# 1 Year old dog and new puppy playing too rough...help!



## rboarderi (Oct 1, 2009)

My wife and I have a 1 year 3 month old English Pointer mix (Munsch) and a 13 week old Brittany/German Short Hair Pointer mix (Millie). Munsch has always played a little rough with certain dogs. When Munsch and Millie are in their crates next to each other or going for a walk they don't bother each other. When they are playing in the yard or house though they always end up playing too rough for my taste. Munsch gets mouthy and will mouth the Puppy's legs and neck (not hard but enough to concern me, he would never bite another dog or human but will get mouthy with some dogs). When he is not doing that Millie will bite on Munsch's ear and lips and try to jump on him. I really don't want my dogs to play like this, it is just too rough and I worry that it is just going to escalate and get out of control as time passes. I want my dogs to play and run around after each other I just don't want them to be mouthing each other and jumping all over each other all day long. Munsch is very well socialized with other dogs and has been to three training classes to far. Millie will start her classes next month. If anyone has any advice on how to nip this habit before it goes too far that would be great! Thanks for your time, I posted a couple pictures below of my two dogs...


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## pbull88 (Sep 28, 2010)

I know how you feel. I have a full blood pitbull and it's just dog nature to wrestle like that, especially with the dogs they live with and consider siblings and even more so with bigger, hunting dogs and such. My pit and her two brothers grew up together and they would wrestle from sunup till sun down. I had another freind who's two dogs were the same. You can train them to be gentle in the house but once they get outside off of the leash, without tons of training, it will be next to impossible to make them play gentler. It's just going against their natural instincts. It's not to hard to get them to realize that inside the house is not the time to do it but once they have the chance, they will. However, they will calm down with age. It's really just a puppy thing. They love to wrestle and scuff. There could be a couple instances that one will get mad at the other because it's not in the mood and bark and maybe snap but as long as they've always been just playing, it will almost never escalate past that, especially if you clap your hands next to them right when it happens and say no. The sharp noise will catch their attention and soon they'll realize that it's wrong to do and learn to just sit there and let the other get bored of trying to play if it's not in the mood rather than getting annoyed and barking. That's much more prominent in pitbull males but all dogs are dogs and have the potential for all the same reactions. But the wrestling is really something you just have to learn to control and keep in check because it is natural instinct and it's very very hard to train against instinct. It's much easier to train them to learn when the appropriate time is to use those instincts than it is to train them to not use the instinct. Don't get me wrong, it is possible, but the dog will be much happier learning when to do it than they will be learning not to do it.


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## katielou (Apr 29, 2010)

But thats how dogs will play. Why would you want to stop them playing as they like? 
You would know if it was becoming more serious. Just let them be.


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## doxiemommy (Dec 18, 2009)

I kind of agree with Katielou. Our dogs are like that, too, but it is just the way they play. I would never let them play unsupervised, that way I can step in just in case, but otherwise, I think if they're just mouthing it's ok.


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## Jo Belle (Jul 7, 2010)

One time, we went to a puppy class where the puppies were allowed to play for 30 second periods at a time. If our puppy got too rough (and by rough, I mean a little jumping and a little mouthing), we were told to remove her from the playgroup until the next 30 second session. It was stupid and I felt like I was punishing my puppy for playing in the way that was natural to her. Dogs don't just play by sniffing each other and chasing each other. They jump and mouth and growl and run...it is really cool to see when you have two dogs that play nicely together (even if it looks 'rough' to our eyes).

My suggestion would be to get someone's opinion on whether your dogs are actually playing way too rough. What might seem unacceptable to you could be quite normal and it wouldn't really be fair to stop them from playing together if that was the case.

(Beautiful dogs by the way!)


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