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Fox Terrier Characteristics By Mary Beam One of my main concerns when sending a rescue to a new home is whether the people understand the breed and want it because of its genetic characteristics or want it because "it's cute". Love of a breed includes loving all the quirks and instinctive behaviors of the breed. It means caring so much for the breed that the people will live with what can't be changed. It means telling your fox terrier that s/he's a good dog when s/he brings you a small creature s/he's just caught and dispatched, not screaming and punishing the dog. It means realizing that YOU are the one to blame if your dog chews something YOU left out. It means not becoming angry when the fox terrier acts like a normal fox terrier, and that requires that the people know how a normal fox terrier acts. If left to themselves, fox terriers (and I think other breeds as well) will use their instincts more than if you train them and utilize those instincts in positive ways. Those dogs, the ones left to themselves, visually exhibit their genetic behaviors more than those who are trained. One can easily observe and recognize instinct in these dogs. Training, good, positive, loving, gentle, long-term, creative training can modify and utilize genetically induced behaviors, to the point where other people don't recognize them, but, the genetic qualities are still there. And the degree of success is different with each dog. Some have more prey drive than others, so the degree of modification is different. Let's take a behavior that is common to all dogs. Rolling in smelly stuff to cover their own scent. All dogs will do this, but some are more inclined to do it then others. The behavior can be modified easily in some and not at all in others.      | |||
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