To a puppy, everything is new, interesting, and exciting. This means that our puppy will try to bite, play with, and chew just about anything that he sees.
In addition, puppies have the infinite energy of youth. Like the Energizer Bunny, they can keep going, and going, and going. After a nap, their engines rev-up from SLEEP to GO, faster than you can catch your breath and shout “Stop!”.
Sound and movement are especially irresistible to a puppy.
The more we shout and move our hands, arms, or feet around, the more likely our puppy will get excited, bite, jump, and act even more crazy.
A very important part of training my puppy involves managing his excitement level, and teaching him self control. By doing this, I set my puppy up for success, and reduce out of control biting and jumping, before it occurs.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
~~[Benjamin Franklin]
1. Nothing in Life is Free (NILIF)
NILIF stands for Nothing in Life is Free. It is a great way to train a puppy, build a strong bond with him, and remain sane in the presence of our bouncing ball of fur.
NILIF is simple – we just ask our puppy to do something for us first, before we give him anything in return. This includes food, toys, freedom, and yes, even our affection.
First, I train my puppy to do some very simple commands. Here are three simple commands –
1. Look
Look simply asks a puppy to give us eye contact for a short amount of time.
- I train this command by showing my puppy that I have a piece of food.
- I say “Look”, and bring the food up to the level of my eyes.
- Puppy will naturally follow the movement of my food-enhanced hand, and look-up at me.
- As soon as he looks, I mark the behavior (Good!) and reward him with some food from my other hand.
- As my puppy improves, I get him to look at me for longer, before rewarding the behavior.
2. Touch
Touch asks a puppy to gently touch our hand with his nose.
- Again, I let my puppy see that I have some food in my hand.
- Then, I close my hand, move it a short distance away from my puppy, and say “Touch”.
- Puppy will naturally follow the food. At first, he may try to mouth or lick at my hand. I ignore these behaviors and wait until he touches my hand with his nose.
- As soon as that happens, I mark the behavior (Good!) and reward him with some food from my other hand.
3. Sit
Sit is a useful evergreen command. Even after our dog has matured into an adult, we will still find this command to be very handy.
- To train a Sit, I show my puppy that I have some food in my hand.
- I close my hand and move it over and above my puppy’s head. He will naturally want to follow my hand, which will cause him to turn his head up and move his rump down into a sitting position.
- Some dogs may move backwards instead of sitting. That is fine. I just repeat the motion until I get a Sit. However, it is important not to repeat the verbal command. I only say “Sit” once.
- As soon as my puppy sits, I mark the behavior (Good!), and give him a treat from my other hand.
Once my puppy understands these simple commands, I ask him to do something for me, before I do anything for him in return. For example,
- Ask for a Look, before giving a puppy affection or tummy rubs.
- Ask for a Sit, before we open the door for our puppy to go on his daily walk.
- Ask for a Touch, before we give a puppy his interactive food toy.
This teaches our puppy that the best way to get what he wants, is to do what we want first. When my puppy bites, I no-mark the behavior (Ack-Ack) and give him an alternate command (e.g., Sit). This not only teaches our puppy what not to do (bite), but also what to do instead (sit).
2. Drag Lead
Sometimes, puppies get so excited while playing, that they are no longer able to listen to us. In general, I try to step in and have a play break before this happens. However, we may sometimes miss our window of opportunity, and our puppy becomes so excited that he will not stop biting or jumping.
In such situations, I find that it is extremely useful to have a drag lead on my puppy. By using a lead, I can easily control and stop his bad behavior.
Often, when a puppy bites, our instinct is to try and stop him by using our hands and arms. We push back, shout, and move-around a lot. All this hand and arm movement will only get him even more excited, because he thinks we are playing with him. Furthermore, rapid movement may trigger a dog’s prey drive and get him to bite more, and bite harder.
To stop a puppy from biting, it is important to stay calm, don’t shout, and not move in a fast and erratic fashion. Instead, I calmly pick up the drag lead and move my puppy into a quiet area, where he can calm down.
