Puppy Play?

[Hound dog]

I have a question about what *might* be a troublesome personality issue with Maggie. At this point I'm not overly concerned as it doesn't show itself often.......just when she gets really riled up.

Now I get down and play with my puppies. I mean I really play with them. I won't let them "wrestle" me per se, but I'll do it with the hedgehog toy because it mimics puppies playing together. I do tug o war, but Maggie is only interested when it's a sock. LOL So not been much of that.

So.......when she gets riled, she gets this rip roaring growl going on (surprised me in a puppy so young) and anything is fair game at that point. I'm the preferred target. Now I realize she's playing, but she's also doing some skin damage and it hurts to say the least. Getting her to stop is almost impossible once she turns it on. The term "fired up" comes to mind.

I had to just spank her on the nose to get her to stop. A light spanking didn't work. She got a pretty good swat. Made her cry, made me feel like a horrible Mommy. I don't like to spank my furbabies. But she took a chunk out of my hand. Ok a small chunk, but I don't want her doing that to the grands. And I know if a pup gets too rough with mom, she'll "spank" them with a nip. Still, I prefer not to spank.

This morning it was her soccer ball that started it. That and she has some built up energy because she had to stay in her crate a bit more than normal. I thought playing with her ball would help burn it off, and she was doing good, then went frenzied on me, came after me instead of the ball and wound up with her nose spanked.

Any other ideas to help her realize she's gone too far/too rough in her play? I suppose I could pop her into her crate for a few minutes of time out..........but she's gotten to where she likes it, I'm not ready to use it as a time out area just yet. Her attention span isn't long enough to *just take the ball away* or something. She only plays with it a short while before moving on to something else anyway.

 

[SuZir]

Can you put her somewhere else for time out? She seems like a dog, whose tolerance for 'pain' (I know you are not hurting her, but you know what I mean) and 'threat' is quite high and to get her understand it really is punishment and not rough play from you part warrants quite a heavy punishment. And she is still very young and new to you to punish her with enough force to make her understand that you are serious can be bad to your bonding. So I would try to get around it and use time out.

Her create is not good place for that, as you said. But could you put her to time out in to the bathroom or something? For our dogs bathroom has always been the time out place.

 

[Fran]

I'm a big fan of getting info from experienced dog trainers. Do a search and see if they have some proven methods.

 

[InsaneCdn]

When a pup hurts another pup - or it's mom - the result is a very loud yelp, and walking away.
We were taught to treat EVERY nip as a huge deal. Scream a very loud "ouch", and turn away. Game over.
But... if they don't stop? I haven't dealt with pups taken from their mom so young... usually here it's 10 weeks... and the mommy dog teaches them these dog-manners. How a person does that, I'm not so certain.

 

[Hound dog]

Hmm, time out elsewhere is an idea. Bathroom.....dunno.......she's "into" the litter box. (and that's where it is)

But I'm picking up some baby gates today.......so I can gate her into a room I'm not in for a few mins. Or maybe baby gate off the litterbox and then use the bathroom.

This isn't a "vicious" issue. Actually, it reminds me of a terrier in full hyper mode. It's like she gets started and gets carried away.

The previous owner was in her early 60's. I have serious doubts she socialized with the pups much outside of sometimes petting them or feeding. Maggie is friendly to people, she's just not exactly sure what all she can do with people. Know what I mean??

Molly arrived with similar issues, but not the over zealous play thing. Oh, she'd get fired up, but not quite this much......and a stern voice was enough to get her attention to stop.

Speaking of which, Maggie just got over zealous with Bruce and he spanked her with a hiss and a swipe. No damage done except a sad pup cuz he refuses to play with her. (he doesn't "do" puppies)

 

[Hound dog]

Ahhhhhh!!!! IC you reminded me of how to do it. THANKS!

I said it's been a while. Yup Yup. That's what we did with Betsy. AND Molly ages ago because she came to us young.........and her owners were an elderly couple so they didn't even realize they had pups until they were nearly weaned.

So I'll work on the OUCH with the back turn.

 

[witzend]

Immediately make a GREAT BIG high pitched "OUCH!" and smack her one. Not hard, but enough to get attention. It'll stop her in her tracks and she'll know exactly what it was that caused it. Then get up and walk away from her. This is normal puppy play, but mom dogs know when to put a stop to it. Otherwise puppy becomes alpha, and you can't have that. This is how mom dogs deal with it. Maggie will learn

Mom doesn't like this.

When I do this fun playtime ends.

Dogs don't have "memories" in the way we do. They don't understand why things happen, they just understand consequences. Playing too rough ends playtime.

 

[Hound dog]

I'm also going to start long walks morning and evening.

I have to remember I don't have an 11 yr old here to burn off extra energy, like I did with Molly. (Betsy didn't have a ton of extra energy) And I'm going to be honest..........Mom isn't going to do much running in the yard with her. I can do it some, but not a lot. She's already learning to play "soccer", like we taught Molly.......to help her burn off extra energy that was getting her into troubles.

Hmmm. I worked yesterday. She didn't get much playtime/romp time, she was in the crate quite a bit of the day. Bet that is some of it too. Because she hasn't done the over zealous thing since last week........on a day after I had to work and she'd had to stay in the crate longer.

Shoot 3 times this morning I *thought* she was ready for a nap because she was lying down getting ready for sleep. (she's been playing while I've mostly been cleaning) Then poof! she's up and running like a maniac from one end of the house to the other.

I'm picking up my electric start mower today. I'm going to cut down that back yard so low it's not funny. Rake it all up, then she can at least get some running time out there. Tomorrow she'll have the grandkids to play with all day. We're having Travis' birthday dinner. Nichole is coming down early, cuz Aubrey is dying to play with Maggie. Then the boys will come over later on, and I'm sure play with her too. As long as she doesn't do the terrior routine, I'll let her play with them until she gets tired. Good socialization for her too.

 

[witzend]

Don't scalp the lawn, Lisa! You'll end up with mud. Mud + Puppy = "There's mud everywhere! What the heck did I cut the lawn that short for?"

 

[DammitJanet]

Lisa, this is why my two puppies plus one older dog are good for each other...lmao. They all put each other in their places when they bite too hard and trust me, bull dogs can bite!

But yes, the method is a sharp yelp and turn away. If she starts getting worked up you can do a low growl like mommy would and that should let her know she is on thin ice.

Mine can run like maniacs from one end of my house to the other but Abby gives out first and goes to lay down and watches Buddy and Ziva keep doing laps. Its hysterical. The girls actually stayed in all night last night to show Tony that they could do it. We got home fairly late last night so bringing them inside was late and they wanted to play and play and by the time they were ready to wear out and crawl in their crate which is the sign for taking them out to bed, well it was about past Tony's bedtime. He asked me if they would cry if I locked the crate and I told him no, I had locked them in several times already so he told me to just let them stay inside. So we did and they were perfectly fine but up and ready to go out first thing in the morning...lol.