I posted a message earlier this week and Lynn who kindly offered to chat through the problem - I have emailed you and posted back to this forum but as yet haven't heard from you. I know you must be busy but I am quickly getting to my wits end let alone how much more battering my body can take - today we had a record 3 outbursts and this was after I thought we were making some progress. If you see this post please contact me or if there is anyone else out there with advice or the name of a good behaviourist in the Sudbury,Suffolk area that would be great.

Argos do some great tall dog gates you can put across your doorways. You can put her out the room without totally excluding her and give yourself some space.
Why don't you also consider a basket style muzzle you can put on her to protect yourself.
My own way of dealing with that behaviour would be to anticipate an assault and grab a handful of loose skin at the bottom of her cheeks on each side of her face as she came in to me, and lift her front paws off the ground, giving a firm 'NO'. Holding her firmly like that means she is unable to bite me should she react aggressively. I would then march her out still holding her like that and put her either outside or out of the room at least.
Outbursts like she is doing to you is unacceptable, dangerous and needs to be stopped at once!
Lara x

HI

It is just possible that if you have been implementing stuff to stop her, she may be exhibiting extinction behaviour, which is basically a sort of last burst of frustration before she stops. I do hope you are able to get it sorted, if you are very concerned and see no light at the end of the tunnel, sort of thing, consider getting intouch with a reputable behavourist who will come to your home and show you how to rect and what to do. Good luck :)

Lindsay

Hi Vodka
I would do as Lara says and if you can't put her out the room ,have you considered a crate /cage - i have one for my dobe and although its not a punishment thing it is great for time out
Do you have any warning of these lunges at all ?? Could you arm yourself with a water squirter and when she starts to lunge give a big no and a squirt ( the shock alone should stop her in her tracks )
HTH
Liz

Hi, if you visit the site www.apdt.co.uk you will find classes and behavourists in your area, hope this helps.

Hi Vodka, I would not recomend a behaviouist UNLESS they offer you written contract stateing exactly what reslut their services will have.
The result is quite obvious, you have explained what the problem is, that is what you want stopped and ANY reputable person who you employ will without hesitation sign a contract to give you what you want.

Remember they are an employee of yours or mine and we employ them for a specific purpose, we do not employ them to hear excuses why we have paid them and no result has been achieved.

Personaly, after 9 months of behaviourists classes I know what they are like, I would not have one near my dog, if they made out an appropriate contract then I would. If you look around this board and any board on the net you will see failure, after failure, after failure of behaviourists.

I counted the first 9 posts on this boeard about 4 nights ago all the dogs with obedience problems were from backgrounds with positive traing methods were used and of those 3 were aggression problems that makes 33% of dogs from positive training backgrounds have aggression problems and the rest are out ofcontrol, just check out on this very board, there is only ONE positive result I ahev read, I mean seriously positive, and that is Darren, if you read his post under the general thread called '"trainer needed bromley" or something like that, all these classes and individuals call themselves behaviouists.

The word behaviourist means nothing it is not a recognised profession and they range from anything from a couple of weeks correspondence course to a couple of years academic course, with about 6 weeks actualy dealing with dogs, they are taught to pass exams that does not equate with knowing anything about dogs, it's like an art degree you have passed the exams your not an artist. Most manage about 6 weeks course a large % of which are correspondence. At the end of the day it is results which count and there is no indication I have seen on the net of any success, just look around this site and se for yourself, so guarunteed work or don't part with money, they are your employee make them work for the wages.

Organisations such as APDT are no different to organisations representing builders, garage mechanics, and anything similar, they are a sort lets get together and make it look good, beyond that they have no meaning, so my advice is no contract no job! hope this helps.

There is a body called The British Institute of Professional Dog Trainers - I believe that they have a high standard of training and examination for members, but do not profess to be 'behaviourists'.

Daisy

Hi Daisy, I saw something like that a couple of weeks ago when I was wondering what way to go but I don't remember much about it except it was very different from the rest of the stuff around, it sounded good, I didn't see anything shouting about 'postive' and 'kind' all these are are commercial persuasive terms designed to pull in buisness. I can only say that when I spoke to this trainer I knew I was talking to a true pro, no messing about, no oh yes I'll take you, he wants to assess me first, no assesment fee and on top of that he sent a copy of his contract and guaruntee, I never heard of a guaruntee before, thank god people are moveing forward instead of this feeding ducks in the park type non-training.

Quite a few members of the APDT are members of the BIPDT and vice versa :)

I also think it is utterlu stupid to offer a guarantee in dog training - now that really is a gimmick for the gullible

NO trainer can guarantee a dog will do this, that and the other, especially in a set time period - would he put this guarantee on a Malamute, a Pomeranian , a Belgian and a Dachshund, and an independent breed such as a Borzoi or a Saluki? I'm sorru but if anything is designed to pull in business it is a "guarantee" in dog training!!! Good grief!!!

Lindsay

I have seen MANY posts on another board from your prospective trainer - and I really don't think he needs this constant advertising on a forum that he does not visit and has no time for :(

No trainer can guarunatee, what you rally mean is Lindsy that no trainer with your level of knowledge can, but that really speaks of your own level of knowledge and not that of others.

