Frantic owners - our 9 month old Lab is still biting our hands, elbows etc when he gets excited or doesn't get his own way. We isolate him for a short time to calm him, tell him no and all the other recommended things - water sprays, pet corrector just seem to make him worse. He is being neutered shortly - don't know if it will help but really concerned he is not going to grow out of it. Lovely, lovely dog in all other ways and very obedient in everything except this. Anybody out there experiencing same problem please?
Hi @Morwena Welcome to the site. Don't expect neutering to fix the problem. It won't. I don't know what is a 'pet corrector'. I suspect it's an e-collar. Manifestly water sprays have not worked with your dog. I suspect they are making the situation worse. Please stop using these tools. I think you need to get a positive reinforcement dog behaviourist to come to your house, and evaluate your dog, and your interactions with the dog. And recommend and show you how to implement some strategies to deal with the issue. It will not be an overnight fix because the dog has a long history of such behaviour. But improvement is possible with patience and consistency. Please give us your location and we may be able to recommend a training organisation
It sounds like he just needs to learn how to interact with you through toys instead of biting your hands directly. Do you have tuggies available? Have you taught him to play tug in a controlled way? I don't know who has 'recommended' these 'recommended things', but it's not something this forum supports or endorses and - you are right - it will only make his behaviour worse. He is already frustrated and confused enough to be mouthing in the first place like this, adding punishment in, is only going to further his confusion and frustration - without teaching him what you DO want him to do, instead. Neutering will not help with this behaviour at all, and is not advisable for the majority of dogs because it increases the risk of various cancers, joint problems, auto-immune diseases, behavioural issues and so on. If you search in the search bar, you will find many posts discussing the drawbacks of neutering with more links to read. Really, you need to have a small tub of treats in your pocket and you need to be able to ask for and get a Sit, any time this behaviour starts and you want it to stop. Reinforce the sit with a treat. But you also need to look beyond that at the reasons why the dog is behaving in this way, otherwise you're just papering over the cracks. Often it is a sign of chronic lack of stimulation and over-excitement when the dog finally gets a person available to interact with. Dogs which are crated or left home alone for long hours, often exhibit this behaviour when they finally have someone there. Dogs who don't get off-leash exercise daily or don't have enough psychological interaction (training!) - ditto. Ensure you are meeting your dog's needs if you want to prevent behaviour problems occurring.
Hi both and thank you for responding. To answer some of the comments we are a retired couple who are at home a lot so H is not left for long periods and when we do go out without him he has no separation issues at all and when we return he greets us very calmly. He is not our first Lab. and after losing our beloved Alfie at 12 years we continued to be members of a local, very well established obedience club and as soon as H was old enough we started going to training with him where he is doing really well. They obviously work on the basis of positive reinforcement. We are hoping he will follow in Alfie's paw steps and pass his Good Citizen Award up to and including gold level and also become a Pets as Therapy dog. He is exercised regularly, interacts well with other dogs and people and we continually play with him. From day one if he mouthed us we replaced our hands with a toy. We have, however, taken on board what has been said about asking for a sit at any time and perhaps we are not doing this enough although he sits at kerbs etc. without even being asked. In respect of the water spray and Pet Corrector (not a collar but a tin of air which makes a loud noise) the purpose of both these things is just to interrupt the behaviour and not frighten him in any way. Thanks again and we will keep you posted.
Morwena, that might be YOUR intention with using it, but if devices like these work, it is not how he is experiencing it. When people try to justify the use of any punisher, they will often say variations on this theme - 'it doesn't really scare him or hurt him, it just surprises him/stops him etc'. The fact is - science tells us that this is impossible. IF something is strong enough to stop a behaviour, it IS a punisher, for that dog. It's not the handler who decides what is punishing, it's the dog. One of my dogs is afraid of metal baking trays. I don't intend her to be afraid of metal baking trays. But she experiences them as punishing. It has nothing to do with your intention and everything to do with the effect on the dog's behaviour. If you do something to the dog - spray, Pet Corrector - and the dog stops the behaviour, then the dog experienced that as a punishment and you are training the dog using an aversive. There is no special category for "non-aversive surprises" - that's not the science of learning theory! If you are providing enough mental and physical stimulation, then I would just walk off from him any time he tried to mouth like that - and show him through my disengagement, that he loses my attention and focus if he does that.
Our 10 mo old lab still does this. We have always replaced it with toys and when he does it now we tell him to focus which he will look at us and go into an immediate sit, which is good and we tell him "yes" and give him a treat, however with Oakley some times once he is out of the sit he will go right back to play biting, we do it all over again, it seems if we keep him in the sit long enough and have him do a couple of other things such as down, or shake he will stop for a bit. He only does it when he gets into what we call his "naughty" moods.
