Author Topic: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!  (Read 2118 times)

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Offline ReggiesMum

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Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« on: September 30, 2018, 05:33:37 PM »
Hi, my blue roan show cocker Reggie is 11 months a few weeks away from
His first birthday. We had him castrated around 3 weeks ago and everything went fine. Around 2 weeks ago my OH left for 5 weeks abroad for work and Reggie has turned into a devil dog.

My OH is definitely the alpha, unfortunately I have tried to overcome this but I know there can only be 1 alpha so Reggie sees me as his level or possibly below.

Whenever I sit down on the sofa or at the kitchen table he will come over and bite me or nip me and do a high pitched bark until I either give him attention or play with him. The bites literally get harder and harder if I ignore him. If I try and play with his toy he sometimes ignores the toy and just wants to continue biting. He was prone to this before my OH went away but since he has gone away it?s all day everyday no joke! He will also play for so long and then just bite me instead.

I have tried a firm no and a time out of around 2 mins his cage but I think he feeds of me saying no and seeing me getting frustrated and he thinks it?s a game and gets zoomies and biting even more. I have just started trying the the ignoring and back turning technique.

Has anyone experienced this? Is it because my OH has gone away and he knows? I play him with him as much as I can but when he starts biting it?s hard to continue.

I walk him for around 30/45 mins twice a day. Even when he is tired he will fight it and try to bite me/play with me. He still has a few teeth looking like they are still coming through as well if this could be a possibility. He has proper chew toys from when he was teething I try to give them to him instead of my arm.

Any suggestions or reassurance will be greatly appreciated thank you :D

Offline Digger

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #1 on: September 30, 2018, 09:06:42 PM »
Hi there. I am no expert but my youngster was a prolonged mouther/ biter so I thought I'd offer some support as I know how you feel with a small furry shark in the house!

 Did you say he has always been bitey but Is now worse? I wonder if it may be worth considering some ideas:

 1)He was castrated and then only a week later dad leaves so he is probably feeling pretty weird. His hormones will be out of balance and also he's wondering where his buddy has gone, so any behaviours he already has may be exaggerated.
2) I believe if a dog has aggressive traits (not saying yours has) then castration is not necessarily a good idea.
3) I think there is a lot of new thinking on the whole alpha thing-many behaviourist now believe that dogs live more like families than heirarchys as previously thought.

My youngster is now nearly 15 months. She was a hellish biter and like you, I found it really difficult to train her as she would just go over the top and start jumping and nipping me. What I did (apart from drinking lots of wine) was just accept that she couldn't cope. 'Training' sessions were kept short and stopped as soon as she started being silly.
Every time she nipped I froze. I mean no movement. No eye contact, no talking, no touching. Nothing. If she carried on I would not move. If it got painful I would zip out of the room and shut the door behind me.
We did this for a very long time-not the old 'your puppy will soon get the idea'....that you read in all the dog training books!  We also didn't find that 'telling her off' really worked (although we did periodically get cross ph34r). Ours is a very bold tough dog. She doesn't scare easily, but she does love to be with us, so exclusion was the only thing that worked for us. We trained her to go and get something in her mouth for those moments where she found it really hard to control herself (first thing in the morning etc).
We gradually reduced what we would put up with and would calmly say 'no biting' and put her out of the room for a minute.-Eventually for any teeth on skin contact.

Ours had her first season at 12.5 months and I think she grew up a bit then, and the biting sessions gradually decreased over the next few weeks. We now have a dog where if she does have a rare moment of relapse we really notice it and we look at her in shock, at which point she remembers she's not doing that any more! :005:

So, sorry for long post but I feel for you! and want to say just keep your cool ;). Calmly take charge of the situation in a consistent way and I'm sure you will be out of the worst of it very soon.