Sorry, yapyap, but Lindsay is quite right - NO trainer can guarantee success every time. All they can guarantee is that they will try their best. That's life.

Well if he cannot then he will loose with me taking into account I get;

1. A foundation lesson at assesment.

2. An opitonal assesment midweek that first week at expenses only

3. Lesson 1 one week after the assesment.

4 Four days after that if I have not emailed him and cancelled any more lessons I have nothing left to pay ( it means I have paid petrol costs that far )

5. Before the begining of the second lesson I agree or otherwise that I wish to contiunue.

6. If I agree I want to continue I sign the contract if I disagree than I pay a small amount, written in advance, BECAUSE I did not cancell after the 4th day after the first lesson.

Quite obviously this is someone who does know what he is talking about and quite obvious some on here are not up to this level.

But as I keep saying look at this board and all the aggession from positive trained dogs, look at the lack of control, if anyone saw my first bitch prior to haveing that trainer in she behaved like any of the dogs on here except she did not bite, what I find interesting is no one is saying why this Weim is biteing, I know why and I am not a trainer or a behaviourist just a pet owner and the answere is quite obvious, yet those who claim to be behaviourists have so far not even stated the obvious.
THAT in itself tells me never employ a behaviourist they do not say why there is so much aggresion from dogs trained in postive methods and they do not say what to do because that as well is beyond their knowledge..

There is one very good reason why no-one here is saying why this Weim is biting - it's because no-one here has seen him, his behaviour leading up to the biting, his body positioning before, during and after the biting, his past history, etc etc. There are very many causes of biting, and the wrong "cure" will do no good and may well do harm.

You say you know why this dog is biting. Could you enlighten the rest of us, please?

Jeanigeni

In the most basic possible terms, the behaviour of the Weim is positive or reward behaviour. As such repetition reinforces the behaviour making its recurrence more likely, as can be seen this is happening more and more. It then sees the owner running from it ( trying to put a barrier between it ) making the owner prey.
The dog ignores NO which means the dog has gained dominance, NO is not enforced and consequently to the dog it means yes and because of the dominance the dog sees the owners as low ranking pack members which have no say in things..
The reward behaviour is continued by the dog and is reinforced at every manifestation because no stimulus is issued which the dog experiences as negative, in common sense terms it gets away with it, the owners are receiving negative stimuli from the dog with their consent..
A negative stimulus would make the behaviour negative to the dog, instead of positive which it is at the moment, no animal repeats behaviour which is not to its advantage or which has no beneficial consequences.
An animal only performs repetitive behaviour by the consequences it receives, in this case it has taken over the house and loves it, it is reward behaviour.
Because no stimulus negative to the dog has been issued it will continue to exhibit this behaviour, it is rewarding itself, operant behaviour. It’s quite normal behaviour for some dogs, nothing out of the ordinary and as I have said before about 35% of behaviourist trained dogs exhibit aggressive behaviour of some kind, more than a coefficient so positive training makes many dogs aggressive, this weim is just one of them and above are the reasons.
The real problem is that the owners are not issuing a stimulus which is negative to the dog, if they did on every manifestation it would cease to be reward behaviour, because of the consequences of the behaviour and it would stop.

Hi yapyap,
I'm sure the owners are glad you can reassure them that their dog isn't deaf (to ignore commands) or have a physical or mental problem that might cause this behaviour.

Where did you study to have learned all this?

I agree Jeangenie :)

Yap yap, you assume I am a dog trainer - I'm not in fact. Or at least, not in the way you mean ;)

Lindsay

YOu talk of a negative stimulus - what would you call a negative stimulus, Yap yap?

Lindsay

A punishment or negative stimulus means anything the dog ( animal including human ) experiences as haveing no benefit to it, that is its definition.
A reward or positive stimulus is anything the dog (animal, including human ) experiences as haveing benefit to it.
The definitions of 'reward' or 'positive stimulus' - 'punishment' or 'negative stimulus' are not my definitions they are standard psycholgy terms and are technical terms.
They are currently used as commercialy persuasive words, desgned to emotionaly orientate people towards one commercial product and away from another, just two of many basic commercial advertising terms used in commercial advertising and promotions.

Yap Yap

You seem very knowledgeable about your prospective new trainer and the methods he uses and from your posts it sounds as if you have a thorough understanding of how this trainer works to achieve his results so I am surprised that you need his services. Unless of course you are actually the trainer in question?

Lisa
xx

I would love him to guarantee that level of compliance from a breed like my Norwegian Elkhounds. They have been used successfully for their current job for at least a 100 years, and yet in that time no one has taught an Elkhound to reliably jump to it just because they are told to!

Also you are also failing to take into account the competence, or often incompetence of the owner who is the one that will have to train the dog!

There are no quick fixes. Wqith all the caqnine disciplines, jobs that dogs do for which they are usually purpose bred, and still there is a high failure rate as regards reaching the required standard, be it Guide Dog, Police Dog, Obedience competitior or any other canine sport. Such is life.

