Is My Dog Normal?: Leash Biting

The first week that we had Athena she seemed to be a very well mannered dog with little to no behavioral issues.  During her second week of being with us, she began to show her true colors and started to give us a run for our money.  I have read about how dogs often have a honeymoon period after being adopted where they seem like a perfect dog to their owner.  Once the dog feels more comfortable in their new home, behavior issues often arise, especially with an untrained dog.

During Athena's second week of being in her new home, she seemed to be over her honeymoon.  We now had a dog who had accidents in the house, bit her harness and leash every time that we went to put them on her, did crazy biting zoomies every night, and a handful of other unpleasant behaviors.  Despite her annoying challenging behaviors, we decided that it was our job as her new owners to teach her our desired behaviors so that we would have an amazing dog for the next 10-12 years.

One of Athena's super frustrating behaviors that emerged after the honeymoon was harness and leash biting.  Every time that B or I went to put Athena's harness on, she would somehow get it in her mouth and begin a game of tug with us.  When we would put her leash on, Athena would bite and pull.  At random times on our walks Athena would decide that she wanted to play tug with her leash and would begin an embarrassing tug of war with us in the middle of the park.  These behaviors made it very difficult for us to even get her out of the house and on a walk (even though we knew that she needed to release some energy as a way to end this crazy behavior!).

During our second week of beginning obedience training we asked the trainer how to eliminate Athena's harness and leash biting.  Our trainer recommended buying a bottle of Bitter Apple spray to spray on Athena's harness and leash.  When researching leash biting behaviors online, I had read a lot about the many people who said that Bitter Apple worked wonders to eliminate their dog's leash biting tendencies.  B and I decided to give it a try as we were desperate to be able to take Athena on walks again without getting into a game of tug at every corner.

The next time that Athena bit her leash and began to tug with us, we sprayed Bitter Apple in her mouth.  Yes, her mouth.  Our trainer suggested that this be the very first step in introducing Bitter Apple to a dog because spraying it on items alone isn't enough for the dog to fully taste the nastiness of the Bitter Apple.  I was a bit hesitant to spray Athena's mouth with the Bitter Apple because I'm not big into punishment or negative reinforcement, but B and I thought that it was necessary.  Once Athena tasted the spray, she immediately released the leash and got quite the sour pucker on her face.  After a few minutes we praised her and gave her some treats and water.

That night I sprayed doused Athena's leash, harness, and car seatbelt (which she also liked to bite) with Bitter Apple.  The next day Athena went about her normal routine of attempting to bite her harness the second that we put it over her head-- she quickly released the harness with one taste of the Bitter Apple.  Once her harness was on and the leash was attached, Athena tested her luck with biting the leash-- once again she released the leash and made her sour pucker face.

We can happily say that from that point on Athena no longer bites her harness or leash!  There have been only a couple of times that she forgot that it's not ok to bite her leash and attempted her luck.  Each time we gently reminded her that it's not ok by simply holding up the Bitter Apple bottle.  No spraying, just holding the bottle is enough to remind her that she doesn't want to bite her leash.

Our lives are much better now that this behavior has been eliminated and we hope that it stays this way for good!

Do you have a dog that likes to bite their leash?  What do you do to eliminate this behavior?

-A

Is My Dog Normal?: Getting Mouthy

Each week I plan to post about one of Athena's behavior "quirks" that B and I are dealing with or have eliminated.  This week I want to talk about Athena's mouthiness.

When we got Athena home from the shelter we began to notice that she plays rough.  She can be very pushy when she wants someone to play with her.  In the first week, we noticed that if we gave her a toy, she would play with it on her own for a few minutes, but would then push it at us to play with her.  Once we initiated play with the toy (say a ball), she would often get our hands with her mouth when trying to grab the toy.

During our second week of having Athena we began to notice that her mouthiness stretched further than simply wanting to play with toys.  One night Athena got ahold of her harness before going on a walk (more about harness biting to come!).  She ran around the house like a crazy dog, holding the harness in her mouth and whipping it around.  I thought that she was going to break something!  I was finally able to trick her into dropping her harness by trading her for some yummy treats.  But, once she figured out that I now had the harness and she didn't, she began jumping up on me and nipping at my hands and feet.

Since having Athena for almost a month now, we have began to notice more of a pattern.  Athena will get one or two extra bursts of energy each day which makes her turn into crazy dog.  Sometimes she will do zoomies around the house and then get so excited that she jumps up on us and nips our hands and feet.  Sometimes she will just decide that we are boring and she wants to play, so she will jump on us wherever we are sitting and attempt to bite at our clothing or limbs!

It is so annoying.

Because this is a behavior that needs to be eliminated ASAP I have done a lot of research online and we have also talked to two different trainers about it.  When it first started, we would do the high pitch yelp that many people suggest to help Athena's bite inhibition.  That didn't really work.  Then we combined the high pitch yelp with leaving the room for 30+ seconds.  That didn't really work.

Now we are onto saying a firm "UH-UH!" when she bites at us and then we leave the room for 30 seconds.  At first she seemed to get that "UH-UH!" meant that she wasn't suppose to put her mouth on us.  But, I think that she would rather continue trying to get us to play with her than respond to the noise.

Yesterday was our first day of introducing Bitter Apple with Athena's mouthy behavior.  Bitter Apple worked excellent for eliminating her harness/leash biting, so we thought that we would give it a try to get her to stop putting her mouth on us.  When Athena jumped up and put her mouth on me yesterday, I got the bottle of Bitter Apple out and sprayed my arms and legs in front of her.  She seemed to get the hint because she REALLY hates that stuff.  However, later in the day when the spray had rubbed off of my body, Athena attempted her jumping and biting again.  Yesterday was kind of a wacky day because Athena was doing this undesired behavior A LOT and I couldn't seem to get her to stop!

At this point B and I need to stay consistent in whichever action we plan to take to eliminate Athena's mouthiness.  Luckily we have a session with our trainer tomorrow so we can talk to her about Athena's progress since last week and get some more advice.  If Athena continues this behavior despite our attempts to change it, I think that we might have to get a behaviorist involved.

Pleassseeee let us know if you have dealt with a similar unwanted behavior and how you got it to go away so that you could enjoy your well behaved pooch!

-A