Author Topic: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...  (Read 3977 times)

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Offline Digger

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According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« on: January 07, 2018, 06:37:53 PM »
Hi all. I have a working Cocker who gets very bitey. I have done lots of reading on the subject and have followed the recommended advice from day 1. According to Dr Dunbar it is totally unacceptable for a 6 month old to mouth at a child's hand. Our puppy will happily go to bite our 1 year old granddaughter and still nips at visitors and clothes. She was 6 months yesterday and shows no sign of stopping. In some respects she seems even worse as she will 'argue' by biting. I am now getting worried as everyone says that this phase should be over by 5/6 months. I'm starting to think maybe we are missing something stupid! Any ideas would be gratefully received..

Offline PollySpaull

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #1 on: January 07, 2018, 07:14:23 PM »
How are you managing the mouthing and play biting?
Unfortunately puppies haven’t read the rule books and each one is different! To say it’s “totally unacceptable for a puppy to mouth a child’s hand” is, to me, a little ridiculous. A puppy explores using its teeth, and at 6 months, they are still exploring!
There aren’t really any set guidelines or timeframes to work within, it just depends on how much work you put in to the pup and on the pup itself.

Offline Digger

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #2 on: January 07, 2018, 07:45:01 PM »
Hi - Thank you for your reply and I agree with you entirely, it is just that all biting issues seem to be referred to the Dr Dunbar article which states the 'inappropriate at 6 months' thing! There is no advice in that article for what to do if your pup hasn't read it (ours definitely hasn't!). We have been dealing with it in the recommended way so far-ie starting with the bite inhibition process and then moving on to the no bite at all process but the yelping never worked- just made her more excited so now we are saying no and if she doesn't stop, time out. It just doesn't seem to stop her doing it again and if we (have to) physically move her off e.g. the baby she swings her head round and bites us ( not hard I must add- she doesn't do any damage) but sometimes in the evening shell just start lunging and snapping at you out of the blue and if you tell her off, then she'll do it harder. She just seems like a really cocky, rude teenager.....but we didn't have this with our Springer so it's a bit depressing as there is always that lurking fear in the back of your mind that you have a snappy dog. Did yours grow out of it? And if so, at what age? I suppose I need to know how old is too old for this behaviour and time to get help? Dr Dunbar says 6 months but I'm hoping it's ok if it's a bit longer!! :005:

Offline Leo0106

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #3 on: January 07, 2018, 07:58:35 PM »
Hi,
I won't give a huge amount of advice here as I am still only just coming out of my own biting battle... but what I will say is that I was utterly horrified when my pup turned 6 months and didn't just learn not to bite anymore..  all these things went through my mind.. 'He's going to be put down by authorities' 'He's an aggressive dog!' 'He's going to bite forever!'

My pup is now 13 months ... I have put my life and soul into training Leo out of his biting, and from an early stage i realised I had to tackle underlying issues before I could tackle the biting... for example, his aversion to certain touch..

I had to look at biting as the behaviour, and dig deeper to look at the cause for this behaviour (the emotion).
As soon as I did that, I made progress.. My partner has been out of the country for 3 months now with the military, and in those 3 months, I have made more progress with him than I have in the whole time of having him.

Your pup is still super young, from my experience I would say don't panic but it may be worth getting a behaviourist in... however one thing to try and do is write down all triggers to the biting.. what makes her bite??

The word 'No', reaching round to take off his harness, and telling him to stop chewing the sofa all makes my pup bite or nip.. so now I tackle these incidences in a different way..

I was so worried that Leo would never learn his all important 'bite inhibition'  but trust me, they will get it... Leo is... if he gets me he hurts but he never puts pressure behind his bite.. his teeth are just sharp puppy teeth.  And trust me I have had a huge amount of bruises and cuts before getting to his point.


Your lovely little pup sounds exactly the way I would describe my pup, if you want an idea on what I have done to sort this issue, please feel free to message me or have a look at my previous posts. 'I need reassurance again..'  has the most infornation on what is working for us.

I hope this forum helps you as much as it helps me :)

Offline Digger

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #4 on: January 07, 2018, 08:54:58 PM »
Hi Leo and thank you so  much for your  kind  reply and brilliant advice. I will absolutely take more notice of possible triggers!! We have already noticed..that she seems worse in the tv room - wonder if she doesn't like the tv?! It probably is wierd for a dog when you think about it. I think these dogs are so much more complex than our bombproof springer was.  It just does make you paranoid when you read things like that article that put a time limit on what is acceptable! And it makes me feel better to hear that those that were 'outside the guidelines' are still ok in the end! I think our little pooch is extra tricky to read because she is silent (I'm not complaining about that!)  And reading some other stories on here I feel lucky - she's really good in lots of ways- you can touch her anywhere, put leads on and off, bath and dry her, pick her up, leave her on her own etc and I am very grateful that she doesn't have some of the very difficult other issues that people are coping with. I reckon cocker owners  have the patience of saints and must be truly lovely people to work so hard with these little dogs-as you have- a breed of their own haha! Thank you so much. I'm off to get a notebook out for Inca.

