My 1-yr old husky males like to jump on me and bite my arm to get his attention when he wants to play. As soon as I get up and start walking towards the backdoor to play with him he stops biting. When I go outside to play with him and sit down after a few minutes he runs up to me and starts biting my arm. It's cute that he wants to play with me so much though I need to change this behavior. He doesn't really do this with anyone else.

Does anyone have any suggestions for how I can reprogram his way of communicating that he wants to play with me so that instead of biting or jumping on me he does something different?

Thanks.

It sounds like you're inadvertently rewarding the behavior When he jumps and bites to play, you walk to the back door to go outside and play- so he's getting what he wants. You can try one or both of the following (keep in mind no one method works for every dog,) 1. When he bites/jumps- completely ignore him and LEAVE. Walk into a bedroom/bathroom and close the door, go inside etc. This way he will learn, well I jumped and bit 300x before and it worked... wth? And he will have to figure out another way to get your attention, which brings us to #2. Teach him to "get his toy." My husky had similar issues to yours when he was younger. Now I can get him all riled up and wrestle around with him- and he actually doesn't want to, he will actually bring me a toy- like "hey, lets play with this!" Which is exactly what I wanted. It really all depends on what you want, and then be black and white with the consequences of his actions. He WILL get it, just hang in there!

When he bites you, ever, for any reason, I'd give him a neck scruff correction so he yelps, then walk away and ignore him. Thats dangerous behavior even if it has innocent intent. During the adjustment time I'd recommend that you be the one that initiates play, and not within a few minutes of him biting you for sure.

It should be a simple solution, will take a few tries and willpower but it will work.

Solution is simple. Don't let him do it.

If my dog gets physical with me, I immediatly get physical with him. When he learns he can't overpower you he'll not do it again.

Don't hurt the poor dog though. My dog used to have a jumping problem. Verbal command and whatnot never worked. He stopped doing it when I told all my friend to just walk into him and push him off physically.

He fell on his back a couple times and stopped doing it. I did the same with the mouthing. I'd use my hand and mouth him back harder. he realised everytime he's try to bite someone he'd get bit himself.

Just don't let yourself be the victim.

Okay, so I saw this one over the weekend and was hoping some others would comment, but I can't stand to wait any longer.

First of all, don't scruff your dog until he yelps. There are a couple reasons this is a terrible idea, first of all, yelp means pain and fear, and quite frankly most dogs can take a pretty high amount of pain before they will actually yelp, especially a 1 year old and especially an action coming from an owner, vs. another situation. The only time Dizzy ever yelps, is if I accidently step on his foot, hard, while going down the stairs (and we wrestle and I even will 'scruff' him in play, which leads to my second point)! Secondly this is a bad idea, because if he bites you in play, he's going to think that you are 'biting' him back in play (many dogs bite the scruff in play), so even if he yelps, it's going to be similar when another dog gets too rough in play and causes a yelp. What he would expect if he yelps, would be for you to back off from the play situation not him. Plus it will only serve to increase his excitement level, and lower the bite threshold and if you do it continually with frustration or anger, it's going to create fear, and more excitement in him.

Secondly, I think what Rundown is referring to is called yielding, teaching your dog to yield space to you. I can see the benefit of teaching this (I taught my pup this as well). I think its useful, but I think in this situation, there are some other things to teach your pup that will also be beneficial and not only help with his behavior, but will also build your bond with him. I use yielding when I need Diz to move out of my way for some reason (laying on the floor in a bad spot, or something).

RigbyJek offers great advice of walking away and ignoring him when he bites. When my puppy gets overly excited and starts jumping and play biting, I ask for an alternative behavior, sit, and if he does it, I whip out his favorite tug toy and get him involved in an exciting, high energy game of tug. This is a great alternative to biting you, because he still gets to bite and play with you. Win/win. So, when Diz gets all wound up with play jumping and biting (he used to be really bad about this, but it's disappearing), I ask for the sit. When he complies, he gets a super intense game of tug and chase. So, we tug, I let him win and then chase him around for the toy. Or I tease him with the toy and run, initiating a game of chase, then tug and let him win the toy, and chase him. Usually I have 2 or 3 so when he wins one, I can pull out another one, and rotate them, I always let him win. Rope toys work great for Dizzy, but use whatever you puppy likes. If he ignores my sit command, I shake my head and walk away. To him, me shaking my head is similar to saying, 'sorry charlie, not gonna happen.' Oddly enough, he learned that in a very unplanned way. When he was learning his basic commands, if he 'guessed' wrong I would shake my head (not on purpose, just a mannerism I have), so now if I shake my head, he knows the reward is not coming.

