the green area. Also, in the green area are two of the play styles: cat-like play and neck biting play.
Yellow Play Behaviors
The other two play styles are found in the yellow area. That’s where you’ll see chasing and body-slamming. These two styles are in the yellow mainly due to the potential for the arousal level to increase in the room and get out of hand. Remember to intervene and help give the dogs breaks if they are not giving themselves breaks on their own.
Red Play Behaviors
Now let’s put your knowledge to the test.
Play the videos below and you’ll see the video in both fast and slow motion. Think about at least one play style and one appropriate play behavior that you see in the dogs playing on the video and we will discuss after.