Offline Leo0106

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #5 on: January 07, 2018, 09:25:12 PM »
Hi digger, No problem at all, I know all too well how difficult things can be bringing up a young cocker..
Leo, too, is amazing in so many ways, but the biting is one thing we always had an issue with.. and still do to a certain extent but it's far more manageable now.

Funnily enough Leo has always been the worst in our t.v. room, he seems to think it is a playroom and struggles to settle.. after many months of teaching him to settle he is a lot better but we are still in the stage now where sometimes he will need to be placed on his lead to tell him it's time to sleep or chill.
He seems to like watching the t.v. haha but he defeinately looks at me when I sit on the sofa and thinks 'she's chilling out, now is my time to create merry hell! '

I felt so paranoid a few months ago. I guess it's like having a human child, you feel the same if tour child dosnt walk, talk, eat solids etc at the 'recommended guidlines' but all pups and humans are differenet, it's finding out what works best for your pup.

I have had our trainer visit and support me with this, mainly because, as a military partner, I am dealing with it alone but she has helped massively In looking into his triggers with me and dealing with them.. to the extent that I don't actually really deal with the biting now, it's the trigger that I preempt and deal with. It's generally my failure if he gets to the point that he has nipped as I havnt picked up on his cues first off..

Another thing to remember is that working cockers are named 'working' for a reason, generally they come from a background of working dogs who are taught to hunt and use their mouth for a job, this is inherent and I finally found that by allowing Leo to use his mouth during certain games and activities, he felt less tempered to use his teeth on me!

Some dogs need a job. We do scentwork, for Leo this works wonders

Offline wendall

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #6 on: January 07, 2018, 11:12:55 PM »
There’s a really good Facebook group, called Dog training advice and support. They are really friendly and only offer positive training advice. You do have to join the group first. There are files on there about puppy biting but if you can’t find it, they will help you. Good luck with your pup x
Rosie,rest in peace my beautiful little girl, you will be in my heart forever. 2/2/12-24/10/12

Offline Digger

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #7 on: January 08, 2018, 09:01:27 AM »
Thank you for that wendall I am so techno phobic I don't have face book. This forum is my first 'post' of my life haha!  But I might have a snoop at that through my daughter! What a nice bunch of.helpful people on here. :D

Offline Digger

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #8 on: January 08, 2018, 09:23:39 AM »
Thanks again Leo, and you are right about the working. Our Springer was from working stock and I like to think he satisfied his natural urges and was kept busy with what we did with him during his long happy life. We had him for 15 years and I only ever left him with someone else for 3 nights.  I think Spaniels are particularly family orientated and if they are with you that is the main thing for them. I intend to do agility with Inca but she's not old enough yet, so for now, she has good rummages around in the fields and woodlands at the back of our house with intermittent recalls and directions with lots of interaction with other dogs too. She's pretty good and does as she's told (..sometimes with a slight delay..) but I haven't lost her yet-I think she knows which side her toast is marmited! Sadly I can see how so many of these dogs end up in rescue centres. Imagine if you'd never had a dog of any kind and thought that looks cute- I'll get one of those......I think this breed can be a challenge for anyone. It's heart warming  to hear of your incredible dedication to your furry friend. You obviously have so much love for him- he is a very lucky boy and I'm sure will repay you many times over!

Offline bizzylizzy

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #9 on: January 08, 2018, 09:59:01 AM »
Hi! You‘ve had lots of great advice so far, so I don‘t have anything else to add except that WHATEVER your problems, stick with us here, you won‘t get better advice anywhere!  ;) You‘ll probably notice that cockers rarely feature in doggy books or videos  :005:, I imagine there‘s a good reason for that!  :lol2: Humphrey is my first cocker and I agree, they are a breed unto themselves but I‘m finding that meeting the challenges has formed a much stronger bond than I‘ve ever had with any of my previous dogs and I‘m being rewarded thousandfold, I wouldn‘t swap him for the world! Plus the fact, if I hadn‘t had him, I wouldn‘t have made all these lovely online friends! Mine is a show model and I understand that workers are a little different but I think, at the end if the day, a good number of the little „problems“ can be aleviated by keeping them mentally as well as physically active,(  which can cause them to get over excited and tired and make the problems worse)
Best of luck, keep us posted!

Offline Pearly

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #10 on: January 08, 2018, 01:39:37 PM »
Hello and welcome to COL

We have four cockers, 3 workers and a confused show type.  3 were bitey as pups and the only reason the fourth wasn’t is because she came to us age 6 years old......they are known as cockerdiles for a reason!

