What are your experiences of the 'teenage' phase ?

[drivinmecrazy]

Have a seven month old Weimaraner and recently he's becoming a lot more of a challenge.
It's as if all we've taught him for the past few months have meant nothing.
He's still very good at basic commands like 'sit' and 'wait' and reasonably good at recall commands.
BUT the biting has started again, and it hurts!
He's also started to get so difficult on his walks.
He's started jumping at me, biting and humping on walks.
It seems to be after he's had an interaction with another dog or when I put him back on his lead when we leave the field.
He's a wonderfully social dog so has many 'friends' he's always played with beautifully. Now after these interactions he seems to flick a switch and become really troublesome.
Trying to put him back on the lead after his off lead field walk also seems to be a trigger.
He will literally rip the lead from my hand and try and hump me on my back.
It then will take me a few minutes (and a few scratches/bites) to calm him down enough to walk home.
From then on it's a completely loose lead walk with no pot behaviour.
Could this be hormonal?
Walking him has become a bit of a challenge for other family members but it seems to be only me who gets the worst of it.
At home he's as he's always been, has moments of craziness but always easy to reign him in.
I'm finding it really difficult and if I'm honest heart breaking.
Getting to the point I don't want to walk him 😞

This does sound pretty typical, but the humping you thing sounds like it could be frustration / over arousal.
So - when you go to put the lead on could you do a scatter feed ‘find it’ game with treats so that he has some thing to focus on instead of repeating this behaviour? It would get his nose to the ground and stop him jumping up, and promote sniffing which is a calming behaviour. You need to give him something else to do instead and pre empt the behaviour you know is coming.

My older lab surprisingly turned into a canine version of Kevin the teenager, would hardly do anything and huffed, sulked and threw herself on the floor when told off or made to behave. Forgot her manners and her recall.
Thankfully, it didn't last long.

I now have a much more assertive and independent European Shepherd breed that like a Weimaraner, takes longer to train and grow up. She is two and won't be fully mature until three.
I can see that she has calmed down a bit recently but she still needs a firm hand. Fortunately, she is too imprinted for recall to be a problem (a feature of the breed) but she is self willed and tests boundaries.
I look forward to three…

Definitely adolescence stage but humping isn't hormonal, it is frustrating or over excited.
Back to basics in all training, treat like a 3 month old ie obedience and impulse control.
Also highly recommend seeing a gundog trainer who specialises in the breed. Weims are working breeds and need breed appropriate training and mental stimulation. They are great dogs but do need strict boundaries and training and if they don't have a job to do can exhibit unwanted behaviour through frustration.

Thank you so much for your replies.
They were all reassuring, I'd started taking his behaviour too personally.
Funnily enough I'd said to DH last night that I think we need to go back to basics so will follow this through.
Also the tip for preempting behaviour so helpful.
We use scatter feeding often so that's something can
Do.

So hard when you're in the midst of it, can't see the wood for the trees sometimes.

We're aware that he won't reach maturity for longer than most dogs, think it's just come as a huge shock that this change has come so quickly, particularly as we were
Just congratulating our selves how well we'd come through the baby puppy months 😂
Would love to get him some gun dog specific training but unfortunately none local to us.
Have a wonderful one to one trainer who has had to adapt many of his techniques with our sessions but he's learning along side us in a way.
First session started with trainer talking is through the exercises, saying it wouldn't take too long.
Ten minutes in he had to completely reevaluate his methods with our dog 😂

If you don't have a local gundog trainer then highly recommend you join the Ladies Working Dog Facebook group. Lots of advice + support on there from female gundog owners and trainers plus they have podcasts and whole series of support sessions.
Could you not travel to a trainer? Mime lives 45 mins away but it is worth the travel.
When you take on a high energy, highly intelligent working breed like this then you do have a responsibility to ensure you are offering the appropriate training and mental stimulation for them. I have working cockers/springers because I work them, if I didn't work them I would have the show version. Boredom = frustration = destructive behaviour or unwanted behaviour.
Every day is a training day so you need to incorporate training into every walk, every day.

Takes me approximately 300 hours of training between the ages of 8 weeks-2 years to train a working spaniel and the first 2 years are key. Put the work in early on and you will reap the rewards later. Set clear, simple + consistent boundaries, stick to them, add in breed appropriate training and mental stimulation and you will have a happy dog.

My teenage terrier has started biting again when over excited. She started bothering the cat after she’d improved a lot. Her recall is still very good but other things are a bit patchy. She’ll whinge and bark at me when I ask her to do something. Her loose lead walking which was superb has disappeared. She is unsettled when left alone after building up to a good solid hour and just generally rough and silly a lot more.

She attends two training sessions a week - obedience which is games based and agility which is age appropriate. Both trainers find her totally normal for her age and breed. The agility class are all teenagers. All horrible 😂 She was going home to drink vodka last week.

All sounds pretty normal. We’ve separated from the cat again, started building alone time again, I have a toy on hand at all times and have gone back to reinforcing EVERYTHING I like every single time and managing what I can’t (harness for walking etc).

Twistyizzy we're absolutely aware of the breed and give plenty of enrichment activities every day.
But it's just been very recently that I've lost a bit of confidence with him.
I know we're doing the right thing but it's so nice to hear advice from other gundog owners.
Not all dog owners understand the nuances that we have to deal with.
Wouldn't change it for the world but boy it's a challenge every day!
Equally the rewards are worth every second.

Blissfully he's having his lunchtime nap now 😂

It’s not a gundog thing. It’s a teenage dog thing. Four different breeds in my agility class all very different functions. All shits.

I’m so glad to see your post (sorry!) having just left the pub early due to him being over excited and barking. Loads of training completely forgotten. He’s started biting my hand during training, if he’s not instantly understood what is required and wants the food anyway. My arms are aching as he’s become far too strong on the lead. And he’s started biting the kids.

He’s a golden retriever, 7 months old next week and had only JUST got out of the puppy phase. To insult to injury, we should be on a Greek island this week, but cancelled as the dog sitter can’t easily manage him with diarrhoea.

We do ALL the training, loads of positive reinforcement and it’s just so frustrating. I actually thought we had a couple more months until this adolescent phase.

Vegemite001

With walking take a toy and offer that when he starts getting antsy. With some practice you can see when it is going to happen so get that toy ready. You can get either fleece leads or leads with a tuggy attached. Get him to take his frustration out on that.

We have the issue after she has had her tea and after walks. Also during training classes if she's found it exciting. So the toy comes out and she can chomp on that for a bit.

Dogs get frustrated and more so at adolescence when hormones can make them less tolerant of being frustrated. You can't train them out of it. You just need to let them get it out and carry on. Ignoring makes it worse. Punishing makes it worse. After a good few weeks of 'go get your toy' our pup (as that's what they are still) will actually run off to get a toy at home when she feels the need and tease us with it. We have very little biting at home now compared to a few weeks ago. At training when I can see she is reaching her limit I get the toy out and offer her that for a game and chomp. If she shoves it at me then she wants to play. If she goes off with it just just needs to get it out. As I said, four teenage working dogs in her class. All teenagers. All the same.

Hang in there. It does get better. Little wonder it's the most common age for young dogs to come into rescue. Ours started at around 8 - 9 months (small dog) and she is still very much in it at 12.

With mine it was recall and ability to settle that went in his teenage years. He would literally dance around me and skip just out of reach when I tried to out his lead on after a walk where he had behaved well! I was so frustrated and upset. It did get better but I think all dogs that age are a challenge. We just went back a few steps - long line and more recall training. - and it did get better. I lost confidence too but it does end. Second the suggestion about a toy to direct him too if he's bitey or jumpy. Just breathe and keep doing what you did at first and you will get through it!

I would cut down the length or change the activity on the walks.

The behaviour you describe is over arousal and he can not at the moment cope with this.

If he is seeing a lot of dogs on his walk cut back on the number of interactions he is having. Re read your post and see that he is getting way too much interaction with other dogs. Let him meet and greet a few then work on focus to you when other dogs are around. Other dogs should mean he focusses on you not goes off and just plays .

Letting him play with every dog in the field is a bit like taking a toddler to a soft play area and giving them additives. They will love it but will cry all the way home from being so over threshold.

If he is getting a lot of chase games etc cut them out

Look at the length of the walk and maybe cut it down a bit so he does not get to frazzled.

Encourage into his walk lots of watching, lots of sniffing, lots of rewards for calm behaviour.

When it is the end of the walk I agree scatter food onto the floor so you can quietly and calmly put on his lead whilst he is eating. When the lead is on walk a few paces and again scatter some food. Encourage the calm!

My beagle was an absolute horror as a teenager - ten times worse than when he was a puppy.

He was bitey (drew blood a few times), noisy, forgot all his training and became very easily over-stimulated. I cried a lot.

He's five now and a million times easier. It does get better, you just have to keep going (and going, and going) even when you can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Good luck

Appreciate the recommendations about the toy but unfortunately this doesn't work.
He will find where the toy is kept and go for that anyway.
If it's in my pouch or in my pocket he'll just go for that.
So all the moment it's better just not to take anything 😞

Another thing you can do is to scatter food down to encourage sniffing. That is calming and I will do it if I can during training sessions if I have a problem (mostly if outside) and a toy if not. We did that a lot as a puppy if we got into a situation where she couldn't cope (this was a bit random as much as we tried to anticipate it - well it's never random but we couldn't anticipate it!)

My dog doesn't play with other dogs and I don't really encourage it but she can find walks with lots of dogs quite OTT so I limit how many times we take her to dog heavy areas each week. Once or maybe twice and then I try to go at quieter times. Where we live is quite rural so it's easy for us to find walks where usually we meet nobody and at most one or two people.

Re. the food I keep the high value stuff in a sealed pot. It lessens the chance of them smelling it. It stops them grabbing it too for the most part.

Going through teenage phase with our GSD. She is so smart! But a horror at times. I know how you feel, when she was much younger her biting was dreadful, we are both scarred and I was in tears many times thinking we could not get past it. Then she got so much better. Now it's one good day, two bad! It's good to know we are not alone. Our biggest problem is the massive excitement and trying to calm her. I do find lots of brain games with every meal ( I spend more time sorting her meals than ours) really helps. On walks I try to do lots of search and find with favourite kongs and/or food. She is currently lying at my feet looking like a little angel!

I have a 20 month old male dog who is still biting and playing tug of war with the lead every time we leave the house. I can't knock it out of him for love nor money. He's 28kg so it's not fun being dragged around the driveway every morning.

At the end of a walk, he will throw himself down on the floor and become a dead weight because he doesn't want to go home. A treat will get him up and walking but then he will just stand there and dig his heels in 2-3 times on the way home 🤣

He's also only started behaving a bit better in general. We are very far from the end of the adolescence stage but he has calmed down a bit in general. He's stubborn, highly strung and an absolute horror but I wouldn't be without him.

Hang on in there.

Just checked back on this thread and it is indeed reassuring it's not just me!
Took him for a walk with DD1 (22) yesterday and he's an absolute angel with her 😡
She had him on his double lead but even so once or twice he gave he the eye and threatened to jump.
We've at least worked out what triggers his behaviour, dogs and people!!
Up until now we've encouraged him to socialise on our walks but his bad behaviour now starts after these completely happy encounters.
So now we're trying to avoid everybody and every dog.
It's difficult because dogs and people see him coming and assume we'll have the same interactions.
But DD has it down to a tee. She politely but firmly explains we're on a training walk and moves on.
Have the trainer booked in for a few weeks time, have DD2 heading to uni soon so head filled with focusing on her at the moment.
About to go out on my first solo walk in a few minutes.
A bit nervous but going into it with (fake) confidence.
Hoping for a better walk 🤞

My lab started this around 7months would ignore me, or do something begrudgingly for the treat. All the training went backwards. He was over a year before things started to improve.

Well done to your daughter. Exactly the right answer.

You can actually buy a lead cover that says 'in training' and I do know people who use them for that reason. I have the problem that my dog is small and very cute and every man and his dog wants to say hi as she is relatively well behaved out and about too. So I often have to explain the same 'thanks but we're training at the moment'. My dog LOVES people but I don't want her to learn she can greet everyone.

Update on todays walk.
He did brilliantly and was so well behaved.
I adopted DDs stance of pre warning other walkers that we couldn't stop.
Made it to one field and into another.
Went back on his lead well.
Got back onto the path, and idiot as I am, I met someone I hadn't seen for a year.
So given how good he'd been (because we avoided all living things!) I stopped to chat.
Rafa was so good, he sat and waited patiently.
Then we moved on.
All hell broke loose!
It turned a ten minute walk home into a half an hour drama.
Grabbing the lead, jumping up at me, stubbornly sitting and not moving.
Only time he was compliant was when I asked him to sit and wait while a dog or kids walked past.
The rest of the time was a battle.
Very weird.
But it did confirm what we had assumed, never ever ever interact with anyone on the walk 🙀
Lesson learnt !!