Biting and lunging puppy

[bigtimefood]

Hi Mumsnetters

I have an 11 week old lab and he's in the the stage where they think biting is playtime, does anybody have any tips to get them out of this stage and how to react successfully? I understand that puppies nip and play, however he's so strong and he's clamping his jaw around any limb he can and is now drawing blood! I've tried a yelp, a firm no/naughty and walking away as much as to say play time is over but he doesn't care! I cannot just stand still and wait for him to stop as these are serious bites and he's relentless! For an 11 week old he's very strong! Any words of wisdom please?

Thank you!

My land shark only responded to timeouts. That meant separating him from us.

Baby gates are good for that as you can get behind them until they have calmed down.

Also watch for trigger points. Puppies are often more bitey when over stimulated or tired. I could set my watch by mine in the evening and had to enforce a snooze by making sure we didn't get to that point by putting him in his crate.

Can you re direct his biting to a toy? That way puppy can live out its natural instincts and learn what is cool and what not.
Puppies that age will be bitey, because that's how they play, explore and learn.

You are not alone I posted this on another thread a few days ok

If your puppy bites you, you need to ignore the behaviour and remove “yourself” from the interaction without any drama, no need to say anything or do anything.

This means to your puppy the fun is over, the play has ended and more importantly the attention is over.

If you behaviour is to hard for you to ignore then go behind a door or baby gate where your puppy does not have access to continue nipping at you.

If your puppy tries to nip at you when you return, remove yourself again- It may seem a really repetitive process but a really important lesson to learn. When your puppy offer appropriate interaction (no nipping) you stay. Any nipping and you go away..

You should begin to see a major decrease in the intensity of biting as well as the amount of biting attempts within a few days.

Other things to think about

It is really important to have a management place for your puppy, such as a play pen. It gives you a break from your puppy and is a clam place for your puppy to settle down if he gets to excited.

Consider your puppies preference for permissible items to chew! (non-human items – so no slippers or shoes, this will end in disaster!) Think about the texture, some puppies like soft latex toys to mouth, other like plush toys or rubbery toys (often a hard chew toy is not the same!) Consider items for your puppy to chew or lick- such as Kong toys or lick mats to help keep them entertained.

Things that we may think are punishing, like pushing your puppy away, yelling at him etc, can be considered fun behaviours for your puppy and can encourage biting.

It is no wonder than yelping as the puppy bites you as you have an over aroused puppy and then you squeal at it - this just winds up the puppy even more.

An over aroused puppy is a bitey puppy! Puppies need a lot of sleep so look to increase this if possible.

Thanks all for your advice!

It's more than nipping, he's really clamping his jaws and drawing blood but is always when playing. If I try and walk away he comes with as won't let go! I will get a baby gate (got a fabric dog gate and he worked out how to remove that within 24 hours.
Also if I try to replace with a toy, he's not interested... my limbs are far more fun.

Is it normal for him to be this feisty even though for him it's playing?
I know they need a lot of sleep and I try to encourage it, but ALL he wants to do is play and my attention. After playtime, if I do something else he sits and cries at me so I play with him. He's got a kong... gets bored within 5 mins when he realises it's going to take effort to get the bits out, bought him a lickmat and he LOVES that.
Before anybody says put him in his crate, he HATES the crate, so he won't settle in there unless I'm in the same room constantly.
Hopefully when he's allowed to start walking he'll calm down?!

Puppies are like toddlers in that they can keep going even when they need rest. Sometimes you just have to enforce the boredom rather than giving in and playing aka hyping them up even further.

Their teeth are sharp. I had holes in most of my clothes and marks on me. Mine used to launch himself at my jeans and hang on with his teeth,

Ok good to know @BiteyShark! He's a beautiful dog, I just want to make sure I'm doing right by him!

Is it normal for him to be this feisty even though for him it's playing? yes very normal. He does sound very overaroused though. When he is whining and you play with him what does the play entail.
Calm gentle basic mind games will be much better for him than stimulating play.

Get a mat put a treat on the mat when he goes on the mat he gets a treat. No noise , no praise just a treat. As he gets used to this hold out on the treat until he is sitting down then treat only when he goes to the mat and sits. This calmer training will tire him out without exciting him and teach him to settle on a mat.

Sounds exactly how our lab was at that age!! She didn't sleep much, eventhough everyone told me she would sleep all day! All she wanted to do was play and have my attention. I was covered in bruises all over my legs and arms, she would latch on and not let go!
She wouldn't stop for a toy! We were mainly in our living room so when she had these moments I would make my way over to the door, sometimes with her attached to me or my clothing! And somehow manage to close the door on her. So it took away her being able to touch and see me (better than a Stairgate) which is essentially her favourite thing. I'd count to 10, open the door, if she came for me again, close door and count to 20, open and so on. If she just sat there waiting I would say good girl and give her a toy.
When they can go for walks it helps sooo much! Remember they can't walk for long but they can be out for longer, sitting down in the field on a bench and them stiffing uses alot of energy!

It does get better - honest. Especially when you can start going out for walks. Taking them out even before then and sitting somewhere with them where the can see stuff - like sitting in the boot of the car and just watching - also tires them out and gets them used to seeing things.

brain games too - simple ones like putting a bit of cheese in an egg box or in a box filled with scrunched up newspaper - really tired ours out. She liked a snuffle mat too. A little bit of training when they are calm helps too - make it a game - just 5 minutes or so of sit and stay.

But I wore the same jeans and bitten jumper and walking shoes for about 6 weeks when ours went through the biting phase.

Have a look at bite inhibition on you tube. Also we would just leave the room and shut the door - just for a few seconds - it reset her.