Offline Leo0106

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #2 on: October 01, 2018, 08:19:24 PM »
Oh reggiesmum! You are me about 9 months ago. I feel your pain! (There are numerous posts on here from me exaplining the exact same thing you are explaining now!)
You are not alone. We tried everything and anything the minute i sat down and my attention was not on Leo I would be attacked. The high pitch bark the bite. Everything. I was covered in bruises. Everyone told me to ignore this behaviour but he just became more obsessed with biting me if I ignored him.
So, i will tell you how i finally got over this.
I ignored, but i ignored to the extreme.
When leo kicked off, i grabbed a stair gate that was detached from a bracket (so i carried it round every room in the house!!) Everytime leo attacked me I would put the stair gate in front of me, stand in a corner and make absolutley no eye contact. This caused Leo to have serious zoomies, bark and scream at me etc and eventually he would calm. I would use no speech, no eye contact after until he was calm and approahed me calmly and then i would praise him.

This took 3,4 maybe 5 weeks! Every day,the same routine.
It sounds so weird but the fact I could ignore him wihout coming to harm really worked.
Leo's issues was attention and overtiredness. There was no reasoning with him! But every one told me to ignore It and I found a way to make it work.

Fyi I also used headphones for the barking and really needed to control my urge to shout at the little sod!
I would recommend you give it a try if you think it might help. It takes a lot of persistence and you dont get chance to do any housework for a few weeks but...i now have the most loving dog in the world who wouldnt dream of biting me (aside from the odd play mouthing)

Offline Digger

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #3 on: October 02, 2018, 08:50:55 AM »
There it is again...Ignore!.Just to concur with Leo (Hi from Inca ;)xxx) I agree, and forgot to mention-we too were sometimes doing this multiple times. All flipping evening some days-my husband and I would find ourselves standing out in the quiet hallway with a glass of wine-the film we were watching playing to itself in the lounge. It is really annoying but it was the only thing that worked. Best of luck- I'm sure he'll come good in time.

Offline Pearly

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #4 on: October 02, 2018, 10:16:40 AM »
I?ve written about this once or twice on here now......

At 9 months old, Pearl had me in floods of tears, sat on the living room floor wondering if I would ever have a normal dog while she was literally flying past my head in full cockerdile mode. 

Having considered what had changed that may be making her like this I had a sudden realisation that during the week she slept, a lot, at weekends I was expecting her to be awake when I was and to sleep when she wanted.  Pearl would be awake from 5 am to 11pm....she was fractious and I was exhausted.

I used to have to enforce a routine of sleep.  At this sort of age, Cockers should be sleeping for around 18 hours a day.  I had to put her in her crate, cover it and leave her to it.  She always slept and often took seconds to settle and be out cold!  I also changed her diet to one with a little less protein.  Manufacturers will tell you they need lots to keep developing but providing they are getting the nutritional value the protein level can be cut back - this makes a huge difference with Coral but did also work with Pearl.

Last piece of my own learning - keep indoors as a calm zone and teach a settle command.  Let him be a pup and have zoomies outside but indoors he should always be calm and respectful (humans before dogs through doors etc).

Good luck with your boy and if all else fails, wine, chocolate and on bad days, gin, helps  :lol:

Offline Leo0106

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #5 on: October 03, 2018, 07:43:41 AM »
There it is again...Ignore!.Just to concur with Leo (Hi from Inca ;)xxx) I agree, and forgot to mention-we too were sometimes doing this multiple times. All flipping evening some days-my husband and I would find ourselves standing out in the quiet hallway with a glass of wine-the film we were watching playing to itself in the lounge. It is really annoying but it was the only thing that worked. Best of luck- I'm sure he'll come good in time.

Oh Leo's long lost cousin. (Probably) inca you never fail to astound me with how similar you were to Leo!
The numerous times I sat on the stairs with a glass of wine in my hand listening to the film I was watching through a wall  :lol2: :lol2:  I'll never forget those days

Offline Digger

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Re: Biting and Nipping, please help!!!
« Reply #6 on: October 03, 2018, 07:59:44 AM »
 :lol2: :lol2: :lol2: