Biting cocker spaniel pup (only to us though!)

[adoggymama]

My partner and I have a 5month old cocker pup together (had him since 10 weeks) and whilst we've had private 1-1 training with a trainer + taken loads of vet advice and brought a load of toys/chews/educational toys & take him out for runs in the woods 3x a day, we still have problems with him jumping up/nipping & even biting in some cases when we are at home trying to walk around or do something!

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hang on, 3 runs a day at 5 months old? That's far, far too much exercise for such a young pup. He should be doing 25 minutes of exercise, twice a day at the absolute most. The rule is 5 minutes per month of age, upto twice a day.

It sounds like he's massively over-stimulated/possibly over-tired and you need to be so careful not to over-do it on the exercise front or you'll damage his joints.

They don't call them cockerdiles for nothing .

Mine was very bitey as a puppy but it's important to make sure they aren't overtired or overstimulated as that makes them much worse. Timeouts when it happens every single time was the way we stopped it.

I assume you mean he runs free 3 times a day rather than go on walks? There is evidence to say that is better for puppies than 20 minutes of structured pavement walking twice a day so I am sure it will be fine.

I did what Bitey said after reading it on here and it really works timeouts all the way.

Puppies need to mouth and chew this can last up to a year.

So it is vital that there is opportunity for them to do this in their environment BUT it must not be on skin

So make sure he access to lots of appropriate chew toys, bones etc.

Chewing and mothing will calm them down as an activity so it is to be encouraged.

When their mouths touch your skin you need to remove yourself from the situation- it is very important that it is you that is removed and that you do not remove the dog.

If he is doing it when you are trying to get on with jobs and he is being ignored then think before you do this how can I keep him busy whilst I do this. So I would use a puppy pen and put him in the crate with a kong or chew toy and then carry out what you want to do.

Prevention is key

Our cocker is 5 now but I remember this phase when she was similar age, she would run and jump biting at us when we walked across the room! We ended up with a consistent pick up puppy say firm no and shut in kitchen for a minute or 2 and she learnt so fast that we wished we had done it earlier! We didn’t want to be too firm with her as it felt mean but it didn’t take long and she never did it again