I would also work on eye contact. I started doing the exercise below with Dizzy the other day and it's having a very interesting effect on him generally. What I have noticed, is that with just a few minutes of practicing this daily, he's starting to make eye contact with me when he wants something. So, say we're out for a walk and he sees one of his favorite sniffing spots. I see that he is attracted to it, so I stop, wait for the eye contact, at first it took 2-3 minutes of silently standing there for him to make eye contact. The second he does, I praise and run him over to whatever he was interested in. Now, after just a few days of working with this, he usually does it in less than 10-15 seconds. The general effect it's having is that he is much calmer and more relaxed and he's starting to be able to keep it together a little better when he sees something really interesting, like a squirrel or another dog. I'm not sure exactly why it has make him more calm and relaxed, but I'm not complaining. Anyway, you could probably use this when your dog wants to play. Calmly wait for him to settle and give you eye contact before you play with him, just make sure to give him the play reward when he does it though.



Final thought, your dog is not trying to make you a victim, your dog is trying to make you a friend. He just doesn't know the appropriate way to do it.

One other thing that may help, is that I have a basket of toys for him on the floor. If I see him going to the basket and pulling out toys, I initiate play with him. It's helped him learn that as a cue to get me to play.

Something I forgot to mention is that Dizzy is very mouthy with me in general, and I actually don't discourage it in certain circumstances. He greets me when I come home by gently mouthing my wrist or hand while talking, and a lot of times uses it as a way to show connection and affection to me. He will sometimes gently just hold my hand in his mouth and lick and slightly bite. With him, it's a bonding thing and he only does it with me and my husband.

wpskier222 wrote:

First of all, don't scruff your dog until he yelps. There are a couple reasons this is a terrible idea, first of all, yelp means pain and fear, and quite frankly most dogs can take a pretty high amount of pain before they will actually yelp, especially a 1 year old and especially an action coming from an owner, vs. another situation. The only time Dizzy ever yelps, is if I accidently step on his foot, hard, while going down the stairs (and we wrestle and I even will 'scruff' him in play, which leads to my second point)! Secondly this is a bad idea, because if he bites you in play, he's going to think that you are 'biting' him back in play (many dogs bite the scruff in play), so even if he yelps, it's going to be similar when another dog gets too rough in play and causes a yelp. What he would expect if he yelps, would be for you to back off from the play situation not him. Plus it will only serve to increase his excitement level, and lower the bite threshold and if you do it continually with frustration or anger, it's going to create fear, and more excitement in him.

Just to follow up on that piece - it's what I do and none of those things described happen with me and Chuck. It's a short term correction that has produced long term, safe results. It hasn't created any additional fear, excitement, etc.  I'm not saying that this feedback is wrong but all dogs and owners are different and it isn't accurate for my circumstance.

I dont like to cause my dog pain but I see short term physical corrections that permanently change behavior that could otherwise really hurt someone very much worth it. If it resulted in some of the issues described by wpskier above, that would change my view, but those things havent happened for me.

That's the great thing about these forums though, you can get a lot of opinions that directly contradict each other and decide which seems to fit your circumstances best

Quick reminder about the up down votes too - while you may think my methods are harmful a very large percentage of people disagree, including the breeder of my dog who I found via multiple references on this forum! It's a disagreement on training methods, which should not result in a loss of reputation points:  

Treats are not...

Quote :

-Something to take away when someone posts a training method that differs from your own. (So long as a training method isn't dangerous, misleading or harmful, there is no reason to take away a treat. There is more than one way to do everything and our forum is about education and owners making the best decisions for themselves and their dogs.)