Tulsa-Dan
Your Friendly Moderator
With the links provided by Eric, I think my position on Alpha Rolling is pretty clear. I don't ascribe to it and don't believe it works. Also, I've never seen a mother dog do this to any pup in her litter for "punishment" or learning purposes. The only time I have seen a mother turn a pup over is to lick its belly/bladder to stimulate urination in the pup.
At any rate, to the problem at hand. I think you have an excellent handle on the problem, although you are unsure of it yourself. Yes, the pup (the female) is seeing your children as littermates, not as leaders. I also suspect that the incident with your son was because he was petting her and she wanted to not be bothered and she reacted to him as she would any other pup in the litter. How you handled it at the time is over and done with now so don't worry about it. We all react and do what we feel best at that moment. However, there are other and in my view better ways to handle situations such as this.
I would HIGHLY recommend getting a copy of "The Culture Clash" by Jean Donaldson and also a copy of "The Dog Listener" by Jan Fennell. These two books will help you establish proper and humane/effective training methods, and will help you set up a proper leadership roll for you and your kids with the dogs.
There are many, many threads here as well on biting and nipping and how to deal with this issue. Use the search button and you'll find tons of info on this.
Good luck.
At any rate, to the problem at hand. I think you have an excellent handle on the problem, although you are unsure of it yourself. Yes, the pup (the female) is seeing your children as littermates, not as leaders. I also suspect that the incident with your son was because he was petting her and she wanted to not be bothered and she reacted to him as she would any other pup in the litter. How you handled it at the time is over and done with now so don't worry about it. We all react and do what we feel best at that moment. However, there are other and in my view better ways to handle situations such as this.
I would HIGHLY recommend getting a copy of "The Culture Clash" by Jean Donaldson and also a copy of "The Dog Listener" by Jan Fennell. These two books will help you establish proper and humane/effective training methods, and will help you set up a proper leadership roll for you and your kids with the dogs.
There are many, many threads here as well on biting and nipping and how to deal with this issue. Use the search button and you'll find tons of info on this.
Good luck.
