[This post was written for a job application. They didn’t pay me for it, so here you go!]
Dandelion (L) and Blueberry (R)
In our house, Blueberry is the undisputed King of Selective Hearing. One morning, I asked him to come inside. He stood at the edge of the yard, wind in his mane, looking out across the field like a statue of noble resistance. After a full minute of silence, he glanced back and sighed—as if to say, “Fine. But only because I was going to anyway.”
If you’ve ever asked your Great Pyrenees to “sit,” only to be met with a slow blink and a long pause, you’re not alone. Pyrs are famously independent dogs. They’re incredibly intelligent—but they often seem to operate on their own mysterious internal code.
The good news? They’re not ignoring you out of defiance. It’s just part of who they are.
Great Pyrenees were bred for centuries to guard flocks in the remote Pyrenees Mountains. These dogs had a serious job: protect the sheep at all costs, often without a human nearby. They needed to make decisions alone, without waiting for orders. That independent thinking is deeply embedded in their DNA.
These days, your Pyr might be guarding the yard, the couch, or the kids—but the mindset remains the same. They still believe it’s their job to assess every situation and act accordingly. That’s why traditional training methods that rely on immediate obedience don’t always work.
Your Pyr isn’t ignoring you to be stubborn. They’re evaluating whether your request makes sense.
For example, if you ask them to lie down while they’re on “alert duty” near a window, they may not comply—not because they don’t understand the command, but because they’re busy “working.” In their mind, protecting the house takes priority.
Aside from traditional training techniques, I think the key to getting your Great Pyrenees dog to stop ignoring you is to stop interrupting him when he's working. And to do that, you need to change your perspective on your dog's behavior.
Once you start seeing your Pyr as a partner rather than a subordinate, everything shifts. Respect their instincts, time your commands wisely, and build trust through calm consistency.
Sure, they might still ignore you sometimes—but when they choose to listen, it’ll be on their terms, and that makes it all the more meaningful. Besides, with a dog like Blueberry, half the joy is in watching them think for themselves.
Blueberry