posted 10-16-2003 06:56 AM         

Anywho, back to the never-ending story of my puppy the angel-devil. She is about 4.5-5 months old now.

I have written before about her jumping up and grabbing our clothes and hands, and biting (gently - well, fairly gently) our calves, etc. I think this is only getting worse.

The way it looks to me, it is not aggression, but a bid for attention. She grabs onto the kids whenever they come into the room. I can see how she would regard them as playmates and I think this is going to be difficult to change. I will work on that once I get her to behave towards me.

She does jump up on my husband, and she snaps at him a little, but he can usually make her stop with a few stern words.

Me, though, is another story. I am the one who works with her on her obedience. I feed her. (Hmmm, HE is the one who kennels her the most though - I wonder....) Anyway, what it looks like to me is that she regards me as one of her toys. When she is brimming with energy, she will charge over to me and leap up at me, snapping at my clothes and my hands, biting at my legs. If I grab her collar, she tries to bite my hand. Lately, she has begun doing the play growling and barking that she does to her toys when she is really excited and playing with them. It seems to be escalating.

I have gotten the feeling from her that she does this when she wants something of me(play with me; come outside with me; let me bite the cats). And I think I have unwittingly been rewarding her for it by thinking "Oh my gosh, she needs to burn off some energy!" and tossing a ball or other toys for her. Sometimes I stick her outside alone for a minute or two, but not consistently (because I have read that is not really teaching her anything).

You have to realize that this dog gets attention from us. I take her for a walk for several miles every day. I toss her toys for her. I let her play outside and watch her and interact when she comes to me. My husband takes her to the park almost every day for a few hours. I get up 2 hours early so she can play before being crated while we are at work. (I get off at 3pm and my husband goes home for lunch so her time in the crate isn't awful.)

So I am thinking that what she needs is to learn that *I* am in charge. She is challenging my position in the pack.

My question is, how do I do this? I already make her sit for everything - her food, going in and out of doors, etc. I feed the cats before her but we usually aren't eating at the same time as she is. Should I alter our schedules so we eat before her? She is not allowed in the kitchen while we eat.

She is not allowed on furniture. I do not let her sit on me. (My husband allows her to romp all over him, which I read you are not supposed to do - and yet she still regards him as dominant. Men!)

I work with her on obedience. I have read about dominant dogs and how to establish dominance.

BUT I think the real issue here is - how do I handle her when she is going nuts on me? This morning I was determined to not play with her if she initiated it by being crazy. So I told her to sit (which she mostly tried to ignore). I held her mouth shut and told her "NO" (firmly and calmly) when she tried to bite. I held it shut for increasingly longer periods of time. I tried to restrain her and told her to settle (she does not know that command well).

I have been told to not alpha roll her - that it makes it worse with aggressive dogs. But is she really an aggressive dog?

Finally, I stuck her in her car crate (it lives in the family room when it is not in the car - her regular crate is in our bedroom). She was slightly better when she came out and I praised her (which usually makes her start all over again).

Does anyone have any suggestions?

I really need to get this fixed. She also thinks anyone lying on the couch is a target, which is very dangerous since she is going for your face at that point. Also, if I tell her "no" for something (usually chasing and biting the cats) and have to restrain her to make her stop, then she starts the whole lunging/biting/barking thing at me.

The injury to her foot happened when she was jumping up on my husband. I am worried with her constantly leaping at me and the kids and us defending ourselves, it is only a matter of time until she lands wrong and hurts herself again.

Do I need to grow a foot taller and a deeper voice in order for her to regard me as the pack leader?

posted 10-16-2003 07:45 AM         

Your puppy needs to learn that your children are not litter mates and can not jump and bite at them as he will soon learn that this is acceptable to all children and could really hurt them.

Does you are any member of your family play fight with your puppy..

Does your puppy get regular walks to stimulate its mind and to tire it out.

There is a soft spot on the dogs nose which most trainers call the training soft spot, Whenever your puppy jumps up or bites you gently press this and it will cause discomfate not pain and he will soon learn that jumping and biting will cause him discomfate...

When at home let him walk around with his ceash on and when he jumps gently tug or step on his leash which will pull your dog back this is another good way of learning him..

Or there is the water method, you will need either a water pistol or a water spray bottle the kind you would use for spraying plants. When he jumps or bites spray him and say No...

But he really needs to see a specialist trainer to determine the best course of action, As if the problem is not resolved it could cause problems as your puppy gets older..

You need to show your puppy your the pack leader and he is a follower...

He eats after you eat, He plays when you want to play.