I use a flat collar with the drag lead. Do not use an aversive collar such as a choke chain or a prong. Such collars are risky. Some choose to use them during supervised walks, but they should always be removed at the end of the walk. I also cut the loop of my drag lead, so that it does not catch on furniture or objects in the house, while my puppy is running around. I only use a drag lead when I am around to supervise.
3. Lots of Exercise & Play
Puppies are extremely energetic and curious. As such, they often need a lot of activity and play time.
If we do not provide interesting and supervised activities for them to do, they will figure out their own activities which will rarely appeal to our human sensibilities. Bored puppies will start chewing on books, curtains, furniture, and people.
To reduce puppy biting, make sure to provide him with a lot of physical and mental stimulation.
Interactive food toys are a big favorite with my dogs. Instead of presenting food to them on a silver dog bowl, I put some of their food into interactive food toys. In this way, they are motivated to work on the toy, and they get mental and physical exercise while figuring out the best and fastest way to get at the food.
Daily walks will also help to drain a puppy’s energy. Make sure that a puppy has had all of his shots before taking him to areas where there are other dogs, and where there is poop from other dogs.
Puppies also love playing with other puppies. Nothing burns quite as much energy as a fun puppy chase and wrestling session. I make sure that all my puppy’s play-mates are balanced, healthy, and have had their requisite number of shots.
Other fun puppy games include soccer, catch, fetch, tug, and flirt pole.
4. Rules and Routine
Puppyhood is the best time to teach a dog new tricks. Puppies learn quickly, and are usually eager to please.
I set up a fixed routine for my puppy as early as possible, and also start enforcing a consistent set of house rules. My puppy routine includes food time, play time, walk time, chew time, grooming time, training time, and most important of all – sleep time. Puppy sleep time is when I get some much needed time-off, away from Energizer puppy. *Hooah!*
In the beginning, it is best to institute more house rules and to address them consistently. In this way, our puppy does not develop any bad habits, which will be hard to break later on.
My dogs have the following house rules –
- No getting on furniture.
- No biting on people or people stuff.
- No pawing on people.
- No guarding of toys or food.
- No bullying of other dogs.
Congratulations on your new puppy! Puppy time is precious and passes very quickly, so enjoy yourself and take lots of pictures. 😀
I was so glad to find your website! It’s given me renewed enthusiasm and cleared my head a bit with training my dog
I have a 13 week old Rottweiler x Border Collie who is not only remarkably strong and unusually large but also one of the most intelligent dogs I have known. He is going to puppy school at the moment and is certainly giving the trainer a run for her money. He has quickly worked out right and wrong and ways to circumvent the rules.
Biting is our only issue. The power of a Rottie bite even of a puppy is quite something.
As it is just me and him and I know that he is teething / playing / working out his role in the “pack” I’ve come to recognize the different types of bites he has and that some techniques are better than others at dealing with them. It’s the aggressive biting where he growls and then leaps at me from nowhere and I have to pry his jaws apart which is the one that nothing seems to stop. For instance this morning he was having a great time running around the park and after 45minutes he latched onto my leg, started thrashing around and it took me 15 minutes to calm him down. Not before inflicting cuts and bruises on my leg. I have no idea what triggered it.
I’m told it gets better and that he’ll calm down as he gets older. I certainly hope so! Anyway thanks again for your site
What I have noticed with my Shiba Inu, Sephy, is that he would get especially mouthy when over-excited. What I try to do with him, is to manage his excitement level and always introduce structure into his routine; especially during play-time where he is most likely to get excited.
For example, during play, I would throw in many play breaks. I call him to me, we do some obedience commands so that refocuses on me and is able to calm down. I make sure to reward him very very well during breaks then he can go back to playing. I also institute and teach him clear rules during play. If he does not play nice, I end the game, so he is very motivated to follow play rules.
Parks are often very high stimulus, so I usually start training with Sephy at home first, then I *very slowly* increase the environmental challenge once he has learned the rules of a particular activity. I pick his environments carefully and don’t expose him to more than he can handle. In this way, he does not keep practicing bad behaviors, and play-time can be a positive learning experience.
Here is more of what I do during our play time.
