Desperate for him to stop!!

[jcbobo]

Our puppy will not stop biting! I am so beyond frustrated at this point. He will be 10 weeks on Monday, he weighs over 15lbs and the bigger he gets, the more aggressive the biting becomes. I cannot handle it anymore. It's to the point where I am afraid to come home when my husband isn't there to help me deal with this overly hyper knife teeth puppy. I am on some medicine that makes my skin thin so every time his teeth touch me i bleed....and because of this medicine, my skin does not heal near as well as it normally would. I have bites wounds all over my body, my hands, feet, face, legs, all up and down my arms, my stomach!! My dr. is concerned, I am concerned, and my patience is wearing thin. I love our puppy with all of my heart and I want to fix this asap but I'm at a loss.

Saying "No" or making him sit just encourages him to come at us more and more. We've tried time out but all he does is take his energy out on the baby gate we have blocking him in our entryway... We tried saying ouch loud, or yelping like a puppy would when he bites us. Ive even tried whimpering like a puppy does. Any sound that we make he thinks it calls for a barking marathon and it just gets him overly excited. He just starts pouncing and biting again. We have spoiled him with toys, He has one of everything. Anything chewy we shove in his mouth the second he bites and he spits it out an goes back into his puppy attack mode. We do this all day long. He likes his deer antlers and his bully sticks but mommy and daddy's flesh is much better :(

We exercise the mess out of him. We have a puppy play date 3 times a week with a german shepard puppy that is just one day older than our dog. They love each other and play for a good hour and a half in our back yard. I love those nights because it wears him out and afterwards he is konked out. We were hoping this would help learn bite inhibition but so far things have just gotten worse. The days we don't have play dates we are running around in the back yard... I have gotten to where when he starts biting like crazy we go run a few laps in the back yard and he's having a blast the whole time trying to bite my feet. I try my best to control him and keep him away from my feet by holding out the leash. He will rest for a few minutes then starts biting again. I'm tired of running laps in my back yard. . I run laps in the morning, on my lunch break, and multiple times every night. i would think he would eventually get tired and stop the freaking biting but my lord!!! Both me and my husband are dropping the pounds while our puppy is just steady getting bigger and going out of control.

Our world seriously revolves around him. He is all that we do and we have great hopes for him once he matures but is there anything we can do to save some skin??? We plan on taking him to obedience classes as soon as he gets all of his puppy shots. We understand he is a puppy but it's gotten to the point to where we are afraid to have family or friends over due to liability issues....and both me and my husband have bodies full of battle wounds from him. We can't control him and have no idea what to do at this point. Besides this and potty training, he has been a wonderful dog. He is extremely smart, is learning to sit and lay pretty quickly, and took to his crate in no time. We sleep through the night, he doesnt cry in his crate unless he has to potty, loves to give kisses, cuddle, and sit in our laps. He even goes and grabs his leash to tell us when he has to go potty (half the time!)... He is everything we wanted except this biting crap.

I hope and pray somebody on here has a solution. This is our first puppy and we are desperate for help.

 

[Bathel]

This may sound silly... but when he get's worked up, make sure he's looking at you and Yawn... lick your lips... those are two signals that dog use to call for a "time out". Some dogs respond to humans doing it too... It may not work, but it's worth a try.

For me, our little pup is like that at times too. What I've had to do is if his teeth touch skin I stop any contact with him. I move to a chair where he can't get to me. Now, he's only 8 weeks so he can't yet jump up on the chair.

Good luck. I understand the frustration.

 

[srennie]

Search around on this site and you will find TONS if information on bite inhibition and puppy biting. Sorry to tell you this but at 10 weeks old (which means you've only had him about 2 weeks at most) you've only just begun. Puppy biting isn't something just goes away in a matter of a week or 2. It's a process of training and building up his understanding of what is acceptable, expected and respecting you. He's a tiny baby and he doesn't understand that he is hurting you. Don't take it personally. He's a normal boxer puppy. I've raised one and will never do that again!! I prefer to adopt past that horrible puppy and adolescent stage which ends around 2-3 years old.

 

[Cami]

Unfortunately you have a LONG time to go with having to deal with sharp puppy teeth. Luckily they will be replaced with teeth that don't feel like razors!
Bite inhibition takes time....and a ton of patience on your part.
Everything you are doing is pretty standard and believe it or not if you keep doing it you will get results but he is just a baby right now and he needs more time for things you are teaching to stick.
You can also try leaving the room (or vicinity). Some puppy's can't stand to be alone. He makes contact with your skin and you immediately leave him. This can be for just a few seconds but it lets him know that when he touches your skin the play stops. You don't say anything you just leave. Come back. If he goes after you again you leave again....over and over....
Bring a toy back to him or a treat, whatever you need to redirect his attention. This not only gives him something else to focus his attention on but you get a break from your frustration as well.
It might not work the first 50 times but one day a light bulb WILL go off for him and he will get it. He will also have set-backs (my girl is 2 and sometimes still forgets but instead of razors for teeth I have to worry about the strength in her jaws). Corrections now are way easier since she knows the rules. A little reminder with a noise is all that is required.

