watch dog!!!

Question
hai sir,
im from india and i own a german shepard(around 7 months old).
we wanted a dog wich is active as well as a good watch dog.
he is now pretty big,but hasnt started to  bark at strangers yet.
He has no barking problems yet as he barks when he plays with us.
Is it because the time has not reached when a german shepard starts barking or is there some training to do!!!
please help

Answer
Most dogs are naturally protective. This derives from their desire to protect the leader (owners) that provide all they desire in life: food, attention, exercise, brain exercise. Depending on the level of protection desired, you may need to train your dog to warn you of strangers. Dogs are social animals and naturally want to avoid confrontations and aggression. They exhibit dozens of "calming" signals to other animals and us from head turning, to "busy with something" to avoid the eye to eye staring contact.  I usually explain it as the bar fight scene. If you are conversing with a person at a respectful distance and then step forward, nose to nose, eye to eye, it makes the other person feel challenged and threatened. "in your face" is the phrase and it means I am ready to fight you. Usually one person backs down to avoid a physical fight.

Being social, the dog wants to avoid confrontation and make friends with whom ever it meets. It knows that any human may be its source of food, shelter and care. Some call this exploitative symbiotic relationship. We get "work" from the dog and the dog gets its life needs.
To enhance the protective behavior without attack training [and the risks of liability] the owners need to be the leader at all times. This is usually brought about in regular obedience training. NILIF nothing in life is free is a training method where the dog must "work" for anything and everything. Work means, follow a command. An example, at feeding time, the dog is called and told to sit stay while the food is slowly brought from the counter to the floor. If the dog disobeys, stop lowering the food and tell the dog to sit stay again. When the food gets to the floor (think of a very slow elevator) then the dog is told to "take it" and is allowed to eat. Likewise with treats, toys and affection. This teaches the dog that everything good in life comes from you and it must make you happy (obey a command) to get it. Then you can teach the dog to bark (speak) at noises made outside your door using standard operant conditioning (Pavlov)

Regards,
Henry Ruhwiedel
Westwind Kennels LLC
www.dogkennel.org