Play biting and teething

Hello,

Having gone through the threads about biting, mouthing etc... I was wondering if I am doing the right thing with my pup.
I let out a yelp when we play and he bites, exchange my flesh for a toy and praise him when he goes for the toy; when he decides to go for my trousers, or shoes when I walk around. I also time him out/ ignore him when he does not stop. I have noticed that he sometimes tries to get my fingers in the back of his mouth in which case I let out a yelp and get him a frozen carrot which seems to calm him down a great deal (he's usually eager to nap after the carrot). Shall I carry on with this method or treat all biting the same way?
Also is there a limit to how much frozen carrot is too much frozen carrot?
Also whoever came up with this, thank you, you are a genius

In my standard answer to this question, you may have seen how I start out describing how they behave with litter mates. They love their biting games and that is all they have known until they go to their home.

There is no quick, magic way to stop the fun. You have to take a zero tolerance stand. What you have been doing is much the same as I do. I suspect leaving them longer with each other may teach them not to bite as hard, but only reinforces the idea that others like to be bit.

I would just be careful with swapping your fingers for other things when he's biting. To him, he bites you and okay, you yelp, but he gets given a carrot or a new toy! That's worth it to him. Also, I have found with some puppies, the more you yelp the more wound up they get! When teaching puppies not to bite, I personally teach them 'gentley'. So lets say the puppy is biting my fingers, I will firmly say 'No!' and take my hand away. Then I would slowly put my hand near the puppy saying 'Gently' as I do it. If the puppy bites, I start over again by saying 'No' etc... if the puppy doesn't bite, you calmly praise it and carry on with the game. I have found this quite effective. My puppy Dolly, used to bite when licking my face. She soon learnt what gently meant and would stop biting straight away. Hope this helps

Hi Sandrine good advice from Wheaten mad who is describing a way of teaching bite inhibition.

You don't really want to stop a puppy play biting , if you do you will miss a valuable opportunity to teach your puppy 'bite inhibition' ,to bite evermore gently then not at all . Teaching bite inhibition ensures that as the puppy grows up and develops powerful jaws, should he bite for any reason (say he is in in pain/at the vets being treated /gets accidentally hurt like standing on his tail) he will have learnt never to sink his teeth into human skin.

Bite inhibition, learning to developer a 'soft mouth' is one of the most important lessons you can teach your puppy, however teaching it takes time and patience and success won't be achieved in just a few days . Also everyone in the household needs to adopt the same approach.

Link to teaching bite inhibition ..click here

The purpose of frozen carrots is to sooth painful gums caused by teething , don't give too many. As an alternative teething aid you can knot an old cotton tea towel and moisten and freeze that for you puppy to bite on.

Hi there!

Congrats on the new puppy!

What breed? Purebred or mix? Pictures? Haha..

As for the biting, by redirecting with a toy you are showing your new puppy that this is the proper thing to bite or mouth. Good for you! Your one step ahead!

I would continue to do this.

I found with my breed especially, yelping does not help. It may when they are VERY YOUNG (5-10 weeks) but after that it seems to only excite the puppy. Mostly because we use the same tone in play as well.

"Yip" to grab their attention when they bite.

"Yippee" to grab their attention when playing or trying to ramp them up.

See how similar? Other words can be used as well, it's the tone that is usually the same.

What I would do is redirect to a tug toy or ball that they can squeeze in their mouth.

I personally like the tug toy because then you can be involved in the play and re-direction from start to finish. Bonding is a great thing.

As for walking around when he bites your pants and or shoes... well.. you are now becoming even more exciting in their mind, because now the "prey" is coming alive and moving! Prey drive is great, you want this, it helps create drive, which helps in training.

I would just redirect with a tug or ball.

They don't necessarily want to bite your pants, it's just that it is there, they want something in their mouth and they want to have fun!

Everything should be fun, nothing should be negative. You want to enhance the bond and be the FUN ONE they come too to learn and play.

Re-direct with a toy, engage them with the toy while praising.

Carrots can be good to give your puppies, but they are high in sugar so please be careful as to how many you give.

I like giving ice cubes. You should see how much fun one puppy can have with some ice cubes. Cheap toy too..

