[belf1125]

Hi, My wife and I have a 7 week old Vizsla puppy. We have only had her for 4 days. She is an excellent puppy, very playful, loving and snugly. However we are trying to break her of her puppy biting quickly. We understand that it will a few months to fully get past that, and it may just be her teething but we want to make sure we are doing the best we can.

Any tips for a puppy this young?

 

[Vlicked]

Oh yes!! I remember those good 'ol days.

As long as this biting happens when you're playing, that's one thing. If the biting is happening as a result of toy or food protection, then that's another problem. Most experts believe that puppies need to learn bite inhibition; which means you actually let them mouth you. This does NOT mean you should let them give you a full-on bite.

So, whenever we felt our pup went too far, we cried out in a startling fashion "OUCH!" and immediately turned our back and ignored him and stopped playing with him. He quickly got the message that hard biting meant he got no more attention. We also tried to direct him to bones or other toys. And, he did eventually grow out of that stage!

Here's some good info that better explains it: http://www.ddfl.org/behavior/pup-nip.pdf
This is good info on why puppies play bite: http://www.sfspca.org/behavior/dog_library/PlayBitinginPuppies.pdf

Good luck with your new puppy!! It's such a great time when everything is so new! If you do not have a training book, I highly recommend "My Smart Puppy" by Sarah Wilson and Brian Kilcommons.

 

[vgal]

One thing that worked well for our pups is when they bit we would yelp like a puppy would if it got bit too hard. Usually the loud sound would startle them enough to get them to stop. Even if the puppy didn't bite hard we would yelp just to let them know that any sort of biting hurts and shouldn't be done. We also would stop playing with them if they wouldn't stop and turn our backs.
As for the biting with food thing...when the dogs were little we would pesture them some while eating (petting them while eating, grabing a leg or tail, putting our hand in the food, Picking up the bowl and then putting it down-I wouldn't suggest this with an older mature dog. Our dogs were puppies when we got them and as puppies we knew that even if they got aggressive they weren't going to do much harm at such a young age). If they showed aggression we simply gave a sturn no. Picked them up and carried them away from the food for a minute and then let them returned when they were calmed down. They eventually learned that being pestured was part of eating and begin to care less if your hand was in their food or you were petting them. They pretty much ingnore anything done to them. Our main objective was to teach them that agressiveness with food wasn't exceptable. Plus if they ever got into anything they shouldn't have gotton we didn't want them biting our hands off if we tried to get it from them. We basically did everything we thought a small child might do to a eating puppy and since we don't have kids yet but plan on having them in the future we didn't want our dogs lashing out on a child so we tried that. It worked for us. Sounds a bit mean I guess but like I said I didn't want a dog lashing out at a child reaching for the dogs bowl.
Each dog is different too. Our one dog cared less from the begining and it was never a problem. The other started with low grumbling growls but that was the worst of it.

 

[Ed.]

Kaiser is now 9 months old and he still sometimes "mouths" but he's vastly better than he was. Previously though, you would pull your hand out and his teeth will scratch or cut you, even though he didn't apply biting pressure and his intentions were mischievous and not aggressive. It's certainly something that needs dealing with. Vizslas are so playful and we were forever telling Kaiser off about this. Lately though, when he does it, we turn on him and shout, "NO!!!". Try to react like his mother would and put him in his place. When a puppy nips his or her mum, the mother will, in no uncertain terms, let them know who's boss. This is essential to establish to fact the they need to be gentle when using their mouths and teeth. Dogs know that chewing a bone or scratching/biting a sensitive area of their body requires completely different levels of dexterity. The same applies to us. They need to know they have to be gentle.

 

[DragonTheRevolutionary]

yeah my Lili play bites me all the time, its very cute, we have no problems with her biting other people, its like our own little game lol