Dog Being a Rude Boy

[evo]

ok , my springer is now 7 months old, he has been doing really well and I started his training approx. 5 weeks ago,

 

so far he has learnt to sit, stay, walk to heel (on lead) instead of dragging me everywhere he could, and this past week I have started training him on the whistle

 

to come back,which after three days he has responded brilliantly to this and when I use the whistle (3 x short pips) he comes running back to me instantly and

 

sits at my feet (waiting for a treat) ,I can have him sit at my side and throw his dummy and he wont move until I ask him too and he brings it back to me no problem,

 

NOW FOR THE PROBLEM,

 

whenever we are at home and I try and play with him after his training session he decides its time to try and hump my leg, not only this he is trying to hump

 

anyone who comes close, this only happens for about 20 mins but can be quite embarrassing,

 

1... how can I stop him doing this and also WHY is he doing it,

 

I know he,s very young and I am over the moon with how well he has been coming on but he just gets really horny after training, is this because he is excited

 

and will he grow out of it (hopefully)

 

any advice is much appreciated

 

cheers Evo

 

 

 

[johnphilip]

he is young and confuse there will be a lot going on in his mind and those are natural things to him . think you have to be firm put fair with him . when he starts to try and hump. push him down not rough those and say "no" "no" it wont be easy at first , maybe take his mind of it by doing something else. you say he is doing after training, he is still excited he has pleased you and you are showing him that you love what he is doing . it may also be a start of trying to be dominant on his part , not sure , you will know your dog better . give it time we were young once remember . good luck

[Nikk]

humping is over excitement

 

If my dog gets over excited we refuse eye contact, no talking and keep a straight expressionless face. It works and he quickly becomes calm because he is getting no stimulus. Once his behavior becomes calm he is rewarded with praise or a stroke etc. You could even remove the dog from the room, a baby gate is a good idea for this. The consequence doesn't need to be very long depending on the dog. I actually tried this yesterday when he go over excited with some other dogs and he wanted to go and play with them, he was on lead so I gave him a No! small tug on the lead, walked off and then refused eye contact no talking etc. I could see out of the corner of my eye he was looking up at me so I let it go about 30-40 seconds and on his 4th look I gave him praise. It's making me realise that you don't need high levels of correction for a dog to know it is in the dog house excuse the pun. Also shouting pushing the dog off etc is only going to increase the excitement level so avoid doing that.

 

P.S I only did the correction after he had ignored the 'leave it command' which he is getting pretty good at, that occasion his excitement level had just got the better of him. We do 'Leave it' and 'Look' in the house and in low energy environments several times a day slowly building up the excitement. I found my dogs ultimate prize was actually sniffing dog wee, more than playing with dogs or food ect. So if he wants a sniff on a walk I do look and sometimes I reward with a sniff, other times a treat or toy and other times just with praise. Slowly the treats become much more rare because he is getting conditioned to looking at me.

 

I don't know if anyone else does stuff like this but over time it's starting to make him a lot more attentive to me because he never knows what he will get. Also I came up with a theory I apply to raising kids. It's the rule of escalation in a correction. If you start off telling a child of when he is young by bellowing then when they one day ignore you and where do you go from there, you see it in people who've lost control and are screaming at their kids in public and the child is oblivious because they've become conditioned to expect it and its normally those parents that are smacking their kids hard and can't control them when they get older. So I figure that you should always use the absolute lowest level of correction you can and only escalate it when you really have to trying your best to delay it as long as possible.

Edited November 29, 2013 by Nikk

[evo]

thanks for the replies lads ( except bi9johnny he he) I,ll keep at him, he is doing really well so I cant complain really,

 

I,ll keep the eye contact to a minimum when he,s being naughty and after a firm no, I have raised my voice to him (wrong I know)but this just makes him more excited so I learnt not to do that instantly,

 

will keep at it and see if telling him NO works

 

thanks again Evo

[Nikk]

Have you got a crate Evo? If it gets excited you can just stick him in the crate and ignore him till he calms down?

[The Mighty Prawn]

Had a hideous time with our standard schnauzer when a puppy which led to a crisis meeting with wife where we worked out whether to get rid, he had pushed us so far we frequently yelled at him etc - friendly dog trainer showed us the withdrawel of attention trick and it worked a treat and still does, any interaction good or bad can be taken as praise and encouragement so not looking at them or touching them is massively powerful - turning your back can also add to your tools

[evo]

Have you got a crate Evo? If it gets excited you can just stick him in the crate and ignore him till he calms down?

we have a large cage we let him sleep in, he hasn,t done it today so maybe the NO trick is working but time will tell,he has been great today whilst the wife has had him as I,ve been out shooting but when I returned she said he has not done it once,, if he decides to try again I,ll tell him NO but if he persists then I,ll put him in his crate till he calms down as said

 

thanks for the help all

 

cheers Evo

[welsh1]

we have a large cage we let him sleep in, he hasn,t done it today so maybe the NO trick is working but time will tell,he has been great today whilst the wife has had him as I,ve been out shooting but when I returned she said he has not done it once,, if he decides to try again I,ll tell him NO but if he persists then I,ll put him in his crate till he calms down as said

 

thanks for the help all

 

cheers Evo

Using the crate may be counter productive,as he associates this with his safe place where he sleeps,using it as part of a punishment may confuse and could lead to other problems,i would stick to a firm no and turn away ignoring him,he will eventually realise that you ignore him if he tries to hump your leg.

[evo]

Using the crate may be counter productive,as he associates this with his safe place where he sleeps,using it as part of a punishment may confuse and could lead to other problems,i would stick to a firm no and turn away ignoring him,he will eventually realise that you ignore him if he tries to hump your leg.

yes I agree,, I,ve not used his crate because that is his safe place as you say,, he is not doing it at the moment after being told NO a few times but I have noticed he knows he has done wrong when I ignore him and look away after telling him NO,

 

just hope he will stick to not doing it but it seems to be working at the moment

 

thanks for the replies all

 

cheers Evo

[mcs1972]

The ignore seems to work with our misbehaving lab, we kept her crate as the happy safe place and not as punishment....being consistent is key and dogs pick up on the smallest chink in defences.....keep at it.... A decent trainer can work wonders....best thing we did was engage a trainer that used postive methods....a few quid now will save your sanity later