Boxer loves to jump like a kangeroo

[Bustern'Macy]

We have 2 boxers and our youngest Macy jumps on the door when she is ready to come in. She jumps so high her feet hit the door at about 6 foot. We have tried closing the gate on our deck so she couldn't get to the door but she jumps the gate. I am afraid she is going to hurt herself jumping like a kangeroo. If any one has had a similar problem please help.

 

[Krikkit]

Macy sounds like my Ruben - he was born with springs instead of normal hock joints :D

What we did with him worked very well, but it does take a little patience, persistence, perseverance and most of all, utmost consistency. Basically the rule for Ruben is that doors, gates etc do not open unless he is sitting.

When he was bouncing to go in or out I would not even acknowledge him until he had four on the floor. When all four feet were on the ground I'd step towards the door and as soon as he bounced I'd come to a dead stop - then when four were back on the floor I'd move again. The first session took me 30 minutes to get to the door. The second session only took five, the third session about 30 seconds and then we were home and hosed. It did not take him long to realise that he was in control of what happened with the door. Once he stopped the bouncing I then went one step further and now only open the door when he sits.

I didn't need to treat or praise or click etc with this as he wanted something that was reinforcing anyway (to come inside or go outside). Basically I did not give him any feedback apart from my progress towards the door when he was calm as I really wanted him to be thinking about this. When he offered the behaviour I wanted the door opened, when he did not nothing happened - does not take them long to figure this out.

He never bounces at doors or gates now.

Good luck
Sharon

 

[mlemiller]

Ruby (15 months) is that way too. She loves jumping. She's constantly jumping over our 5' fence in the back yard. It's a problem.

 

[Bustern'Macy]

Macy is doing better

Macy dosen't have to much problem with jumping except if we have company and she can't come inside as far as jumping the fence we already had to fix that with our oldest so Macy has never tried it. We put an extra 3 foot of fence on top of our fence and made it angle in so that Buster couldn't jump it.

 

[ljnash]

Samantha jumps up like that outside if she sees people or other dogs walking by. One night, I woke up and found her in a corner of the bedroom, and she couldn't stand up! So, after an expensive trip to the emergency vet that night, I found out she had sprained some muscles in her back. At first the vet thought she had a herniated disk in her back. After some muscle relaxants and pain shots, she was back to normal! It must have been from all that jumping!!

Lenore