Puppy behavior questions??? Get answers from a professional behavior consultant

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Feel free to throw me some questions. Iove to help people out and make your puppy experience as full as it possibly can be!

[Adina P]

There are tons of questions in the group Puppy Madness and anyone can respond...so that's a great place to add your thoughts to the struggles puppy owners have.

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Sandy,

It is most likely that you have not done anything at all to create this problem, and it could be stemming from a variety of things. It is important to correct this because as you mentioned she may get a hold of something that she should not have and in that instance you would have to be able to take it away from her.  I would suggest starting this with her:

when she is having her regular food go up to the bowl and drop good things in, maybe pieces of hot dog or some of the treats she likes but is not overly excited for, do this for about a week. After a week increase the favor-ability of the treat to something she is more excited over, stay right by the bowl throughout her feeding. Then the next week crouch down by the food (being careful at all times) and drop in some highly desirable treats, staying by the bowl throughout still.

keep this up for several weeks to ensure that she knows you are not a threat as far as taking the food bowl away.

 

Start teaching a leave/take; have a few desirable treats in hand and hold your hand out in front of her, be ready to take the treat away along with your hand until she ignores the treat. So hold your hand out in front of her and say "leave" and dont let her have the treat, once she ignores the treat, even giving a distance of 6" or so from the treat, then tell her "take" and give her the treat. Work on this the same way for about a week. This can also be transferred to her food bowl but train this first... lemme know after you get this under control and we can start with the food bowl and teaching her to leave something that she has already gotten a hold of :)

 

Now for the chews get a few of her most favorite chews, different values for each- some more desirable some less. Give her a less desirable chew and exchange the chew for the more desirable chew, do this 3-4 X a day. If you must leash her while she has the chews that way it is easier to grab her and you run less of a risk of her escaping with the chew. Now also start to use the chews in the "leave/take" way as well...

 

Okay, After she has got these down lemme know and I will help you from there on based on how she responds to these protocols.

 

Now as far as understanding why she does this there are may reasons and without knowing her myself I dont want to suggest one thing but the reasons could be: based on litter behavior, could be the way she fought for food with the litter or her mommy. It also could be a bunch of other things but typically this protocol will work. Lemme know how it goes!!! Good luck and give Hattie a kiss for me!

 

Here's my e-mail if you wanna contact me about any question or progress, I am always here to help! [e-mail]

 

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Start out by doing this with the regular food then start adding (after week 2) the yogurt to the food, mixing it in. This will help start her out getting comfortable with or more so used to you dropping the food in and being by the bowl - as a primer. I would try to do this every time you give her food, even if it is on several different occasions throughout the day.

[Ginny Nightingale]

My puppy is gated at one end of the house and has other dogs with him--he is very well behaved at 7 months old and is totally house-trained. I can leave him with the other dogs in the two rooms he is gated into with no problem at all--BUT when I come home or come into those rooms, he always greets me as if he hasn't seen me in years and jumps on me--a  lot. If I turn away, he jumps on my behind. If I knee him or tell him "off" he stops a bit, but not totally--this goes on for at least a minute or two until he calms down. I also own his mom who is three and she has started to jump along with him in order to compete for my attention. She is away for a few days right now though and he hasn't slowed down on the jumping a bit. I have tried stepping gently on his rear paws to discourage him also. Any other ideas?

 

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Okay, this is a good one and fairly easy to work with but time consuming to correct. I would start by having a helper, a person to work with her at the door. Stary by training a boundary at the door, a "sit" or "down" boundary. It will be easier to train the sit boundary first then the down boundary once she has mastered the sit boundary. Have the helper armed with treats (as you can see I use all positive reinforcement), have them leash her and have very very desirable treats in their hand, and have you outside the door, walk in the door and have the helper put her in a sit, reinforce when sitting only. If she starts jumping on you walk out the door. once the helper has her under control again repeat the walking in and having her sit. This is going to be time consuming and it is going to be a pain, try to start this on a weekend or a time frame when you have a helper available and can make sure that every time you either enter the rooms where he is or through the door you have the assistant there to help you. This will help train an alternate behavior, this is a differential reinforcement protocol.

 

Try to work with each dog individually and then together. This is going to take time so be patient, and always end with a positive. That means try not to overwork this all at once, and treat only when the desired behavior is present. I would also throw a sit for everything protocol in... that means sit for attention, sit for food, sit for going outside, etc. I say this would be acceptable because he is well potty trained so it should not interrupt that training at all. Utilize the treats for the "problem behavior" and then use the no attention, no food, no outside without a sit first for everything, I mean even the smallest thing like patting his head!