We got a pug cross with American kelpi, we are struggling to the point where she has so many behavioural problems we might have to start putting her in the dangerous dog category. She jumps up and ifher teeth don’t get you she will make sure her claws get you on the way down, she always jumps up its like she has a coiled spring up her arse, she bites every chance she gets despite us spending over 200quid on loads of bones,toys, other distraction bits but her only goal seems to be to bite, we tried the techniques about jumping up and it just turned her into a harder biter, she has now started going for my groin, our clothes are not safe our hands,feet,cats, shoes are all targets.
She constantly eats stones and no matter how we tell her no she will guzzle them down. She knocks her water over so she isn’t drinking. We brought 6 different bowls but they all end up over the floor. Causing a slippery surface and then when your trying to clear it up she tries to bite you or trip you up, if she trips you up she is going for your face. She is 3 months old and we are already considering having her destroyed. I’ve had dogs before but never this bad
I would get help from a professional trainer.
http://www.apdt.co.uk/dog-owners/choosing-a-trainer
This is what I do to stop my dog from biting. However, dog training is very context dependent and each dog and each situation is different. A good trainer can visit with the dog, observe his body language, routine, environment and more, to identify the source of his problem behaviors.
Here is an article on why dogs eat rocks and what we can do. Rock eating can be very dangerous to a dog because it can obstruct his stomach or intestinal tract. I would put a lead on my dog and supervise him closely to prevent further rock eating, as well as get professional help as soon as possible.
Hello,
We have a 10-wk-old Shiba Inu female, and she is extremely mouthy since we brought her home two weeks ago. I would say that 98% of the time I cannot even pet her without her trying to bite me! I have read your articles and tried all the steps, but we are seeing no change in her aggressive behavior. Sometimes she gets into “running fits” where all she does is run around the house, stopping occassionally to bite our hands/feet, or chew furniture, so we catch and crate her until she calms down.
I’m just very worried because if we cannot control this bad behavior before she grows up…we are just concerned. We don’t want to give her up or get sued for dog bite. How long, or at what age, should we expect to see her calm down? Thank you!
Hello Abigail,
The running around behavior is very common for a Shiba, especially a young Shiba. This is often called the Shiba 500. Sephy also did a lot of that when he was young and he was also very mouthy. Sephy didn’t particularly like much affection, and he is very stubborn. He is better with affection now, and even seeks it out sometimes, but still less so than my Sibes. I had to do a lot of touch and grooming exercises with him to get him comfortable with being handled.
When training Sephy, I learned that dog behavior is very dependent on timing and context. Therefore, details on exactly what I do, when I do it, what Sephy is doing in response, and the surrounding context are all very important.
In terms of biting, this is what I do –
1. I no-mark the behavior, and redirect Sephy into doing something else (e.g. a structured game or doing alternate commands).
2. If he redirects, then I reward him by continuing our game.
3. If he does not redirect, and continues to bite at me then I withdraw my attention by standing up, folding my arms, and turning away from him.
4. If he is biting, running around crazily, and I want to stop him, then I step on his drag-lead. I step when he comes close and slows down, or when he changes direction and slows down. After I stop him, I get him to do some commands with me. I *do no* chase him. Sephy loves to play chasing games so if I chase him, I would only get him more excited, he would run more, and I would be *rewarding* his crazy behavior by playing chasing games with him.
Note – I only use a drag lead with a thick flat collar that is properly sized and *NEVER* with an aversive collar. I only use the drag lead when I am supervising Sephy. I make sure there is give on the lead and I step hard enough that he can’t escape, but not too hard that he is forced to make a hard-stop; which would not be good for his neck. This is also why I wait until he slows down. Details are very important in dog training.
5. If he escalates his behavior and jumps on me or bites me when I am holding his lead, then I calmly say “Timeout” and take him to a low stimulus timeout area. I *do not* use his crate for timeouts, because I want his crate to be a positive area that he associates with sleeping, eating, and safety. Here is more on what I do with timeouts.
Dog behavior is very dependent on context and on the temperament of the dog. In my articles, I describe my experiences with Sephy, Shania, and Lara. However, I *do not* do exactly the same things with each dog. Each dog is different, each dog has different priorities, and are motivated differently. I adapt my training to properly suit the temperament of each dog.