I read something once about putting butter (or similar) on your hands and having them lick the butter off. This is supposed to let them know it is okay to lick your hands but not bite them. I never tried it with my own pups but have tried it with a clients Golden Retriever puppy. Worked like a charm. It was messy but SOOO worth it since I visited her twice a day for many months. She was a terrible biter! She ripped not only my skin but a lot of my clothing. I praised her while she was licking the butter off my hands. She got to a point where she would run up to me and want to lick my hands even without anything on them. You might give it a shot but again it isn't a one time thing. She learned that licking was "good" and she got a reward (the taste of butter) and a lot of praise from me while she was doing it. Once she bit/nipped me I walked away from her and blocked her access to me. She is almost 2 now and I no longer have to worry about her biting me at all.

Certain things will work and certain things won't. It just depends on the dog and your persistence/patience. I'd for sure say don't let him chase after you while trying to bite your feet. That is a GAME to him and one they all seem to enjoy. :D I sprayed Bitter Apple on my shoes when my first girl was a pup. She loved feet and shoes while on feet. She also didn't mind the taste of the bitter spray but other dogs don't like it. You could try that as well.

 

[larrygs]

Many of us know how frustrating it can be. As said, there is much in BW on bite inhibition. A boxer puppy is all about play and interaction with you. And at 10 weeks the attention span is probably measured in seconds.

What this means is saying No is engagement from you and a reward. A time out may help calm things down, but is not likely to be connected to the biting. The yelp and withdraw engagement approach is key.

Even so, with Layla the standard bite inhibition approach just wasn't getting traction either, so we got advice from a trainer that worked pretty good.

We set her up to fail in a way for her energetic puppy brain to see things more clearly. We started by playing with her in a small room with a door, (bathroom etc) The first time she bit, we immediately yelped and left the room, closing the door behind us, leaving her alone. We did not scold or try to distract her. We just made the disengagement as crisp as possible. Returned in a minute, played again and when she bit, yelped again, left the room, closing the door, repeated and repeated .... We repeated this for what seemed like an hour, and Layla finally got it. She would subsequently test, but got the same response from us any time she would bite, basically yelp, disengage all attention, went somewhere else and closed the door behind us. This may sound like a lot of effort, but it really isn't, and works.

Good luck!

 

[jcbobo]

Just wanted to give a little update. It's been 2 weeks, our puppy will be 12 wks old on Monday. We thought he would never stop biting. I went to bed crying quite a few nights thinking we made a mistake in adopting our little devil dog. The only thing that worked for us was Time. Two weeks have gone by and he's made huge progress. He has calmed down a bit, we've seen a little bit of maturity in him. He has done very well with not biting as much. This tiny bit has meant the world to me...and he gets better and better every day. We constantly aboid or redirect his biting to other things like chew bones or toys. Along with lots of playtime in our back yard, we have started walking him once an evening for about 5 minutes. We go just 4 or 5 houses down and back. Super short walk but it's helping him see a new part of this world, face his fear of cars, and understand his leash a little better.

All in all he is doing great. My fear of having a aggressive puppy turn into an aggressive dog is over. I can't imagine our life without him. We have loved him like crazy from the beginning but I feel like now we can be more affectionate with him since he's chilled on the biting. This is what I wanted the most. Now I get to hug and kiss him without bleeding!!

For anyone out there with a new puppy going thru this horrible phase, there is light at the end of the tunnel!!! Puppies are a heck of a lot of work but it's starting to show in our baby and he is making great progress! Just stick with it and they will learn as they grow up. Thanks for all the advice!

 

[CoraBoxer]

An aggressive 10 week old puppy? . When Cora was young, she'd bite and scratch... easiest way for me to not get scratched or bitten.. or to end it once it started was to just get up off the floor. Not to be a fun kill cause it sounds like you're doing better but phases come and go :P

 

[dora]

One thing I found that helps is teaching the 'touch' command, which is where you get the puppy to touch your hand with their nose. I taught this by letting them smell a treat (so they knew there was a reward) and then I would put my flat palm up and gently touch the nose, and then work up to having them touch you instead. It takes time, and there are probably other ways to teach it, but now when my puppy is nippy, I say no bite! touch! and she nudges my hand instead of biting it. If they nip at you, pull your hand back and say no! then say 'touch' again really calmly and slowly put your hand to nose. I think the calm part helps them understand this isn't a play game.

Also you could try the 'leave it' command. Again probably a lot of ways to teach it. A trainer showed me this way:

Set a treat on the ground and say 'leave it'. If the puppy lunges or reaches at all, immediately cover it with your hand. The first few times, the puppy may dig or bite at your hand (maybe try a glove to protect skin if yours does this too much). Just be patient and wait for the puppy to give up and back away. Once he/she does, then 'good! ok take it!' and let them have it. Once they finally realize what the game is, you can work up to longer times, and even drop it in front of them.

This helps with biting because you can say 'leave it' and have them leave your hand alone!

The trainer also said it is good to work up to the 'drop it in front of them' part, she called it the pill bottle scenario, basically if you accidentally dropped medicine or chocolate (both toxic to them), you could say leave it and the dog would not run up and gobble up things.

Good luck!
Jenny