As you have already discovered, Cockers are very different to springers - tho to be fair, all dogs are different and a great deal depends on the breeding of the dog and just how much “drive” they have.

My thoughts are a) ditch the book, you now have COL and a wealth of experience of all types of cocker spaniels from their owners (real life stories v generalist book content, which it has to be) and b) invest in wine and chocolate both help enormously with the coping strategy for the cocker pup owner.

One subject I note you haven’t covered is how much sleep your pup gets?  Cocker pups need around 18 hours rest/sleep a day which really took me by surprise with my first dog.  She is the reason that I’m on COL and yes, it was (like so many other members) how to cope with the biting phase that brought me here!   I forget who said about routine and sleep for pups but I owe them my sanity  :lol:

Is your pup in a set routine of sleep, eat, going outside, wake for 30 mins or so and maybe a short walk (recommended 5 minutes walk for every month of age up to 3 times a day) then back to their bed/crate for a sleep?  Pearl (#1 dog) would become fractious as the day wore on and although slept during the day all week, while I was at work, by Sunday night she was a whirling dervish of teeth....my own fault for not being savvy enough that her sleep pattern was disrupted  :shades:

The other consideration is that at 6 months your pup will be teething.  This will make the play biting, nippiness worse as frankly your pup has sore gums and like babies, will want to relieve the gums - frozen carrot sticks work a treat.  Teething can also cause a very upset tum so expect this if it is teething.

Hopefully this has started to cheer you up a bit but be aware......the teenage phase is yet to start.  8-10 months old your lovely pup who has a good recall (?) will very likely suddenly develop selective deafness  :lol: there is a good reason for this, their hearing develops last and only really forms age 10 months on and if you have a headstrong, hard hunting dog (#2 dog) I would suggest you may want to programme those brakes now!

Good luck with your pup,

Jayne
X

Offline Digger

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #11 on: January 08, 2018, 02:03:43 PM »
Ah thanks bizzylizzy, Yeah now you mention it, the cocker spaniel does seem rather conspicuous by its abscence :lol2: I wonder why! ...How funny. Yeah, those books are just sent to scare us aren't they? I think I will ask any (probably lots)  of future questions on here. I think it is the cocker owners who are a breed unto themselves too- The stories I have read so far prove enormous resilience and determination of character!!! So glad I found this site and all you helpful people.  :D

Offline Pearly

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #12 on: January 08, 2018, 02:29:32 PM »
Ah thanks bizzylizzy, Yeah now you mention it, the cocker spaniel does seem rather conspicuous by its abscence :lol2: I wonder why! ...How funny. Yeah, those books are just sent to scare us aren't they? I think I will ask any (probably lots)  of future questions on here. I think it is the cocker owners who are a breed unto themselves too- The stories I have read so far prove enormous resilience and determination of character!!! So glad I found this site and all you helpful people.  :D

It’s a mine of useful information and often a lot of fun too! One thing to consider is that Gundogs are being increasing bred to be sensitive but harder hunting driven dogs compared to even 5 years ago (which isn’t always a great combination) training techniques that worked then may not be the best for pups now - worth going to a trainer for a couple of sessions to help get a better appreciation of the nature of your dog.  I thought Coral was a submissive dog........er no, that would be a dog who learned very quickly how to fool its owner  :lol: and I’m still learning almost 3 years on!

Jayne

Offline Leo0106

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #13 on: January 08, 2018, 05:53:12 PM »
. Imagine if you'd never had a dog of any kind and thought that looks cute- I'll get one of those......I think this breed can be a challenge for anyone. It's heart warming  to hear of your incredible dedication to your furry friend. You obviously have so much love for him- he is a very lucky boy and I'm sure will repay you many times over!

Digger, this quote from you literally had me crying with laughter.. ... this we EXACTLY my thought process. Leo is my first baby... I've looked after my uncle's working cocker for years. He is a working game dog and me and my partner used to say 'kippers so cute and he's so well behaved! We can do that'........ WELL  wernt we in for a shock  :005:  I wouldn't be without him now though. He has tested me to my last strand of patience but with all the bad times, for the past 10 months he's made me laugh every single day, I can't stay mad at him for anything... it's so worth the effort. And I echo what everyone says on here, this forum is a true godsend.. I would never have given Leo up (I'm too stubborn to be defeated) but I would have certainly felt far more lonely going through what we have gone through if it wasn't for the lovely people on here.

Stick with us !

Offline Leo0106

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Re: According to Dr Ian Dunbar...
« Reply #14 on: January 08, 2018, 05:56:31 PM »
Oh and with what pearly said, fully agree....
There I was thinking 'well if a dog is tired he will just go to sleep '... again how wrong was i... as soon as I told myself that I actually need to enforce naps in Leo things instantly got better.. he still dosnt sleep enough and still needs to be encouraged to sleep, but he is so much nicer to be around when he has had a decent sleep!