When Sephy was young, we visited with several professional trainers. A good trainer can observe Sephy, read his body language, and get to know his temperament. A good trainer can also help with timing, technique, and more, all of which are very important in retraining a behavior.
http://www.apdt.com/pet-owners/choosing-a-trainer/
Things got better with Sephy after I learned how to properly handle him, set up a fixed routine, established consistent rules, and properly motivated him to follow those rules.
Energy wise, Sephy calmed down some at around 1.5 years old. Then he calmed down more as he got older. He needed a lot more structured exercise and structured activities when he was young. However, even today, I have him on a fixed routine and consistent rules.
With Sephy –
1. Part of it is about his youthful energy and redirecting it into positive structured activities,
2. Part of it is about controlling my own internal energy, as well as learning when and how to properly handle Sephy,
3. Part of it is about teaching him house rules, and motivating him properly to follow those rules.
I have a 9 week Cocker spaniel, new to the family and now part of our pack. She is a hyper little thing and seems to have bonded with me specifically. She seems to have separation anxiety when I am not any where she can see. I cant even leave her in the kitchen with her food with baby gate up or she will whine, nor leave the living room as she does the same, I have tried distraction, and get her to play with my older dog and always wait till shes ignoring me when I leave the room but she just cries till I return. If my partner is in, she sometimes doesnt bother if Im not in the room with her but others times she goes crazy. Ive tried not returning till she is quiet and doing it alot but I dont see the difference. I think I might be comparing her personality to my older dog (rottweiler/gsd) as he didnt bother when I left him etc, just worry that its going to be a bigger problem when shes older. Any advice would be great thanks.
What helped with my Shiba Inu in terms of separation anxiety are desensitization exercises-
http://shibashake.com/dog/separation-anxiety-dog-why-how-reduce-dog-stress#desensitize
I also did a lot of socialization exercises with him, which helped him to build confidence and made him more comfortable with new experiences. He really enjoyed his Sirius puppy class and getting to socialize with other dogs and other people. I made sure to pick a good class, where the instructor checked for puppy vaccination records for all the dogs.
http://shibashake.com/dog/dog-socialization-what-why-how
Here is some more general information on dog anxiety.
Hope this helps. Good luck!
I have a 3month old husky, he wines so much while in his kennel. I knew from the start that huskies would be vocal but geez, I need sleep also. What can I do????? I tried frozen Kong toys, regular toys everthing right now I need some new ideas before I start to cry myself.
Yeah, puppies may whine/cry, especially in the beginning, because of anxiety and stress. From the puppy’s perspective, he has just been separated from his mother and siblings, is now in a totally new environment, and with people that he is not very familiar with.
To help my puppy through this transition, I find that it helps to have him in the bedroom with me at night. I put him in his crate and place the crate in a place where he can see me and is fairly close to me. This helps to reduce anxiety and can also help with bonding. Puppies don’t have very big bladders, so I usually have to wake up a couple of times at night to take my puppy outside to do his business.
Now that my Huskies are older, they prefer being downstairs or outside in the enclosed yard, where it is cooler. I let them decide where they want to sleep.
Here is a bit more on dog anxiety and separation anxiety.
This article describes the first 10 days with my Husky puppy Lara.
Hello,
I have a 9 week old Siberian Husky and everytime he sees me he bites me. I have many scrateches and bite marks on my legs and arms. What can do? Please Help!
Help. My siberian digs. Plants outside, lights what can I do?
Here are some of my experiences with leash training and pulling-
http://shibashake.com/dog/leash-training-your-dog
http://shibashake.com/dog/stop-dog-pulling
I have 2 ten week old husky pups and i am trying to train them on a leash but they pull back away from me when i try to get them to walk beside me but they wont what can i do to get them to walk beside me
Hello… I have a beagle puppie and i have this sitiation that when my kids want to play with him he start biting and he bite hart but he think he is playing with them but after playing my girl start crying because he bite a lit and hart. And he is only 7 weeks. Please help me i really need help i dont want to give him in adopcion but if he does not change this behaivor.. Please helpppppppp