Reassurance please - puppy & biting

[WelshMammy123]

Hi all. We have the most wonderful 15 week old cocker spaniel. I'm besotted by him but he is a really nippy so and so. We have two young children (6&2) and he is terrible for nipping at them - he also bites my DH. I get the odd nip but generally not too bad (I tend to feed and walk him etc so perhaps that's why).

Everything I read says it gets better but I just wanted to post here for reassurance. It all feels very stressful at the moment. Does anyone have any tips or tricks to help or is 'wait it out' the best advice? And he will stop won't he?! Thanks all

It’s a cockerdile
Don’t worry it will eventually stop, puppies are cute because they are utter Dicks .

We have a puppy a few weeks older than yours. The most effective thing I have found to do when he gets bitey is say a loud NO and stop playing with him. Usually I put him in the kitchen with a toy. It's definitely working. Mostly now we can just say no and put him at arms length and he stops. And he's as thick as two short planks.

Oh god I thought it would never end but it does!
My advice would be just anything you can do to make it easier on yourself. Remember that they are like toddlers - either uncontrollable because they’re tired (puppy bites), wants attention/ play (puppy bites), hungry (puppy bites), teething (puppy chews). It’s the only way they can communicate so try and meet their needs once you get to figure out the different signs rather than tell off - they just have no idea how to communicate with you so you need to teach him.
But otherwise - management!
I wore wellies in the house and taught him to play through a toy (so I tied toys on the end of dressing gown cords and cut up old jeans and tied them up!)
I’ll be completely honest as well and say at times I stood on a chair just to get out the way!
But he learnt that basically the way he got attention is through a toy/ he grew out of it.

Will also add that you will probably at times panic he’s turned aggressive. We’ve all been there - he’s not.

And yeah - puppies are bloody awful. Good thing they’re absolutely awesome when they grow up a bit.

Thank you all for your replies. It's reassuring to hear that it's normal. But yes I have that worry in the back of my mind as to whether he's always going to be like this and that it won't ever stop. He tends to be worse when the children are around and I assume that's because they're loud and run everywhere instead of walking. He must see it as play. Once again thanks all - helpful to know it's normal and that it will, in all likelihood, end.

Yes our puppy went through this phase. She is six months old on Monday. But I would say it petered out about the approach to five months old. Hardly mouths at anyone in family now. It will get better OP, hang in there!

I segregated the youngest two DC from the puppy in her very manic bitey moments back in those early weeks. Never have to do this now. She is calm around them (always an adult around anyway though as they are 5 and 3).

I remember those days well. My kids stayed out of his way when he was at his worst. He grew out of it around 5 months. We used to put him in timeout for a couple of minutes to calm down.

It will definitely get better! Ours used to hand off dd's plait like a shark! He doesn't do it now. I felt like the first year was so relentless but now ours is almost 3, amazing

I'd look at the context in how the nipping / biting is occurring. Yes all puppies tend to have the excitable nipping but just keep an eye out for guarding behaviours & body handling difficulties which some cocker spaniels can have.

Try to get him into an early habit of being happy to give valuable items back and readiness to be handled on various parts of his body. There's lots of positive training advice about this.

Also lots of rest periods as they are worse when overtired, my now 5 yr old springer was like a shark in first 6 months. I fostered a 5 month old cocker last year, he was relinquished due to his aggressive tendencies with the kids, he was just being a pup! and at a year old now he is fab with his adoptive family.

We have lots of rubber and rope toys, and i would constantly give a sharp "AH AH!" every time they nipped me and put a toy in their mouth, when they bite the toy instead give lots of praise. They do improve!

15 weeks was about as bad as it got with our puppy biting. He’s 20 weeks now and the biting has completely stopped. It will get better!

All puppies are arseholes. It's true.

You will have weeks of this BUT it will eventually stop.

Mostly I think it's one of those behaviours that tends to die out on it's own but some gentle training to engage with humans in different ways never goes amiss, either.

Plus, obviously, it's important to make sure neither the children nor the puppy inadvertently do anything that risks a future good relationship between them

It stops.

We found it worse when she was tired. So try and make him nap...same with the mad zooming, that meant she was knackered.

Take yourself out of the room, it resets them, only for a couple of seconds. Don’t shriek or react, a firm no. Replace with toy or treat.

There’s a brilliant Facebook group called dog training advice and support that has some great modules on this and puppies and kids.

One day you realise that nothing has bitten you all day and it’s lovely.

Completely agree with @MaryIsA. If the biting is excessive I'd put my pup in her crate for a nap with a chew to calm her down and get her to sleep. They're overtired toddlers at that point. I also attached toys to strings so we could keep our fingers away during play.

There's good advice on resource guarding here too. It's definitely worth making sure that you're dealing with that if it takes place.

Congratulations on your gorgeous puppy!