Lurcher behaviour

[Littlewoo]

We've recently got a rescue lurcher, the vet thinks she's around 2. Apart from that we have no history on her as she was found as a stray.
She's a lovely dog, very affectionate, walks beautifully on the lead. Friendly to other dogs, slight interest in cats but a firm no and a tug of the lead and she stops and continues to walk with us.
When we let her out in the garden she takes these mad turns where she'll run round and round in cirlcles barking, picking up her toys and tossing them in the air. She'll then come in and collapse.
The only thing concerning me is this morning she charged in from the garden and put her mouth round my sons knee, she didn't bite hard but it was a definite nip. I said no very loudly and sent her to her bed.
At lunchtime today I was making lunch and she came into the kitchen. She started bowing down a few times then when she got up she came over to me. I went over to her to give her a pat and she tried to bite my hand. Not hard but again a definite attempt to bite. I said no loudly, sent her to her bed and walked away.
Just wondering if anyone has any advice on this?
We don't allow her on the sofas/beds etc as much as she tries. Whenever she's on them she gets ordered off. At first she wouldn't budge but now she instantly gets off when we walk into the room.
Any help would be much appreciated

She is trying to engage you in play. Get a tug toy or flirt pole and play with her.

And the word no means nothing to her.

The Nonsense of No.

I am on my second lurcher and have never been bothered by this behaviour in either of them. However both have at times done a playfull 'nip' on the nearest hand or leg when they have become over-excited from 'mad zoomies' but as you say she is affectionate I would not worry this is a sign of aggression. She is also fairly young.
More experienced lurcher owners will be along to explain it better than I can and suggest how to cope.

My wee lurcher is a very mouthy dog. She's gentle but she likes to play bite. She's a rescue and when we first got her at 6 month old she would play bite really hard. I worried we would never stop her but she did calm down with a lot of patience and saying ouch and stop playing type training.
We find she needs 2 good runs a day and then she settles much better in the house. She also loves to chew and we have a lot of chew toys for her and give her a stuffed Kong or a chew to chew on every evening.

Thanks for your replies, much appreciated. When she did it to my son he's been out playing with her in the garden, I'm putting it down to over excitement and wanting the game to continue.
She does have a pull toy and a kong which we do play a lot with her.
My concern is sometimes it's not a convenient time to play and my worry is this nipping will be how she tries to get our attention.
Interesting article about the word no, thanks I'll use some of the tips.

just to add - it occurred to me that my lurchers were never particularly keen on being approached from the front and a hand descending on their head for a pat - they were happy to be stroked on their side while leaning against you., At the time I had always assumed it was because of their past (both rescues) but I sometimes wonder if dogs do not like humans looming in close.
ear scritch goes down well though.

We fostered a similar aged lurcher and she was really mouthy and they still have very sharp teeth at that age! We didn't have her for very long (6 weeks) so I didn't manage to do any long term training but I used to save her Kong for when she was in her bed. She would happily go at it for an hour or so and we used that as quiet time and just left her be. She was VERY food motivated though so yours might prefer something else. One thing I read is that you should never engage with bitey behaviours, it's obviously not a desirable behaviour so no attention to reward it.

Could you try and train a more desirable way to get your attention? We had some success with teaching her to take food nicely by offering treats in a closed fist. She had to politely nose bump or lick before she got the treat, not crazy mouthing or biting.

Thanks, you're right it's not behaviour I want to encourage. She stood in front of my son this evening and growled at him. He got a big fright, my dh said her name loudly and she went off to her bed. This was just after they'd been playing with her in the garden, so I'm wondering if she's got overexcited and tried to carry on the game?
I have not had a lurcher before, had labs, schnauzers and spaniels so this is all new territory for me. I'm looking into taking her to training classes so the dc's can learn the correct way to deal with her, just now not sure what type of training I should be looking for.

Hmm my lurcher can be a bit vocal and she will woof at you to play with her. When she plays with other dogs she will be quite rough and noisy although she has really improved on that now.
About the zoomies I find she doesn't do this now we give her more exercise. She did it a lot when we first had her and couldn't let her off lead.
I think you might try a one to one session with a good dog trainer. One in my area will do this for £30 and we had a session when we first got ddog

By the way I really like my lurcher and I would definitely have another one. We used to have a Labrador before and always thought we would get another but we ended up adopting ddog and now we are converts to the lurcher. They are lovely dogs, funny, very sweet natured and beautiful to look at.

Thanks Tinsel, good to hear! Yes it's the zoomies that seem to make her worse. She is still having to be walked on the lead as only had her for 4 days so don't feel ready to let her off. She's getting two long walks a day and two shorter ones but I guess if she's not getting off to run she'll still have pent up energy.

That's probably part of it. When you can let them run it is very nice to watch them stretch out and fly along. Mine loves the beach and will run in massive circles there. Then she comes home and sleeps for hours lol.

Oh just realised yours is a rescue dog too. You could contact the rescue centre with any worries and they will be sure to help.