My 7 Mo old eats EVERYTHING!!! Benches, toys, hoses!! Everything in the yard was or is in the process of being destroyed!! I try to teach him "NO" very harshly ...not happening!! He jumps all over me! I'm 5'3 130 he stands 5'3 and about 90lbs!! What can I do to control him?!
Jumping up, stealing stuff and destructive chewing are very common in young labs. Don't worry about the 'harsh no' stuff. You don't need to do that. Does your do sleep in a crate, is he crated much or left alone much during the day? What kind of exercise does he have. Have you attempted any kind of daily training sessions? And if so what kind of things have you been doing with your dog?
It's very common for young labs to go through a renewed chewing phase at this age, as it's when their back molars come in. You need to be keeping him confined to an area where he simply can't choose wrong, when you are not able to supervise him directly. That means crating him. Is he crate trained? If not, do follow a progressive crate training method which will teach him to enjoy his crate. Provide him with suitable chew toys which are safe. Stuffed Kongs are a safe bet. Nylabones or similar are used by many. Identify the type of material or product he is chewing that he's not supposed to, and purchase toys which are made of the same or similar material. This is information to you, about what your dog likes to chew! But he has a biological need to chew and if you don't provide him with sufficient suitable and appealing things to chew, then he will chew your furniture and house instead. Please don't say 'no' to him or use any harsh methods, you will only confuse him and as you can see, it doesn't work. Everything in the world, to him, is a chew toy - he has no ability to discriminate between a shoe and a toy he is allowed. The solution is always: Prevention. (Crating or close supervision with a houseline or tag line on, so you can work on a Drop.). And providing him with suitable other options to enjoy chewing on. Puppies and young dogs need very close supervision and need to live in dog-proofed areas without any 'wrong choices' available. Giving a puppy or dog too much freedom around the house, too soon, only leads to them learning the wrong things. Once they have learnt how enjoyable the 'wrong' things are, they will try to return again and again, to these things. Which is why looking ahead and putting prevention into place beforehand, is so important. You might want to look at these videos:
My lab is 1 year now, so I can sympathize. First, you can't ever leave him unsupervised, ever. You are either playing with him, or he needs to be on a 'houseline' so that he can't reach anything. If he's alone, he needs to go in the crate. Teaching 'drop it' and 'leave it' is fine, but don't expect too much from a dog that just lacks self control, you're only setting a foundation for later; At 1 year, he should be much better at chewing on his toys, and not other things. Aside from management, the best thing to do, I think, is teach the dog how to heel, and sit and stay. A dog that can sit and stay, even with distractions, has self control. Without your dog having self control, you'll be running around yelling 'no' pointlessly forever...
Mine too! My 5 month old River thinks she can eat everything from leaves to poop. Chasing her does no good as she thinks it a game. I am enrolled in puppy training classes once a week and repeat her training everyday at home. 'Leave it' is starting to work but now she tires to be sneaky and will check to make sure I am not looking when she goes to pick up some tasty, stinky morsel on the ground. When I take her on walks I always bring her treat pouch and clicker. It is getting better, just needs more work......
We humans tend to think that the crate is cruel in some way, and while it CAN be abused, it really is not such a bad place when the time is taken to make it pleasurable. If your puppy was previously crate trained and you put it away because it appeared that all the house rules were learned, then it needs to be brought out and used again. We don't put our puppy crates away until the dog is well over a year old downstairs and they stay in their upstairs night time crate until they can be trusted to sleep the night through without need of a chew toy. That varies depending upon the dog. Even then, they are behind our closed bedroom door to avoid their wandering the house and being tempted. If you cannot supervise the puppy then it must be crated for its safety and your sanity (and pocketbook). We have a Kong and a nylabone in our dogs crates at all times. I have extra Kongs and nylabones and softer toys to offer when a mouth finds the table leg or the arm chair and begins to mouth it....there is always something to distract the puppy close at hand. I even have a baggie of kibble to distract with some quick "trick" training if needed. Then it would be out to potty (on a leash and on demand) and into the crate for a quick quiet time if none of that worked to distract the puppy from those naughty things.
The first couple years are such a chore because they are so wild! But after a couple of years they tend to mellow out- at least that's what we were told for our lab, but he didn't mellow out till he turned 9 haha! I wouldn't have it any other way
