Behavioral differences associated with litter care at Guiding Eyes for the Blind

Abstract

We compared C-BARQ scores of puppies that received ‘home litter care’ (reared in volunteers’ homes) to those that were cared for in whelping kennels at the Developmental Center at Guiding Eyes for the Blind. A few behaviors were significantly worse among home-litter puppies (chewing, pulling on the leash, emotional urination, and separation urination), while kennel-litter puppies scored worse for other behaviors (staring at nothing, barking excessively, self-grooming, dog-directed aggression/fear, and stranger-directed fear). The largest differences were observed for nonsocial fears, separation-related problems and attachment/attention-seeking, for which puppies whelped and reared at the Minnesota Guide Dog Breeding Center scored much more favorably than those whelped at GEB. These data indicate that early rearing environment plays a key role in canine behavioral development and suggests that further study would be greatly beneficial.