Over Excited Doodle!

[Christine Lavallee]

Does anyone have a problem with there doodle being overly excited around people, my 85 pound
goldendoodle can not seem to settle down when people are over or when we walk him outside, he keeps wanting to jump on everyone he meets, at our house when people visit he wants everyones attention the whole time they are over. He was well socialized as a puppy, very smart, easy to house train, very calm in the house when its just us, never destructive , we are at home with him all day and walk him frequently. He also has his younger doodle brother to play with. I was thinking of the gentle lead walker( that goes around his mouth ) to walk him outside. Has any one used one of those? Any other suggestions on this subject. Other then this we love! love! him to pieces!

[Leslie and Halas]

Halas is generally very good, but he also gets really excited around people. I know that our problem is that I'm not consistent with our training. I always make him sit before I let someone pet him, but even if he doesn't jump up, he still stands up and turns in circles. So I think the keys are training, consistency, and rewarding good behavior, although I seem to have a hard time doing this myself.

[Christine Lavallee]

Baxter forgets all his training when people come around, he gets that crazy! But I do agree with you that alot has to do with being consistent on our part, when he was a puppy we found it so adorable, maybe thats when you have to nip in the bud. Thanks for the feedback!

[Nanette de la Torre]

Hi Christine, I too have a Dood who loves to jump and kiss everyone he meets. When folks come into the house, I ask that they walk in without any eye contact with the dog, or physical touch - basically please ignore my maniac. Meanwhile, I have the dog on a slip collar, which gives me full control of the dog. I can then place him in sit stays or whatever and reward. Takes a long time and because we don't have may visitors he does get rusty. When I walk the dogs and someone is walking by I have them sit and leave it. If someone wants to pet the dog I ask that they don't until I have him in a sit or a calm stand. Some good places to practice ss PetsMart, Petco, and even Home Depot. Basically, everytime I take them out I try to do some training.

[Christine Lavallee]

I cant even imagine him at petsmart! Just the thought of it scares me to death, if he wasn't so big and strong it
would not be so bad, I don't even take him to the groomers, we have pet mobile service come to the house, and I have to give him a mild sedative for him to be groomed otherwise he's all cut up from the shavers and it takes 4-5 hours to groom him. A trainer when he was younger recommended taking him to the pet stores with us, when he was younger we had more control. Also these Goldendoodles draw a lot of attention, so if you take them out , people want to come over to you right away. I would love for people to enjoy Baxter like we do at home, it really kinda saddens me. So I am really appreciating all the advise!

[Leslie, Dexter & Kirby]

The gentle leader works really well for us. Dexter has almost 100% stopped jumping on people when he has it on.

When visitors come over, we have started to put him on the GL and leash him for 5 minutes. It has almost totally eliminated the jumping. It's pretty easy to control Kirby - but when both of them are excited at the same time it's chaos :)

[Kay and Tanner.]

Tanner is also very excited when we have visitors come in ...He just loves to greet them ...by jumping up and licking them, I am just hoping he will get better as he gets older...He will be two years old in another couple of weeks...But thats about the only problem that we have with him..He is also 85 pounds..
The Gentle Leader works great on Tanner...We always put the gentle leader on him whenever we take him for a walk.

[Christine Lavallee]

Oh so you know exactly how i feel with your extra large teddy bear! That seems to be the only problem we have with Baxter too, He just turned 2 years old in December. Now I just have to figure how to use this Gentle leader!

[Louise and Toby]

We've got one that gets very excited too. He's 2 1/2 now. These have ALL been very good suggestions and we have tried many of them. Toby does not jump up, thank goodness, but he can be mouthy - he must know this is not good because he almost always goes and gets a toy to carry around while he does his "figure eights" for 10 minutes or so it seems! He used to sprinkle too in his excitement but that has greatly improved. Good luck Christine - I'm sure you will notice some improvement.

[Adrianne Matzkin]

By the time we started Puppy Kindergarten at 3 months, Samantha had already been playing with neighbor's dogs what were bigger than her, and they played like adult dogs. This is was she was used to.
Now we get to Puppy Kindergarten and the trainer was not all impressed that Samantha was playing like a big girl. ShHe suggested, and I listened, to use the gentle leader on her. She hated it and still attempts to get it off but she knows that I won't let her. She walks like a perfect angle when she has it on and doesn't jump; after the 1st attempt she remembers.
funny sidebar story - we had the GL for about a week when we went for our lunchtime potty break (she comes to work with me everyday). We were walking back to office when this older, strange woman stops to pet her. Samantha decided that this woman's long skirt looked like a great place to try and rub the GL off her face and kept rubbing her head between this women's legs - higher and higher. The funny (or sad, depending on how you look at it) is that the woman never a said. IWhen I realized what Samantha was doing i stopped it but I think this woman was enjoying it. YUCK!!!
Samantha is now 11 months old. Her jumping is less and that is because I am insistent on it. I wasn't always and Samantha paid the price for my lack of consistency. She will jump if she meets someone who uses that excited tone of voice "oh, oh, what a beautiful puppy......". I try to stop the human from doing that but that is not so easy so I have to try and control Samantha.

Don't be afraid of PetSmart. Most people will say 'oh, that's okay. She can jump. I love puppies'. That's when I say 'thanks, but she is not allowed to jump'. I usually tick some people off but that is my child and she must follow those rules (if she ever gets to be a certified therapy dog she must stop the jumping). It is a great place to desensitize a puppy. But you must set the rules for your pup and the humans you meet. Try going when they first open. They also sell the gentle leader and hopefully someone there is knowledgable enough to show you how to size it. If not, purchase the one with the DVD.

Consistency and continuity - the name of the game. You must take him out everyday to knew places to practice. Supermarket parking lot, nail salon, the vet - just to say hi.

Thanks for listening - good luck!!

[Janie]

My two are generally well behaved, except when people first come around it takes them about 5 min. to settle down...we are working on this.

[Adrianne Matzkin]

The more I thought about this I would be surprised if there wasn't a Doodle that didn't have this problem at one time or another. They love people!

[Christine Lavallee]

Ok , too the pet store I go tomorrow to buy the gentle leader! Its sounds like a good start. That story about Samantha is hilarious, that's the thing about these doodles they tend to outsmart you after awhile.