We have a five month old chocolate lab. The kids were gifted the puppy at Christmas. Its been 2 years since our last puppy of 15 years old died. We live in northern Michigan and its really cold out. We are really struggling to train our dog. She will listen once in a while, but for the most part is set on just being plum crazy. She is so hyper and rarely sits down to rest. I know she needs more exercise and its been difficult with all the ice and snow. I am hopeful for spring and getting outside more. Here are our problems: 1) She is very mouthy. She bites my 10 year old son all the time. She does not stop and we have to drag her off of him. How do we change this? 2) She eats anything she gets her mouth and we find in nearly impossible to get it from her? 3) She will not walk without pulling on leash?
Regarding being mouthy, we had it initially but were quite strict on stopping all play as soon as it happens, and introducing a toy to play and pull etc. Jax still starts biting when excited, but we now firmly say "get a toy" and point to the toys, and normally on 2nd or 3rd mention, he goes and gets one and then we crack on with playing. Jax is the same with eating stuff, but in my experience, this is a lab trait. We are still like you, have to take it out his mouth when its something that shouldn't be there. Jax pulls a bit on the lead, but he is still be trained and 'heal' is part of that training, both on and off the lead. I use a slip lead which is fairly short anyway, and make it even shorter so he has no option but to be next to me at heal when he starts to pull. He now only pulls when we are near the park on way out, excited to get off lead, and near the house on way back in, as he is going to get fed. So we are not quite there yet. If you haven't already, I would take the dog to training sessions, or at least do what i did, take him for an hour session to your local gun dog club, and they will help you with the puppy basics so you can go away and start to implement. Good luck, and persist with whatever advice you get from an expert, its hard work initially, but eventually it clicks and the whole lab experience gets better and better !!
Stephanie, I have a just about 5 month old black lab. We are not too far removed from your experience. I second the strictly stop playing when they mouth. It is tedious and tough, but every time my pup puts her mouth on me I turn around and look away (for only 5-10 seconds), giving her zero attention. One time I had to it 12 times in a row before she stopped mouthing me in that interaction. Repetition is important and it take times. I find playing fetch in the house is great exercise, and we bought a ball that we put her food in that she has to work to get the food out. We don't use it often but it is great for getting some puppy energy out. Make them work for the food. My pup will be on her second set of obedience training classes starting tomorrow, and most of the time she still pulls. We did make it all the way around the block by having cheese in my hands and giving her little bits every couple of houses with minimal pulling, but with no cheese she loves to pull. My pup mouths very lightly now, but it took a lot of work to get her there. She is like your pup, and full of energy. We actually started increasing the number of forced naps, and that helped. This forum is great for support and advice. Keep working and have faith things will improve!
