My nearly 5 month old boxer has in the last couple of days started to jump up and try to bite us if we are walking around the living room. It only seems to be for short periods of time and around late afternoon. This evening she had 'aquired' a tissue and as my 15 year old tried to take it of her (using the 'drop it' command) she lunged at her and bit her breaking the skin on her thumb. I dont know if these two scenarios are connected and any advise/ways to deal with this would be grateful.
As she is so young i tend to take her for a half an hour walk usually in the morning, but i was wondering if i broke it into two smaller walks then this may help with the late afternoon outbursts or are they not connected with this type of behaviour? 

Well, it sounds like your dog is getting out of hand and not quite getting the picture that you and your human family are the ones who are suppose to be in charge. When he jumps up and tries to bite, do you get the feeling that it is aggressive or is he playing too roughly? Either way, he needs to be told off, "NO BITE!!!!" My Dobe, if I play too excitably, which I try not to do, but if he gets too exuberant will on occasion jump up when we're outside and running, and grab my arm, never too hard, never broke skin, but even that hurts and is NOT acceptable to me. So, I shout, "NO BITE!" He knows what no bite means. And he knows I mean it! Then he settles down and I tell him how wonderful he is.

There are some other things you can do in the meantime to teach him that he is not running things in your household. Look up "nothing in life is free" on a search. Go through Google.com. You've taught the drop it command. That is good. Are you working every day a little bit on other obedience? Just the act of doing that helps let the dog know you're the leader, not to mention the direct benefits of the learning these skills and basic good manners.

Yes, I think the dog could use a little more exercise. I'd do what you're doing twice a day, or 20 minutes of some good rip roaring twice a day. When you say you go for a half hour walk, is that on a leash? Let your dog run and play and get that energy out. Don't worry so much about hurting the bones. It's the repetative, excessive exercise that is not good or high jumping and landing hard on the legs. But running, sniffing, stopping, turning, bounding around is good for them. If I didn't give my Doberman sufficient exercise, his behavior would suffer too.
Just be careful about bloat and don't have him run hard for an hour before or two hours after he eats.

Anyhow, that's what I would do and what I have done and I don't have a problem with my dog doing that. And he doesn't have any deep seated, buried, psychological torment from it either. So, don't let anybody scare you with that. Be decisive and firm, letting him know without doubt what is expected of him. And rewarding and fair when he complies. 

Carrie

Generally speaking i wouldn't be too worried; its excellent that you have taught the dog todrop on command. I wonder if the dog lunged expecting play, or excitement, or because it wanted the tissue back?  Also some dogs will get upset if the owner uses aggressive body language (not saying you did but just mentioning it) or shouts and may react. I would set up some training situations with not very high value toys or objects and do "swopsies" for a tasty treat (using the drop command that you have already taught) and this should teach the dog that it is the best thing it can do, to give up articles, as it is highly rewarding. I have taught my dog to Bring an article directly into my hand. She often brings me things but its something we both enjoy and she needs to do stuff around the house! <g>

My dog too would jump up and get excited and nippy when an adolescent. It's quite usual but as you say, not acceptable. I taught her an incompatible behavour (ie sit) and rewarded well, also stood very still so iwas boring. My view is that if you react the dog will find it exciting and want to carry on. Whereas if you give the dog something to do instead, such as Sit, you have not only solved the problem butg also gained control. It's not easy when the dog is bouncing around but plenty of training and the dog will start to sit almost automatically, as a reaction, which is the standard you want to get to. I would use food rewards to practise the sits. Keep the food handy and give plenty of rewards and praise when the Sit happens during the exciteable episodes.

If on the other hand you feel there was some genuine aggression as the dog lunged, you may need to see someone, possibly a referral via your vet to assess the dog's temperament etc, but i suspect it was just normal young dog over excitement. Dogs as you may know often do get "silly times" where they will do a wall of death round the living room or go completely OTT (sometimes it calms down as they mature but not always!). I think it may be a good idea, as you mentioned, to split the walks and also, if yoiu don't already, interact on the walks and practice recall, sit, and play a few games so she really responds to you.

Good luck :)

Lindsay
X

What do you feed and when and do these episodes only happen at a particular time of day and if so how long after she has eaten?

She is still on burns puppy bites which she has dry with a few spoons of boi yoghurt about 10am and then she has dry again about 6pm mixed with a can of sardines.(She stopped her dinner time feed herself so i started giving the breakfast time feed later so that the gap wasnt too large inbetween meals and upped the quanity) She seems to act like this mainly in the late afternoon.

I think that's a great way to stop the jumping up....asking for a sit. How can they jump when they're sitting? However, I'm not sure that teaches them that jumping and biting is a behavior you don't want. It may be simply averting their attention or avoiding the jumpping up. And then next time, they'll try it again...unless they simply grow out of it with age. I've tried that too in the beginning and it worked each episode, but he'd do it again because he didn't know that I was displeased with the jumping up and nipping. He just thought I wanted him to sit. So what? When he got the idea that no, I didn't want him doing that, it came to a screeching halt. He stopped jumping up at a very young age, where lots of puppies are still doing that. Like I said, only if he gets way too exciteable, which is rare and my fault for playing too crazy, he may forget himself, but that's the exception, not the rule. I didn't have to be harsh or mean. I simply told him firmly, "no." Then when he got down and collected himself, I praised him to show the contrast between what I didn't like and what I did....what he was formerly doing...jumping/biting and calming down and not jumping up and biting, just trotting along a playing in other ways.

Carrie

Hi Sweety

Lindsay's advice of training in an incompatible behaviour is excellent and picked up very quickly by most dogs.

Exercise should be be given sparingly to puppies of large breeds in order to avoid skeletal damage. 25  - 30 mins a day is plenty especially if combined with lots of 2/3 min training sessions and fun play sessions in the garden.

An attack of the zoomies is quite normal with dogs of all ages, particularly exuberant youngsters of the more boisterous breeds, especially around this time.  You are feeding a good quality food so there should not be any dietary link.

Good luck and have fun.

I agree with tohme, please don't let her have unlimited exercise you are doing just right with what she is having. 

As you know when she is going to be at her worse, could you try some training sessions just before that time.  They don't have to be formal, even teaching a new trick will use her brain and this will tire her out far more than off lead exercise.

Enjoy her
Sandra

I don't have, nor have I ever had any big problems with my dogs' behavior, temperament, happiness or health in the past 40+ years. I've had large dogs, small dogs and inbetween dogs. I've had meek dogs and more dominant type breeds. So, what I'm doing works too.

Best wishes,

Carrie

Thanks all
We have been trying the ignore and stand still routine but this is sometimes difficult for the kids if she is jumping quite high. I also thought by encouraging her to sit (and then reward) it would distract her attention to something more beneficial to her. This seems to be working really well when visitors arrive and it also stops her from sprinkling on their feet :-) We'll carry on with this and hopefully it will become less of an issue.