Hi, this is my first post having been browsing the website for a while and seeing the great advice people pass on hoping that someone can help me.

We have a lovely 8 month old mongrel who is a joy to live with most of the time.  He's very calm, gets on with other dogs, people etc.  I take him to obedience training and puppy agility, both once a week and he seems to be doing well.

The problem we are having with him, which is only occasional, is that sometimes he seems to get overexcited when on the lead and then starts jumping up at either me or OH and biting our arms and generally going bonkers.  He did this when we first had him and I was unsure how to handle it until it happened in training class and the trainer intervened and made a growling noise and yanked pups lead which sort of shocked him into stopping the behaviour.

Anyway, from then on he stopped doing it and I thought oh great he's grown out of it, but recently it's started up again, as I say just occasionally but always when other people are around and he's on lead.  The biting is starting to get quite painful as well so that's the most worrying part.  It seems to be triggered by excitement but I'm not sure how to handle it and calm him down.  Growling at him and yanking the lead seems over the top to me and I'm not very convincing at it anyway.

He did it again in the training class last week and another trainer stamped the ground and growled at him and he did stop but is this the kindest method, as I say, generally he is a sweet little thing that everyone seems to adore but just has this 'demon' side.

Thanks for any help and advice you can pass on.

I have an 8 year old who was like this at 8 1/2 months when I had her back as she has a strong character and had not been disciplined.

You do need to show him you will not tolerate such lack of respect, and I don't feel your trainer has been harsh, a short sharp reprimand and then carry on in a positive manner is perfectly OK, as he is being rude and the behaviour is unacceptable.

If he did this to another dog that he lived with he wouldy get a short sharp warning snap or growl too, and the other dog would stalk off in disgust.

My Jozi wills till occasionally jump up and do this when she is in high spirits, it is usually the other dogs that get this and I do have to stop and sternly remind her of what is what.  she thinks it very funny and has a huge grin on her face, and she is 8 years old now.

I imagine the growling at him is what the mother would do and presume thats why it works as he is only at baby at 8m.

You are getting into the junior stage where everything that they have hopefully learned seems to go out of the window and they revert back ' trying it on'

If he is biting the lead try spraying it with bitter apple or something that tastes 'orrible as for the biting a loud convincing 'OW  that hurt can work wonders, he is pushing the boundries so you need to be convincing when telling him off.

does the training continue when you get home ...dont rely on once a week at the training class!!

If he is very active give him things to do to use up his energy ie: sit /stay/ down and use up that brain power as mental stimulation tires them just as much as physical exercise.

HTH

Roni

Thanks so much for your advice, it does make perfect sense, and, thinking about it, once the trainer had done her bit Chester went back to being as sweet as ever, so clearly it worked.  My problem is feeling self conscious in front of other people but I need to get over that for the benefit of both me and the dog.

Hi Starryeyes, thanks for your advice too.  We do quite a lot of training at home daily as well as out and about and he responds really well - he's a smart little fella, as you say probably trying it on!!!

I'll try the bitter apple spray as he does sometimes bite the lead.

I just posted a reply but it doesn't seem to have registered!!  Oh well.  It just said that I sympathise as I had exactly the same problems with my strong-willed pup at 8 months, seemed to regress in the biting us / biting the lead areas but that at 13 months he seems to have pretty much grown out of it.  We ended up just holding the lead just behind his neck so that he physically couldn't bite at it and totally ignoring his behaviour otherwise, so he didn't get rewarded for his behaviour.  He would usually give up pretty quickly, otherwise he was told to go down and stay down till he'd calmed himself.  So hopefully yours will also start to mature soon!  Good luck :)

How about just ignoring him and walking faster. He wont have achance to jump up if he needs to concentrate on walking and where he's going.
Think all puppies go through that stage (mine did) you just need to not make too big a deal of it so it odesnt continue into adulthood

The trainer at agility suggested ignoring him when he set off last week and I ended up walking over some poles laid on the floor with Chester hanging on my arm!!  Eventually I managed to get him outside into the car park where he calmed down, I think the exercises and environment were making him get overexcited, but of course almost as soon as we went back into the training area off he went again!!

Anyway, yesterday in Pets at Home he started up again and I thought right bite the bullet, don't worry about what anyone else thinks, and tried to copy the obedience trainer, so I growled at him 'enough' and gave him the look - you know the one I mean - and it worked, he calmed down.  He did try it on again a few more times but each time my reaction was the same and he eventually settled.  I think he realised from my stance, tone etc that I was serious and that seemed to make the difference.

We have agility classes again tonight, so it will be interesting to see how we get on.  Another thing the agility trainer suggested was to distract him with a toy, so I'll take one with me and see how we go.

We had all this with our dog at about this age. It was quite a problem, especially when my teenage daughters walked him. He would nip their hands and the lead and jump up and grab their clothes when they put him back on the lead and be totally over the top. We were advised that he was so excited by the fun of the walk he didn't want to end, so he was trying to persuade them to carry on playing so we decided not to play so much with him off the lead, then give him loads of attention when on the lead again, so a bit of training, with treats, as soon as he went back on lead, maybe a short tuggy game, etc (all very controlled, and all attention stops if he starts jumping up, biting etc). I think it is important that you do the activities before he gets naughty, rather than as a response to him being naughty, otherwise he will be naughty to get your attention.This worked really well, and my dog doesn't do it anymore (age 2), even when he's not getting any attention at all.

My pup is 8months old tomorrow :) He has stupid moments when everything seems just too exiting for him to cope with. I can understand why the trainer stamped & growled, but I would not be happy with that. I believe in the pack & dominance theorise BUT socialization is still very important and in my view this could cause your pup to have negative associations with strangers. The stamp & growl is a rather confrontational, bullying approach to take not a leadership/alpa approach, if the trainer tried this on a fully grown guarding breed he would be asking for trouble.

If somebody did that to my pup he would be mortified, I wouldn't be able to get him to leave the house again, if I did that to my pup he would think it's a game and get even more wound up.

Like RReeve said, loads of praise for appropriate behavior works wonders, he still may feel the need to be a pain, in which case stay calm, ignoring sillyness can be a lot more effective than trying to verbaly dicourage it.

I regularly have to growl and stamp my feet at my youngster (10 months old) I also have to do it to her mother now and then, but not nearly as much. I'm top bitch ;-) in my household so they have to do what I tell them :-) They learn very quickly what type of behaviour is acceptable, and what isn't. Though they will try it on every now and then. Usually after a season :-D

Well, we went to agility last night and Chester behaved quite well, only showing off a couple of times during the evening when I told him enough and he backed off.  Towards the end of the class though he started to get very naughty which I think was due to tiredness, he's only a youngster after all, and so I distracted him with the toy suggested by the trainer and that really helped and he calmed down quickly.

RReeve, thanks for your suggestions about the training on lead.  I shall be giving that a try and see how we go.

So glad that I posted this question as the replies have really helped.  It's also good to hear that this is normal behaviour for a puppy Chester's age.