Hi,

My Golden is now 5 mth old next week, he has stopped the puppy mouthing nearly and if he goes to chew something he shouldent a sharp "oi" and he dosent touch it. The thing is when i try to stop him doing something he shouldent by voice or holding his collar he turns around and snaps at me, so me reaction is to stand up and egnor him, turn away from him as i have been advised to do, but he jumps up and bites my arms and clothes. He is good the rest of the time and we have just finish 6 weeks of clicker training and excelled in all tasks, but when i correct him for eg when i bend down to pick something up he comes over and bites my head, ears anything he can get hold of, which all ends in me getting my cloths ripped and my arms and hand bitten even drwaing blood, i really though he would grow out of it but he hasent.
We were feeding him royal cannin maxi which the breeder gave us so we kept it up, i ran out and thought i would try hills which gave him awfull wind, so i changed to Burns which he wouldent eat now he is back on the royal cannin, he does seem to be more hyperactive on the royal cannin and has seemed to bite more since eating it, do you think it mite be the food and if so what should i feed him.

A good reason to stop telling him off.  If you are clicker training then you must realise the benefits of using a positive approach.  Everything that he does that you don't want him to can be avoided by either denying him the opportunity or by asking him to do something different instead.

The example you give of him biting your head when you bend down to pick up something could be avoided by teaching a down stay on the other side of the room, putting him into another room or outside first or better still teach him to pick up whatever it is that you want picked up. ;)  And it's a myth that dogs grow out of things - they get better with practice. 
Sally

I would agree with everything Sally has said and although diet may be a factor just changing it in isolation will not effect a "cure".  I don't know what Royal Canin contains, however if it is maize based I would strongly recommend that you change to a variety of food that does not contain maize. If your dog won't eat Burns then there is Naturediet (which is a wet food) or James Wellbeloved is a complete dry and I think most of their varieties do not contain maize.

Thanks for that, you do tend to get stuck in a rut and you carn't see when yo are so closley involved.

The worst thing is when he tries to jump on the bed or furniture when he has never been alowed to, thing is when he about to jump onto your sofa with muddy paws its hard not to be negative with him.

How would you advise me to be more positive about this?

I will try the james wellbeloved food i was told by a lady with a golden herself that is all she feeds her dogs.

Shut the lounge door. ;)

When something you don't want has already happened, you should call him to you, ask him to do something you *do* want him to do (like 'sit' or 'bed') and praise him for that, unless you think he's doing the 'bad' stuff for attention - in which case cover the beds with something that doesn't matter and COMPLETLEY ignore him - not looking at him, talking about him etc - treat him as if he doesn't exists!  Try and not let him get into the position where he can do the bad stuff will help too - so close doors, use baby gates, watch him like a hawk and remind him of what you do want as you see him showing an interest.  Dogs don't understand the concept of being 'told off' after they've done something - all they learn is that humans can be unpredictable and they may need to defend themselves against them :(

Just to  add as well that once you get in the habit of seeing "naughty" dogs as simply showing a behaviour, it is much easier to deal with and mentally sort out :D just as managing/ignoring/training at the appropriate time and place can work too ;)

And not letting the dog have a chance to get into a habit works wonders, which is where the managing bit can come in. Eventually the dog does the alternative thing, the thing you want, because that has been practised and has become second nature.

Lindsay
X

Thanks Lindsay, it is so hard not to get angry at Harvey, and to see it as a behaviour which it is.
He is a lovely dog and i don't want people to be scared of him as it upsets me.

I will let you know how i get on!!

Do you thing it is the "shouting" that winds him up? Or is it being stopped from doing things? If it is the former, you could try leaving a trailing lead on him in the house. In that way you could get him off bed, couch etc without physical contact, and without using your voice. He may not respond quite as badly to that. Does he go to obedience classes? It may be a useful source of advice and support, and may help you evaluate the reasons that he is challenging you. Most of all it should show you coping strategies to nip this in the bud.
Cathy

I have put a short lead on him and that does help, he does seem to respond badly being told "no".
All day yesterday after speaking on here all i have done is egnor the bad and praise the good, he tried to climb on the bed in the evening as i was having a lie down i would normally say no and get him down by his collar which would then lead to him jumping up and biting me, so i turned over and egnored him and he got down and when he did i praised him then he never tried it again until this morning but he got down and we praised him and he just lay on the floor by the bed.

That's great Tracey :)  Keep it up, and remember that because he's always got what he wanted in the past, he may try and up it (it's called an 'extinction burst') but keep doing what you're doing and he'll quickly get the message - he sounds like a smart pupster :)

The hard thing i find is getting everbody else to do the same, my parents and inlaws to be along with grandparents and boyfriend all seem to think that if he misbehaves he shound get a smack on the nose, and think why it should be diffrent nowadays from then becase there dogs never misbehaved and it never hurt them. It makes my mad that they don't want to lishen to me and what i read upon about dogs and behavour and i feel it falls on deaf ears as i don't want to spend all my time hearing people say he is naughty and i shouldent be so soft with him as they don't see egnoring him as a way to get him stop, so this time i am putting my foot down and they are going to do this to make sure it works, i have printed all that you guys say and make them read it but i just hope they help me keep it up, i feel like im nagging them all the time but i don't want him to be the way he is and its time to make a change.
I feel better now i've had a moan, it's so nice to hear of people who are so positive about the dogs as i am!!

Tracey,  Don't just ignore bad behaviour, try to help him to get it right and prevent him getting into situations where he goes wrong.  As digger says be prepared for things to get worse before they get better and make sure you tell the family why it is happening otherwise they will just say "see it isn't working".  You MUST get them to stop smacking him or he may start to fight back and then the consequences don't bear thinking about.  I can't do links but have a look here for more info on why punishment doesn't work that they may be prepared to read.
http://www.scallywagsdogs.com/punish.html
http://www.noogenesis.com/malama/punishment.html
Sally

:) Do let us know how it goes, it's always good to follow what is happening. I agree with Sally, you do need to show him what you want and help him to get it right. I tend to use my voice inflection a bit too, high squeaky for praise and so on. Don't forget to provide chews and stuffed kongs etc to keep him busy and tired, stuffed smoked bones are good too. A tired dog may be less trouble :D

If the rest of the family are smacking him on the nose, it will be confusing for him and doubtless he will show apologetic body language but not always know what the smack is for. It may also cause him to fight back if he has enough and to be hand shy etc. May well be the reason why he bites at you...

Lindsay
X

Thanks you guys, to get him to stop i was distracting him with a toy or treat, then i got him to do a nice sit then i gave it to him this worked ok do you think this is ok?

That's okay Tracey but beware of him learning to do the 'bad' behaviour to get the toy.  Try to predict when he might be thinking of misbehaving and get in quick with the sit and reward and teach him loads of other things to do as well so that he doesn't get bored with 'sit'.

yeah i see your point with that. What i also have is some discs that i got from my trainer which we throw on the floor next to him to stop him when he starts, which works a treat thing is you don't always have them on you when he starts. What do you think of this method??

not a lot

Do you not think the use of noise as a distraction is very good method?

I agree Sally.

Why??

If you read your thread right through from the beginning the glimmer of an answer may start to come through................... :)

how whould you get him off the suit ?

I would teach the dog the difference between "on" and "off" , so that neither is negative and ensure that he had an extremely comfy bed to lie on instead of the sofa and make it more worth his while to be on the bed than on the sofa :D

That would be my answer too. :)