Excessive puppy biting

[couponqueen1956]

I am beyond frustrated! I have a 16 week old lab puppy. The entire 8 weeks have been dreadful, due to her obsession with biting me. Not normal puppy mouthing, but blood drawing, skin ripping biting! Nothing I have tried will stop her. She will gladly do almost anything for a treat, but as soon as I run out of treats, I am bitten. Take her for a walk, guaranteed she will sink her teeth into my legs. Play time always results in me bleeding. My hands, arms, and legs are ripped up and bruised. She is my 8th puppy, and never have I experienced this. I keep a light leash on her in the house, and when she comes near me and bites my leg, she then goes for my hand, arm, or other body parts when I reach for the leash. I am heartbroken over this. What should have been 8 weeks of enjoying my new fur baby, has been exhausting and painful. I started this course tonight. She did well with the pre school basic of “target”, then back to biting. I don’t know whether to scream or cry. Help!

[JMFS]

Ouch! That's no fun. :( These are supposed to be the happy-go-lucky breeds after all, but if you've had 7 other puppies and any have been labs then you know what a mouthy breed they are. My brother's Golden Retriever was the same age when I met her. She wasn't Quite as frequent with her bites as your little nipper, but it was irritating nonetheless. Stella would wrinkle up her nose and start peeling back her lips before she'd launch an attack, she looked so evil right before. A little fluffball of teeth! She normally did it to my sister-in-law and especially when sis-in-law would turn her back - that little devil would go for her Achilles (yowch!) or calf and those puppy teeth are flippin' sharp! She tried it on me a couple times but learned real real fast she'd end up with my fingers in her mouth, unable to bite down. I don't know how well that method resonates with force-free scientific training, but I got fed up with the bites and it works great on cats (who, incidentally, don't care what training method you use as long as they get what they want in the end).

 

When you say nothing you've tried has worked, what have you tried and for how long before you moved on to a different kind of attempt? There are quite a few posts about puppy biting and you can use the search field in the upper right-hand corner (there's a looking glass icon next to it) to search for bite or biting - you might find some posts that Adrienne's answered that relate to your situation. I'd be wearing long sleeves, socks, and pants, maybe even mittens, to cut down on the skin damage and pain - I have very little tolerance for that behavior so I'd have to mitigate the damage.

 

Out of curiosity is she full lab or mixed? If full is she yellow, chocolate, or black? That's one of my favorite breeds (along with most of America, lol). Chocolates have been the cantankerous ones in my experience so I'm interested to see if yours will break that chain. :D Any way you look at it, she's still very young and I'm willing to bet you'll be able to get that bite inhibition in check with the advice you get here. :) You Might want to repost it in the training and behavior section - that's where the most activity is. I wanted to say hi and express my empathy for your situation. I have a resource guarder with whom we're starting modification training with a Behaviorist this week so I understand the stress you're feeling - I've been doing it for 8 years so I'm also going to lend encouragement to stick to correcting it at this early age. Hang in there!

[couponqueen1956]

Thank you for your response. Full bred black. Over 8 weeks, I’ve tried redirecting to a chew toy or toy or bone, saying ouch, screaming ouch, saying no bite, smack on the nose, smack newspaper on my hand for noise, holding snout a few seconds, putting on floor and holding down, holding under chin by collar, redirecting to a treat. I laugh when told to stand still like a stone. Right! So she can tear my legs up? Tried each of these consistently for 3 days or more. Two previous lab pups who never did anything close to this. I am worn down, and pray she will eventually stop.

[Adrienne Farricelli]

Hi CouponQueen1956,

It sounds like you sure got a handful! All puppies nip and it's a normal stage of their development, albeit your case sounds to be on the extreme side. Sometimes this happens, especially with working lines of purebred puppies. I hope it's just a matter of rough mouth and that she is not exhibiting any signs of aggression. I suggest to stop smacking the nose and holding the snout or other physical interventions as these can trigger defensive aggression in the long run as the hands are perceived as aversive.

