Puppy biting

Hi,

My very cute puppy has now started to biting me and my husband alot more. I have tried some sugestions which includes if she is on my lap when she bites I put her down and ignore her or if we are playing and she bites to stop play and ignore.

However when I put her down she just goes to my husband or gets her toy and plays.

Am not really sure how to get ehr to understand she is not aloud to bite.

Does anyone have any good ideas??

Thanks,

You may want to try leaving the room when she displays this behaviour. My pup did this a great deal and it helped for us. Also she was worse with OH than with me and we came to realise that this was because she considered him to be a playmate. Once we kept up with leaving the room when she was mouthing aggressively she seemed to learn that it wasn't acceptable.

Hi jessicanutt,

It sounds like you are doing the right thing by ignoring her. I also agree with Fourlegz that leaving the room or at least putting some distance between her and you is good too. Try adding in a yelp. In the wild puppy's learn bite inhabitation by other pack members yelping then turning away to let her know that it is unacceptable.

You are on your way with this. If she is going to get her toys and playing, she has stopped biting which is what you want her to do.

How old is she?

She is now 18 weeks old - Thank you for the advice I will try going out of the room

Teeth start falling out at 16 weeks (give or take a few days either side) so she won't be too long before the need lessens and you should find that the measures you are taking take hold

Does everyone do the same thing when she starts play biting ?

She needs to learn that mouthing skin is totally unrewarding, which means saying nothing when she starts, nothing at all & immediately getting up & leaving the room for at least a minute of being out of sight.

I personally do nothing if one of my puppies mouths me, no reaction at all, yes it hurts, I do have teeth marks on my hands, but puppies learn very quickly that mouthing me is totally unrewarding & they stop after a couple of days being with me. I have had 5 rescue puppies over the last year & as they have all come from living with other puppies of the same age, they have come with less bite inhibition than puppies that have lived with their mother & been "taught" bite inhibition by her. I do however live on my own so don't have anyone else to consider.

Thanks for all your hope. She is slowly getting better. One of her teeth came out last week since then she only seems to bite when she is super excited which is as bad

I allowed Maya to mouth me when she was small because I wanted her to be able to learn how to do it without hurting. If she hurt me I said "OW!" very loudly and put her down, refused to play with her any more. Now she is one and we play with her 'biting' me......she mouths me and makes all sorts of noises but never ever hurts me. The idea of this is that if a child (or annoying adult!) ever gets near and puts their hand near her mouth, she will not bite, just mouth.
My dog was taken from her mother quite young, 6 weeks (because of the conditions she was living in, not my choice) and the vet said that the period 6-10 weeks is a crucial training point from the mother to the pup in terms of appropriate biting.

Hi Jessicanutt,

I had the same difficulty as Hippy with my first puppy ever, who I adopted at six weeks old, well after he'd already been taken from his mother (I knew this was a bad idea; newspaper ad mixup and too adorable puppy, yada yada, you get it). He had no bite inhibition whatsoever, and the only thing he wanted to do was chew on me. My hands were like hamburger! I tried many things: yelping, dumping him and ignoring him, leaving the room-- nothing really got through to him, so I tried this: I taught him that the game Is Not Fun. When he would go to gnaw my hand, I'd just close my hand around his lower jaw-- not hard, just enough to stop him chewing freely, and enough so he couldn't get away-- and ignore him. No more than about half a minute. This hurt like the dickens, as you can imagine, with those needle puppy teeth piercing my multiply-pierced hand, but it did work. I do understand the 'No Mouthing At All' perspective, but I mixed this with putting something nice like soft cheese on my hand to let him lick it off, so he'd understand that I don't mind his mouth, only the teeth. It seems to have worked well for me! I hope you find a way that causes you less pain!