Don't let his biting intimidate you dogs have a great ability to sense submission or fear and they will use this to get there own way with you...

Good luck and keep us posted of his progress

Mike

posted 10-16-2003 10:34 AM         

Our dog Haley was horribly mouthy when she came here in February, at 2 YEARS old because her owner had never taught her not to do things like that. We were able to redirect her mouthiness to a toy instead. She (much like your pup) would get excited everytime someone would come into the house, or room where she was, or stand up after sitting down for a while, and start mouthing/tugging on clothes as an outlet for her stress/excitement. When she would do this, we would just ignore her, grab a toy (I kept one outside by the door so I had one when I came home, and there were others scattered all around the house) and put it in her mouth, then praise and play with her for a minute. Within about a month and 1/2, she was starting to LOOK for a toy when someone came in and she started to get excited. Still only looked in her general area though, and would mouth if she didn't have one. She's made steady progress since, and now, 8 months later, will either hunt down a toy immediately upon seeing something that excites her, or will greet them without mouthyness, then when she gets too excited, runs off and grabs a toy before she starts mouthing. Rarely does she mouth at people anymore, only if she's REALLY excited and blocked into an area with nothing to redirect on. Once we made the initial connection between praise, stress release, and toy, she much preferred it to the previous; mouth, get shut away in another room for a while. You can't just expect them to NOT mouth when that is their way of releasing stress, and sometimes verbal or leash corrections only make things worse by increasing the stress level, so redirecting is an easy and almost always effective way to stop mouthy behaviors.

Another thing to try for her overall pushy behavior... when she gets all playful and barky, put her in a down/stay for a few minutes, THEN take her outside and play with he rif she still needs it. This enforces that you are boss, and you decide what is done when, but if she really does need the exercise, she'll get it.

What I would do when she's acting all spazzy is to put her in down/stay (if she knows it, I know she's only a young pup), then praise lightly when I let her up, so she doesn't get all wired out again. Then if she does it again, into the crate for a few minutes. Then if she does it again, into the crate for a bit longer. It may take a while before she "gets" the connection between action and consequence, I would guess at least a month before you notice much improvement. Keep a short leash on her in the house, so that she's too wild, you can grab it or step on it and keep her still until you can issue a command.

posted 10-16-2003 12:30 PM         

Goob - I've tried the toy thing but it doesn't seem to redirect her. She generally chews on it for a second and then goes back to me. I would love to do some different games with her, but she doesn't even fetch reliably. Some days she does, and some days she won't bring the ball back, and some days she runs after the ball but doesn't even pick it up and just keeps on going. I am so frustrated that she isn't seeming to learn the word "ball." She is a very smart dog, but whenever I tell her to "go get your ball" she looks at me blankly. I have associated the word and object many, many times. I don't know what else to do about that, or if she does know it and is just pretending not to. The down-stay sounds like a good idea. I guess this is sort of what I have been trying without much success, but I should be consistent in following it with a time out in her kennel and perhaps she will get the connection. She also doesn't have a very long or reliable down-stay. We are working on this.

NewLabOwner - There was a girl in our puppy class whose dog did the same sorts of things and outgrew it. I am hoping Nala and Max do as well. As you know, though, I need to try everything possible to make sure she knows it is WRONG. And I need to be sure that the four of us are all above her in the pack.

I realize it is very important to get her to stop behaving this way toward the children, but until I find something that works for me (who is with her a lot more) I don't think I will be able to stop the other. When I find something that works, I can adapt it for them.

I doubt the soft spot on the nose will work for her. It seems to me that the more physical I get with her, the worse she behaves. My husband has swatted her on the nose (and then made up with her and praised her) with really good results. I tried it and it was disastrous (as it is supposed to be). It really sucks that he can break all the rules and get better results.

posted 10-16-2003 01:21 PM         

When he gets really carried away, I get some training bits and we work on commands. Sit, down, up and stay. Though, he isn't getting the stay quite yet. It seems when I have to make him concentrate, he calms down a bit.

We start obedience classes end of the month and he's being neutered tomorrow. I'm hoping the jumpiness will get even less and less.

I do think I lost the dominant roll a bit with him, but the fact it's been slowly improving I think he's learning a bit.

I hope.

posted 10-16-2003 01:48 PM         

[This message has been edited by jeminn (edited 10-16-2003).]

posted 10-16-2003 03:07 PM         

I am not sure yet, but watching Nala just now mauling the cat (yes, the same one she was nice to less than an hour past) - I think she ignores me not intentionaly but because she is so tuned in to the cat that she doesn't hear me. When I finally managed to startle her (I think I should buy an air horn...), she at least looked at me and then came to me to get her treat for Leave It....but then went right back to the cat.