Good luck with you puppy!

Hi Elizabeth , if you try to teach BI only using toys a puppy will never learn not to bite hard on human skin, the puppy won't have chance to lear about not about not applying pressure unlike the method Wheaten mad has described

Hi Minihaha,

I have to strongly disagree with your statement.

Although I respect your difference in opinion, I do disagree.

By re-directing with a toy or ball, you are teaching a dog or puppy NOT to bite on human skin at all.

Especially with a larger dog, a small puppy (like my 9 month 77.6lbs puppy) can still do some damage when mouthing, even if they are being gentle.

I understand BI, I do schutzhund.. lol.. but having a puppy re-directed to the thing you want, instead of the thing you don't (your hands and or fingers, and or pants) is teaching the puppy, "no, don't use my hands, use this to play".

Young puppies aren't going to learn the difference of "gently biting your fingers", they just want to bite, it's instinctual. Why have them bite your fingers at all? Your (not you personally, general statement) teaching them that it's okay to bite you, that is not okay.

I will use an example as to why this shouldn't be okay.

I have 2 German Shepherds. My 9 month old male is 25' at the withers, 77.6 pounds.. if a little girl say, 4 years old wants to play with my puppy (yes, he is still a puppy... lol) and he goes to "gently" bite her hand, gets too excited or the little girl screams just because now this huge puppy has her hand in his mouth (gently or not)... who do you think is going to pay? Yes, my puppy.

Puppies, especially young ones are all about the here and now. They are very excitable and "forget" especially when in "play mode". You want to ensure that your puppy never sees you as a thing they can bite, gently or not.

Teaching BI can be done many other ways, it doesn't need to be on your (or someone elses') skin.

JMO though.

miss posted...

Hahaha.. It's okay!

I thought I was seeing things.. I was like "where did that post go???"

No problem!

Hi Elisabeth apologies for the incomplete reply, I will try and reply in full now and hope the phone doesn't ring again

Yes I agree with redirecting the puppy to a toy but I think this should happen only after bite inhibition has been achieved. Wheaten mad explained half of the method and you explained the other half .

The method of teaching BI was I think originally conceived by Ian Dunbar who I think taught Jean Donaldson and it is JDs method I use

To quote Jean Donaldson in 'The Culture Clash'

''Suppressing puppy biting to early means the puppy doesn't get repeated doses of feedback on jaw strength and the puppy grows up with a hard mouth .This is a serious squandering of a critical line against dog bites.

Smart puppy owners allow some puppy biting in order to give the puppy information on its own strength, Start off by targeting hard bites , let the puppy chomp away on your hand and monitor the level of pressure ,although puppy teeth are sharp puppy jaws are underdeveloped so this will not be unbearable . As soon as the puppy bears down a little harder screech ouch as though it hurt more than it did, glare at the puppy and leave the room for a moment. The time out has clear refusal to play consequences with the ouch as a conditioned punisher. Many puppies also have an innate understanding of the screech making the system work even better. After a minute or two resume play but be prepared to repeat this procedure over and over until puppy learns if he bites hard he plays by himself.''

JB goes on to say when the puppy has learnt a degree of bite control start targeting the lower pressure bites to get 'soft bite' practice. When the puppy has learnt to mouth with very little pressure at all then is the time to say don't touch and redirect to a toy.

You can go on reinforcing that gentle pressure only is allowed when hand feeding treats, (I curl my fingers around treats and let a puppy lick and take it gently), if the teeth touch your hand when taking the treat say ouch and withhold the treat.
It is also a good idea for all members of the family to teach BI but chidren must be supervised.

It is of course easier to teach BI to a young puppy (who expore everything with its mouth ) and harder to teach it once a puppy is over the age of four months when it has shed its puppy teeth and gained some jaw strength.

Elizabeth I appreciate you may have been taught a different method but I wanted to explain the method I use because I think teaching BI is so important and this method always works beautifully for me .

When one of my dogs became old she developed CCD (like senility in humans) and was not quite herself I had to carry out an uncomfortable procedure on her mouth every day and although she attempted to bite me the BI training was not forgotten and she never sunk her teeth into my hand.