 

It sounds like your puppy is persistent and by biting you when you are standing still she is trying to engage you back into moving. While yelping can be effective with many puppies, it doesn't always work with very determined or "drivey" puppies as the yelping increases their arousal because it makes us humans sound like a hurt animal. If the yelping seems to increase arousal or doesn't seems to work, then it might be time for plan B.

 

The fact that she grabs stronger when you stop interacting with her, may be an extinction burst (see the glossary section for this). Basically, it can be her way of trying to engage with you more. If you freeze and stop interacting and she grabs stronger and that gets you moving (hard to stay still if the bite hurts!), then her stronger bites are being reinforced. "If I bite stronger, my owner finally engages with me, yay!"

 

To prevent this, you would have to persist and be determined to not move at all to prevent her from getting any reward history, but I know this can be a challenge, especially when those sharp teeth hurt! You may be better off therefore giving a shot to redirection at this point, trying your best though to catch her before she has had the opportunity to latch on.

 

Now, you mention that redirection doesn't work: Generally when a puppy doesn't respond to redirection, there are some possibilities:

 

-The puppy is too over threshold

-The puppy hasn't been trained an alternate behavior that is fluent enough (this may take some time to train) to replace the problem behavior

-The toy offered to redirect is too low value in respect to nipping

-Treats offered to redirect are too low value in respect to nipping

-Games offered to redirect aren't rewarding enough

-The activity the pup is being redirected to is too brief.

-There hasn't been much consistency among family members. If the behavior is allowed sometimes yes and sometimes no, it puts it on a variable schedule, which means persistence is being rewarded.

-Children are encouraging the nipping by playing with the pup in chasing games/play with hands/moving fast away when puppy grabs pants etc.

-The nipping is being rewarded by moving away or providing resistance (which is what encourages dogs to latch on more as we become human tug toys to them)

 

Here are some tips:

 

-Try redirection using high-value toys. Trying to redirect using a regular toy that likely your puppy has always access to can be rather boring compared to your clothes she can play tug with. Instead, try walking in the room when you expect her to come towards you to nip, and as soon as she is close to you, freeze (become motionless) and offer her a stuffed Kong (Kong toy stuffed with smelly goodies like peanut butter mixed with some kibble and dog cookies stacked to make it hard for her to get the kibble out), rather than just a regular toy. This should occupy her for long enough for you to walk away and keep her busy. A Kong Wobbler/ Buster Cube filled with a portion of her daily allowance of kibble can also come handy once she learns how to get the kibble out.

 

- You can also try to engage her with toys that add movement into the game such as a tennis ball tossed in the opposite direction (make it extra fun!) or a flirt pole (stick with a stuffed animal attached one end). The goal is to find a way to make these toys much more interesting, rewarding and fun to interact with than your body.

 

-You can also encourage some fun games that are also rewarding. Here are some fun ones: https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/m...ibition-games/

 

-Training a replacement behavior can also come handy. You can try with Targeting, which is explained in the Brain Games sections of the course. Since she's a young pup, you can teach her to target a target stick or long wooden spoon you can carry when you walk so that you can keep her focus off your body but on the wooden spoon instead.

 

- You can teach her to do some attention heeling inside the home (no leash needed), if she can stay so focused on your clothes, she can eventually be taught to stay focused on your eyes if you make the activity rewarding. Every time she makes eye contact with you, toss a treat across the room so that she gets a workout too. Now, with the short attention span of puppies, don't expect to get long attention, but just a quick glance works for now. After several reps, she should approach you to make eye contact in exchange for a tossed treat, rather than focus on your clothes.

 

-If she loves her kibble and you are training her indoors and have time, starting today, start using her kibble and putting her to work for it. Place her full morning portion in your treat bag and put her to work for every single piece if feasible. Depending on the size of her kibble you may end up with 50 or more opportunities to reinforce desired behaviors. By the time you are done, she should be ready to nap and you should be able to fill up your treat bag with her evening portion for later on. You can use this portion to fill up interactive toys or do more games/training.