I think if I can get a reliable down-stay it will help with the cats. We are working on it. It's hard to find the time when she is calm enough to listen, yet not too tired to work.

posted 10-16-2003 04:17 PM         

Your puppy see's your husband as the boss he is the dominant one and he is not to be messed with...

Your puppy really seems a handful. Out of all my dogs only one has ever been like that but she soon realised i won't be pushed around and when she went to her new home she was great with the b/f but not his g/f she would attack her as she was the weaker of the couple and would back off when the puppy wanted to sit on the sofa or wanted to play with the b/f...

Try doing whatever your husband does with your puppy see if that helps you out..

posted 10-16-2003 06:56 PM         

I also believe there is a great tendency for dog owners to overuse misunderstand the whole "dominance" theory. I can understand how the human perception can and has easily misinterpreted dog behavior. Say your dog did see you as dominant she would expect, for one, you to roll over on your back while she postured you into understanding SHE is the leader. I doubt this happens. You are also the one providing her with food - YOU say when she eats. You also dictate when she goes for walks, when she plays and when she goes to pee. This is not the behavior of a submissive pack member. The pack order is not the proper theory for explaining what may be misbehavior, rambunctiousness, and/or under-stimulation which may be contributing to the problem.

posted 10-17-2003 07:01 AM         

As for trying my husband's techniques, I tried that since it worked for him (even if it went against everything I have read about handling dogs) and it made things worse for me. I think it only works if you are 6 feet tall with a loud, deep voice and no fear of the dog.

So with jeminn's suggestion sounding very good to me, I tried it. BUT I remained calm and gentle, yet firm. I did not let her scare me or make me lose my temper. She is not that big and I am still stronger than she is. I told myself her bites don't hurt - she does have bite inhibiton and she never breaks the skin. It hurts the most when you pull back and her teeth scratch you. So I let her grab my hand in her mouth, grabbed her collar with the other, told her to SIT and guided her into position. When she kept twisting to bite the hand on the collar, I grabbed her on either side of her head and looked into her eyes and told her NO BITE, firmly but without yelling. I was not angry and did not sound angry. She wouldn't look at me (which I assume is a sign of submission) so I would keep turning her head to look at me and telling her NO BITE. Then I would let go and if she started right back up, we'd do it again.

After that first session, if she started jumping at me I would command her to SIT and then make her if she didn't listen, and do the NO BITE thing again if necessary.

This morning, I did not have any incidents with her (well except for the cats, but one thing at a time). When my husband came into the room to relieve me so I could go take a shower, she usually runs up to him as he comes through the gate and jumps up and bites his bathrobe until he gets her to stop. As soon as she took off toward him, I said EASY and she hunkered down, slowed down, and approached him lower to the ground with tail wagging and body quivering. Not once did she take his robe in her teeth or jump up on him (I use EASY when on walks to slow her down, and when she is approaching a cat - she knows what it means).

I think we are getting somewhere, although it's too early to tell for sure.

I think with the kids, I will first have them work with her on the SIT command - one at a time - when she is calm. Then, I will dress them in jeans, sweatshirts, and gloves if necessary. They must NOT be afraid of her. (They are 9 and 11, for those of you picturing me doing this with a 3-year-old, LOL.)

I will instruct them on how to do what I am doing with her and then have one enter the room. If she goes nuts, they will do exactly what I have been doing. Stay calm, don't be afraid, command her to SIT, grab her collar and maker her sit, hold her collar and close her muzzle and tell her NO BITE, look directly in her eyes, etc. Hopefully it will work if repeated as necessary.

We are working on STAY in a slightly different way now, due to the Leerburg video. He is very good at breaking the steps down and showing you exactly what to add and how much at what time, as far as distractions, distance, etc goes. My goal is to work her hard and have the major work on the SIT-STAY done by this time next week. I will be able to tell along the way if this goal is unreasonable, but I think it is doable in light of what she already knows. I am also going to finding our old choke collar or buy a prong collar to aid in the learning process, so that corrections (when we get to that stage) will be effective.

Thank you all for the suggestions! I will keep you updated on how it goes. I am really hoping the end of the crazy dog syndrome is near.

posted 11-06-2003 06:30 AM         

She chews through a leash if left on her. I have to watch her with undivided attention every second to prevent it. I just don't have the time to stare at the dog without blinking for hours!

I am trying to think of a kind of rope that might be hard for her to chew through.