# Mouthy One Year Old - want to hear from other mouthy dog owners...



## Cotonlove (Jan 29, 2012)

My 1 year old pup is still mouthy. She doesn't bite...she just will put your hand and fingers in her mouth when she wants to play....she has little teeth so it hurts a bit sometimes if you pull your hand out too fast. She uses her mouth like we use our hands. A big part of the problem I am sure...is that my DH likes to play with her rougher and he lets her mouth him. She is much gentler with me but it bothers me because I don't want other people to think she is "biting", as it is no where near a bite. Will she outgrow this or now that she is one year old is this as good as it will get? She was very bitey, mouthy as a young puppy and so I feel she has gotten tons better. I just want to know if as she ages if it will get even better.....less mouthy. What has been your experience with this? thanks....


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## Amaryllis (Dec 28, 2011)

As long as your husband encourages her, she'll never stop.


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## georgiapeach (Mar 17, 2012)

Both you and your husband must have the same expectations for improvement to occur, as mentioned above. Your pup is in the terrible teens phase and needs firm, but gentle redirection. When she puts her mouth on you, offer a toy or chew bone as a replacement, to show her what should be in her mouth. You can also make the high pitched yelping noise, as would happen with a litter mate, if she actually puts her teeth on your skin. For some dogs this works. Withdraw all attention when she is uncooperative. Dogs hate to be ignored!


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## hanksimon (Mar 18, 2009)

You can still use Bite Inhibition training to stop mouthing.


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## Losech (Apr 5, 2011)

My Shiba was basically a 4 month old completely untrained half-feral alligator when I got him. Bite bite bite was his method of communication (he didn't start barking for 2 months, hasn't shut up since) and it took a TON of work to train that out of him. Somewhere during the bite-inhibition training, I started to praise and reward him for licking. And now he licks like it's going out of style. Oh well...



georgiapeach said:


> You can also make the high pitched yelping noise,


This never worked with my Shiba. It made him bite harder. I guess since he was "killing" me, and he loves to "kill" things? Like, shake and bite and destroy and whatnot.



georgiapeach said:


> Withdraw all attention when she is uncooperative. Dogs hate to be ignored!


This worked better with the Shiba. The whole point of his biting was to get attention or play, and when I got up and ignored him or put him in "time out" which he HATED, and he quickly learned that biting = ignore/time out. If we were playing a game and he bit or nipped, the game ended right then and there and the toys were taken up. Another thing that he hated, so I was able to find what his buttons were and figure a way to work with it.

Anywho, everybody needs to be on board with this if you want the behavior completely eliminated. It's possible to teach her that she can be rougher with one person than another (My Shiba knows he can play very rough with me but has to be gentler with my 10 year old brother, and especially no rough play or mouthing with the Matriarch of the family) but that can be difficult to do sometimes. 
I never eliminated my Shiba's mouthiness. It's still a major way he communicates, I actually kinda like it, and mouthy roughhousing is a huge part of play with my Shiba.


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## sheep (Aug 22, 2012)

Amaryllis said:


> As long as your husband encourages her, she'll never stop.


I second this. My fiancee always insists in playing rough with our dog... Our dog is gentler with me but is harsher with him most of the times, and then he would wonder why... But then our dog would also be rough with me a few times too, and I'm kind of angry with my fiancee for this! But he says that he will stop doing that, so let's hope things can get better.

Our dog was a much worse shark back then... Welcome to puppyhood, with an energetic and confident pup!  Things like yelping and ignoring simply didn't work and still doesn't. Our dog is a confident and rough one, and also quite demanding when he wants to play. Can't blame him for lacking social skills, since he and his litter mates got parvo when they were very young and he got separated from the family too early.

What we do are the following:
- give him plenty toys and chew bones (make sure your dog is interested in them) to redirect his need to chew;
- avoid playing with hands or feet or roughly, or get him too excited;
- play strictly with toys (fetch, tug and so on);
- encourage licks and pet him gently a lot;
- do impulse control exercises (like sit and wait for food and such) - with good impulse control, your pup is more likely to listen to you telling him to stop;
- time-out to a boring room 'till he calms down - it worked for us at the beginning, the only problem was that it was not practical for us all the time as we can't have him bark bark bark at night for the sake of our neighbors;
- if he insists too much and I need him to stop, I hold him by scruff and distance his mouth from my arms or feet (or whatever he wants to grab) and only release when he calms down. This is not to hurt (holding scruff doesn't hurt), and you have to remain calm as this is to show him that he can't do that if you don't want him to, and not to really punish;
- never go angry mode, it can make pup more aroused and excited and even think that you want to play - or it can scare the softer pups.

It gets better after a few months, since pups tends to bite more now coz they are teething and they are curious. But make sure your DH really follows the same rule, or else your pup will never stop being rough and it can hurt others.


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## dagwall (Mar 17, 2011)

I adopted Jubel when he was just over 2 years old and he was very mouthy and pretty rough about it when I brought him home. Lots of training similar to The Bite Stops Here, saying "ouch" when he mouthed and ignoring him, if/when he continued I'd remove myself from his presence. Removing myself was the biggest punishment too him because all he wanted to do was be with me and play. It took a couple months for it all to completely click with him but he eventually got it that I do NOT appreciate him walking up to me and chewing on my hands or feet. 

Now we DO still wrestle and he mouths when we play rough. It is much gentler than what he did when we first brought him home but it's more than a lot of people would tolerate I'm sure. My brother and I don't mind and he's actually rougher with my brother as he lets him get away with it. Jubel did learn he can NOT go mouth on anyone else but he will get rough right back at someone being rough with him. Very playfully but some people seem to expect him to just take their rough play and not reciprocate which kinda baffles me honestly. It's not often an issue as it isn't common for a stranger to come up and rough house with your dog, and if I notice someone trying I warn them to back off if they don't want to get as good as they are giving. Have found a few people who enjoy it as much as I do, he'll also stop and back away the moment I say "off" as well so things don't get out of hand.


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## Cotonlove (Jan 29, 2012)

Thanks everyone! I read all your answers to my DH and I noticed today he wasn't letting her mouth him as much! Maybe we can get this licked yet (no pun intended).


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