 

Okay, Lemme know how this goes for the first few weeks and then I will wean you off the treats at the door/gates etc.

[shelly]

Oh Boy!  Have I got a GOOD one for you!  I would LOVE to get inside of Tori's head!  Here's the 'thing' with her... sorry everyone - this must be the upteenth time I have stated this!  Tori either has a fear of strangers or is very territorial.  She is an aussiedoodle.  Whenever someone comes to the door she barks like crazy.  I cannot get her focused on my voice.  I try diverting her attention with treats - NOTHING.. she's fixed on the windows and that is that.  Sometimes... she will bark very aggressively at a visitor (stranger), but back up if they extend their hand to allow her to sniff.  I am constantly getting comments like "wow, most dogs like me". I tell them it really it not personal, but... they believe it is.  She only picks out some people, and not all to bark at. She can hear the UPS truck coming from around the corner (even before I hear it) and tears to the window to bark.  After he drops off the package, she sniffs it crazily and runs back to the window, barks and runs back to sniff the package.  Today I put her out of our house before we had a contractor come.  He came, and left and I let her back in.  She sniffed all around the path he took as he walked through my kitchen and into my living room. She followed his trail and then went to the window and - you- barked....we had a trainer come, but all she did was feed her treats and didn't really help at all...(that's why I asked you if you knew any behaviorists on L.I.).  I do have many video-tapings of her in action.  I have said before that I wanted to post them, but haven't.. I think I will do that tomorrow.  She will bark differently when my extended family comes for visits, then she greets them with kisses and twirls. BUT.. as soon as anyone leaves, out comes "Sybil".  She does her barking ritual and will bark right up to them as they walk out my door, then bark at them from the door and run to the window and bark when they leave.  Could it be that she doesn't want anyone leaving 'her area'?  Sorry for the long post!

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Barking can cause a dog a "high" and this rush of adrenal hormones is naturally reinforcing.making controlling this extremely hard!

I dont want to give you any advice until I know more about the situation. Drop me an email and send me a couple of the videos so I can see the behavior first hand, when people explain behaviors it can often be construed as a different behavior and I want to be sure I am completely aware of what she is doing. When it comes to any potential aggression, fear or phobia behavior I use caution when I cant see the dog and the behavior first hand so drop me a note and the video and I will help you out! [e-mail].

[shelly]

Thanks so much!!! I'll do that today!

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Look forward to hearing from you later today :)

[Madeline and Peanut]

We have an 8 week old mini goldendoodle and would like to know how to play with him without promoting aggressive behavior and without him nipping/mouthing.  When he is playful he mouths and nips us and we try to distract with him with a toy he can chew or we respond by saying ouch and ignoring him until he settles down.  Also, when he bites or chews on the fabric that hangs down from our couch the only way to get him off is to physically open his jaw and take the fabric out of his mouth.  Any recommendations for either of these issues?

[Golden Beauties Driven 2 Doodles]

Okay this is a normal puppy play behavior, they get rough and often wind up destroying things because their hands are actually their mouths and this is how they explore their world.

 

So- use a toy exchange when you are playing with him, dont play tug-o-war at all right now, it will only encourage him to pull things away from you, and destroy them. Do use a time out... but only when he is so wound up he wont listen at all, and the toy exchange does not work!

The time out that means to utilize the crate or a room where when he gets too rough he goes into time out. Now be careful, I like dogs to learn to automatically go into the crate and enjoy being in the crate as many owners need to use the crate for up to and often over a year of the pups life. So here's what we do with the time out- when he starts roughhousing just grab him, stick him in the crate and without yelling or anything (putting a smile on your face as you say timeout helps), say time out. Dont let him out unless he has settled down (or obviously if you know he has to potty).

 

Then train a drop it, this is an easy one but it will take several small sessions to do it. Give him a toy and be armed with treats (very desirable ones) offer the treat while he has the toy and say the words drop it. Do this 3-4 x a day for about a week and he should have it down pat, then wean away from the treats gradually, so take 5 minutes of time to play "drop it" and the first time give the treat, the second no treat the third a treat and randomly give treats, this is a variable schedule and it is a great way to keep him learning that sometimes he will get a treat for dropping it, it will increase the likelihood that he will drop it because he assumes that he may get a treat. Then you will be able to use the words to get him to drop the fabric on the couch as well... Now rather than giving him a treat for dropping the couch fabric give him a toy instead, typically a chew like a nylabone.

 

 

[Madeline and Peanut]

Thank you so much for your input.  This is all new to us and we are trying to find a puppy trainer who can come to our home to help us with the basics and then enroll in a puppy training for socialization as well.  Thanks again!!