Of course every owner should be abole to train their dog to have good manners when it is under their direct controil. As for when a dog is off lead and has the oprion to obey or not, then a far different set of paramenters are at work. Natural Instincts vs Habit to carry out actions given certain commands (Conditioning/Training), also the respect and position that the dog and owner have. All these are extremely variable.

This is one reason that training courses where a dog is sent away without the owner are largely of little use. Except in an already trained dog, who is having it's natural aptitude for a task trained up, as in Gundogs. The owner will of course have to learn the commands and w8ill already have trained and have a proper relationship with the dog. Even so I am sure the trainer gets a better/sharper response thatn the owner of lesser experience/skill.

My trainer who takes classes to help owners train their pet dogs, has often shown her skill compared to the owbners lack of it. She has sometimes shown a frustrated owner that the dog is not at fault, and will carry out the actions asked if it knows what the owner wants, or has sufficient respect, if it is choosing to disobey. She can put the dog thorugh it's paces, and back it goes to the owner and it no longer does!

Vodka

I'm short of time just now so can't go into any detail re your problem. However, if I were you then the first thing I would be doing is contacting the breeder. It is very difficult to give the advice you require over a forum and without seeing the dog or knowing more about her. Every dog is different and as you know weimaraners can be dominant if not kept firmly but gently in check. There is a big difference between being firm and being harsh and you need to learn what those differences are. Your breeder should know you, your dog and the breed so give them a call and let us know how you get on.

I have 2 weimaraners and depending on what they were doing to test me, when they were doing it and how they were doing it would depend on how I dealt with it. Sometimes I would redirect their attention onto something else e.g. when my boy was mounting cushions I would distract him into doing something else rather than telling him off, however when he was mouthing me quite badly I would say the word "NO" in a stern growly voice. There are a number of things you can do to stop this problem from getting any worse, your weimar is not the first to do this and most certainly won't be the last so try to stay calm and not give her the impression that it is worrying you :-) Also weimaraners really hate to be ignored so if you can ignore her it should help. If you haven't already then buy the book "The Essential Weimaraner" by Patsy Hollings, it's worth it's weight in gold IMO.

Best Wishes.
Claire.

Hi. This is my first time responding to any messages, but felt that I had to respond to your plea. I also have a 6 mth weimaraner bitch and she too has recently started lunging at me! I've finally decided that it is simply her (rude) way of trying to get me to play. I don't have any other dogs and think that she is just trying to play with my like another pup. My trainer agrees.

I'm impressed that you've managed to keep your weim off the sofa, I'm afraid mine wore me down!

I've tried shouting at my pup, pushingher off etc. but it just makes her more excited. I've tried physically restraining her and holding her close to me to calm her and whilst this works, I was advised not to do this incase she bites.

The only solution I've found is dragging my pup into the kitchen by her collar (where her day bed is) and shutting the door firmly on her whilst in a loud deep voice telling how annoyed I am. I then leave her in there (preferably with the light off) for about 5 minutes. Apparently any longer and she'll forget why she's in there. I then open the door, don't look at her and return to the lounge. I don't speak to her at all at this point to show my disgust. My pup then generally returns quietly to the lounge and curls up on my lap after licking me to apologise. Sometimes I have to put her in the twice if she comes out of the kitchen and tries it on again.

I am hoping that this bizarre behaviour will disappear as quickly as it's arrived. I'm told it's just adolescence - thank goodness I have no children!!

I hope this is helpful. Sorry for the long message.

Vodka
Poor you!
I assume that Lynn is busy on discover dogs stand at crufts. So give her time.
I live in Norfolk which is not that far from Suffolk.
If you were just down the road I would come and see you.
This is a common problem it would seem with mouthing pups in Weimaraners. You do have to be stern with them. Some people do the following:
Spray water into the face, or growl, say ouch, or scream, put dog onto its side straight away and dont let them up until you say so, smack them hard on the nose. (the later is not one that I would do but works for some people).
I usually remove their teeth, then lay them down on the side to stop it.
All puppies find out their own worlds by their mouth, they can really hurt and the older they get the more it hurts.
I would contact the breeder and tell them first of all, as most Weimaraner breeders are helpful and want to help you.
Contact me on
silvestre-weimaraners@thehomestead.freeserve.co.uk
I dont know if I can help but may be able to locate someone from the Weimaraner club close to you that would pop over and see your dog and give some info. Also for a behaviourist try your vets as they usually have info on this. Their are good training centres in Essex/Suffolk. He needs some interesting things to take his mind off what he is doing.
How long do you leave him on his own each day?
I have found that Weimaraners that are left home alone for more than 2-3 hours do exactly what you are describing. Quite often it can be down to boredom and then they are so pleased to see you they show this kind of behaviour.
Hope all goes well for you. It is hard when they start to do stuff like this.
Have you joined the Weimaraner forum with experienced Weimaraner owners on. Their is lots about the mouthing pup on this site. That may just help you. Also you will find out you are not alone with this problem. E-mail me if you would like an invite.
Nutkin.