 

Now ask her to sit when you see her approaching you and reward by tossing a treat away. Do this as often as needed. You should see an increase in the sitting behavior and a decrease in the nipping behavior overtime as sitting and catching tossed treats are more fun!

 

-Teach that gentleness pays. Place a smelly treat or kibbles in your hand inside your fist. Ask your dog to sit (this helps her to remain calm) then present the closed fist to your dog, keeping it slightly under her chin. If your dog bites your hand, continue keeping the fist closed. Be persistent and patient. Once your dog stops biting and nibbles gently or licks your hand, praise, open the fist and release the treat. If your dog has an alligator mouth, for the sake of safety wear gloves for this exercise until he develops a softer mouth! However, it’s also true that gloves may blur sensation and you may think he’s not biting when he actually is!

 

-Remember that learning (of good and bad behaviors) always takes place in all your interactions with your puppy. You may find it helpful to carry a treat bag filled with some kibble on you at all times so to provide opportunities to make good choices. This for the most part initially until you puppy learns to seek alternate forms of entertainment.

 

-Make sure you provide outlets for pent-up energy. Games, training, exercise and opportunities for socialization should wear her out and provide outlets for her basic needs. With brain games that allow her to chase things and get rewards out of them (like kibble out of a bottle or a Kong Wobbler) she should seek them more and more which can turn your clothes pretty boring after a while because she gets more out of these activities when he's bored.

 

-Also remember that puppies need to sleep too. Sometimes, when they are super nippy, they just may be cranky and in need of a nap. Give a pleasant time-out in a crate with chew toy. Chewing should relax her and make her likely to sleep.

 

-To tackle the biting when you go grab the leash, practice some fun leash grabs. Do several in a row. Everytime you go to reach the leash, (use gloves if needed) use your other hand to hand feed her several kibbles in a row. Feed her some as you are walking her as well after the leash grab, preferably doing some steps of attention heeling. This should redirect her for some time if she is trying to nip for play, but can also help cancel out the negative connotations the act of grabbing the leash may have assumed in case you have used the leash to correct her.

 

Now, I must be honest here in saying that 3 days or more is not enough to start seeing a significant reduction in nipping. It generally takes several weeks or even months and the reduction in nipping to a certain extent is part of of the pup maturing and understanding that we are not playmates to play with using their mouths in a rough manner, but that we are a different species with thin skin and that we play and interact with them in different ways.

 

You may have to try several of the above options and see what works best. Redirection to a rewarding treat-dispensing toy or game that uses treats should be quite easy at this age if these activities are made rewarding. Teaching an alternate behavior is also important because dogs cannot misbehave if they are busy making eye contact or sitting! It may take a bit of time though to teach these alternate behaviors fluently but it is sure worth the time and effort. By providing outlets for her energy and needs for mental stimulation and reinforcing appropriate behaviors, you should eventually start seeing a decrease in the nipping behavior. Keep track of it so to measure whether things are getting better with time. I hope this helps,

Good luck!

Adrienne

Edited November 5, 2018 by Adrienne Farricelli

[couponqueen1956]

Thank you so much for taking all the time you did, to offer so much insight and help! Your assessment is spot on! Harley is definitely bitey when tired, so we've started mandatory rest time in her crate throughout the day. I had already stopped some of the correction methods, as I was not comfortable with the "dominance/I am the alpha dog" suggestions of others (not on this site). I don't believe her to be aggressive, thankfully. She is better with my grandkids, also a good thing! It's mainly me, she bites so hard. Your response was reassuring, and very helpful. I plan to put your suggestions into action IMMEDIATELY! I know I have a great dog here, but needed some guidance, which you provided. Thank you!!!

[couponqueen1956]

Forgot to mention, your link to fun games takes me to an error 404 page.

[Howler]

Sorry, looks like it was mistyped: this link should work for you:

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/bite-inhibition-games/

You need to be logged-in to the website as a member to access this.

Edited January 11, 2019 by Adrienne Farricelli