Make sure there's lots of toys (but rotate them to keep interest), frozen carrots, frozen tea towels, chews like lambs tails - yakkers, puppy chews.

I'd freeze meat juice in an old yoghurt pot and let them lick that out.

Getting them to rest is really hard. We ended up cuddling ours to sleep on a chair. She got to know when she was in that chair being cuddled that was time to go to sleep. People use crates or their bed in the same way.

As PP says - do some calm things with them - like settle. Or getting them to sniff for treats.

Easy peasy puppy squeaze book has lots of ideas.

One thing I did to massive success was to put my fingers in her mouth but with his own lips, no force or rough touches involved from me and of she didn't bite it was no bother you either of us, but if she did bite she felt it herself and quickly released her jaws.
I have no idea what a dog trainer would make of that, but it passed my own criteria of able to do it during play, not unkind to puppy so not creating issues and an effective lesson

When she was sleepy we let her gently bit or mouth us but withdrew our hands when it got too much so she learnt her limits - similar to what dogs do - they stop play when it gets too much. She's very very gentle now.

Also taught her to take treats gently - that's on you tube. You put them in your closed fist and she only gets the treat when she takes her nose away. It's the start of training 'leave it' too.

I could've written your exact post when Biteypup lab was little! I'd never known such a bitey terror. Our clothes and arms shredded by puppy needle teeth and quite frankly I dreaded spending any time with her as she could be so horrible. In the end, we called on the help of a behaviourist, as I was at my wits end and she concluded that the biggest problem for her was tiredness. She was just too much of a busy dog and wouldn't sleep during the day at all, so we had to enforce rest to make sure she didn't get overtired and super bitey. It was hard work, but made such a difference!

I also remember picking the brains of @BiteyShark on many occasions Although her pup was a different breed, so many of the behaviours and triggers were similar.

Thanks all!! All of your advice has been so great and I'll take it all on board. He's so gorgeous and I know it's just because he's young and doesn't know the difference! I'll try all of your tips and see how we get on! Have already started to leave the room when he's been bitey today and it's worked so far! Thanks everybody!

@PollyRoulson so I've been doing everything you said however it's just getting worse. He's now targeting me and only me and the bites are hard. I cannot ignore him because he doesn't care, he keeps biting my legs. If I put him on the other side of the door and wait, he doesn't care, I open the door and he attacks again. I'm at my wits end!!

Are you leaving it too late before you remove yourself from him? I started to notice the trigger points and would remove myself (or him) straight away to give him a few minutes to calm down. DH would leave it a bit and try and move him off and it was obvious BiteyDog thought that was playing so just went in harder.

You also need to give them time to calm before letting them back in then straight back out if it starts again. How long are you waiting?

Also if you are struggling a good 1-1 trainer who can come to your home is invaluable in observing how you interact with your pup and give you tips.

I am a complete amateur and bow to many other mns but what did help us a bit was putting vicks vapour rub on our legs and arms and most bitten places like tops of slippers. It did seem to work when all else failed. At 16 weeks she is much less bitey, but still partial sometimes. I put vapour rub on a cable she was interested in the other day and she left it alone. Might be worth a try?

We bought a pair of wellies for everyone to wear indoors. It sounds mad but it really deterred our pup from attempting to bite feet and ankles. He soon got bored trying.

Yeah, any sign at all that you think it’s a game or it’s getting to you will encourage them to ‘play’ more. Ignore and remove yourself.

It gets better quite quickly as they get older.

And make sure they are resting and sleeping. Find a chew they like. With ours it was lamb tails.

Also, if ours wasn’t in a complete tantrum, A little bit of training With treats really helped to distract and tire her. Just sir, wait and stay and lie down, she had a particularly cute dramatic drop.

We’re having this exact issue with our 13 week old beagle pup
The thing is we have 3 kids- youngest is 7 but when he starts biting they start screaming and running around trying to out run him. I’ve tried to explain to them to sit on the couch when he starts and try not to scream or run as he thinks it’s a game
We’ve all actually received some pretty nasty nips from him where he’s even drawn blood- please tel me it gets better!?
I might try that vaporub tip another tip which we have yet to try is a small water gun and to spray him with it when he starts getting nippy?

Don’t do the water gun.

Have a look at dog training advice and guidance on Facebook there’s great tips for kids and dogs.

But the kids need to keep away from the dog when she’s like that.

So many people that seem to know nothing about Puppies, get them and then moan about them being puppies, doing totally normally puppy type things 🙄

I am a complete amateur and bow to many other mns but what did help us a bit was putting vicks vapour rub on our legs and arms and most bitten places like tops of slippers

PLEASE don't do this!!!! It's toxic to dogs!

2 things that we've seen that works - firstly remove yourself. The minute he gets nippy, go next door and shut the door so he knows he's being ignored. I see a few people have mentioned that and we are starting to see that it works.

Secondly, I find our puppy (also 11 weeks) is much more nippy when over tired. They get so tired so quickly at this age. All my dcs have left home but dp has 2 young dc that come every other weekend and when they over excite the puppy, he gets more nippy too (so I've had to try and teach them not to).

We also have some chew ropes and a big chewy toy carrot that we give him if he fancies a chew on something

Sorry i see you say you've tried removing yourself - we also realised we had to do it immediately and not wait. And sometimes keep repeating again and again!

Ok so today we have moved him into the kitchen and utility room and when he’s not nipping or biting we bring him into the family room with us. When he started nipping or biting we took him out of the room
I know it’s early days but it worked well today. I can’t remove my children from a room every time he gets bitey as even when they get down from the couch he gets super excited