Cassie is nearly 21 months now and more and more becoming the best of companions as she matures. As a small puppy she was a committed crocopup, something I'd never had to deal with before, and then at 13/14 months I had a devil dog experience of nipping and jumping up, which may or not been due to hormones (phantom pregnancy) and/or diet (E numbers). Gradually the puppy biting reduced to mouthing arms etc, but even that seems to have stopped now (although never say never!), she rarely does it to me or family and friends she sees regularly, and the outdoor devilment has not happened on our daily walks for several months. I did eventually change her food to one without EU permitted additives. But, she still sometimes jumps and grabs my arms in other situations, when I collected her from boarding kennels after a few days, when I returned to her after leaving her outside a shop with (to her) a stranger, I left her for barely 2 minutes. And last week at gundog training, after not having been for a few weeks due to Christmas and bad weather, in a howling gale. I can't quite remember but I think it was after a sit/ wait exercise. That time she bruised my arm which hasn't happened for months. I just wonder what triggers her to do it, what she's trying to say. The thread posted last week by @Jojo83 about fear reactions got me thinking, because my first thought was that, so far, Cassie has shown no fear of anything (except a dislike of one vet). I would say she's very confident with people and other dogs, too much sometimes. She's pretty bold and fearless in different terrain, banks, fallen trees, undergrowth ,bogs and so on, although she doesn't swim I don't think it's due to fear. She doesn't suffer from seperation anxiety, nor do loud noises terrify her although she does respond to birdscarers or fireworks she hears at a distance. BUT, is this jumping up and grabbing me some sort of fear reaction?
I would think more of an anxiety than actual fear ? She seems to be a well balanced dog , but the fact that it happened when you had left her , albeit briefly , makes me think that she is a little anxious ? The gundog class scenario could also be anxiety as she hadn't been for a while and so was maybe a little unsure ? I would try to ignore, give her loads of reassurance ( which I`m sure you do ) and hope that as she matures , these episodes will fade away , sorry I cant be more helpful xx
It sounds very similar to Willow's coping mechanism. When she's over-excited, frustrated or after being suddenly startled, she will leap towards my face. This is very different to "jumping up", which she also used to do; it was sudden and explosive, not repetitive. She hasn't done it in a long time now but did a lot when she was younger. Situations would include when I first started training the two dogs together and she had to wait her turn - frustration. She would do it as a youngster when meeting new people, or seeing people that she had met before and knew she liked - basically when she was too excited to manage her emotions. I see it as a release of nervous energy; whether that is from good stress or bad stress. If she can't contain herself, she will leap. For us, maturity played a big part, but teaching her how to manage frustration made a difference in the training scenarios. I'm now going through a similar process with Luna, who doesn't cope well with frustration - although she doesn't leap at me, so it's a little less terrifying
I’d call it a coping mechanism rather than fear. They tend to go to puppyish solutions in new situations I find. ,
The times we've met Cassie she struck me as a normal boisterous young Labrador. Having seen her with other dogs I wouldn't call her fearful or under confident. I don't think its that unusual for a dog to look for a bit of reassurance when they're unsure about something. Our last lab, Cocoa, found it unnerving to meet people who weren't walking dogs and would trot back to us for reassurance. On a few occasions she barked at them before coming back to us. As for grabbing your arm, Holly sometimes does that. Its her stage two signal for wanting to go out to the toilet; stage one is standing in front of us and making a nipping move towards our hands. When she gets excited (the pre-zoomie state) she sometimes pretends to lunge at our hands until we throw the ball. I think its just her way of getting attention.
Hi @selina27 interesting question and one that can only be answered by seeing the behaviour and looking at the rest of the body language and the context Having said that there can be a an element of pure happiness together with a little anxiety on the collection from kennels. The only time my girl has been in kennels she literally dragged the kennel girl 100m to get to me and I had to kneel on the ground to greet as the alternative was to bowled over. The reaction being left outside a shop again could be a little anxiety - you walked away, disappeared and left her with some one else. Have you practiced something like this before? If not, Cassie wouldn't have any history to fall back upon that you were coming back to her so some anxiety would be natural. The gundog training again could be over excitement to be there after a break , with the other dogs and have a great time. She's also still young so we need to remember that there are occasions when they forget their 'manners' and do something we've been training an alternative behaviour for so I wouldn't worry too much about the few incidences, just keep on with the training methods you've been using before. Just as an aside again, my girl sometimes startles when the bird scarer fires off, usually when it has not been in evidence for a while, but then again this morning we heard it for first time in months and no response. I just put it down to much the same response as our own when we hear a loud, sudden noise and jump/startle a sort of 'what's that' and then carry on.
I still get these problems with Ripple even at over two and a half. I think it's mostly over excitement or frustration - snowy or icy ground, waiting for his turn at agility, also when OH has been walking him for several days and he's had no or little off-lead time. Mostly when he has a hoolie I can step out of the way but at these times he is unavoidable, and I get the jumping up, growling noise and biting. I think I posted last week about him bruising me through four layers of clothes. I've not had this with my labs before and it's horrible when it happens, I would dearly love to stop it from happening.
