[holotype_hyena]

Hello, all. My friend just purchased an 8 week old border collie puppy, and she's become a TERROR. This puppy bites and bites and BITES. I've been training dogs for a long time, and NONE of my methods have worked. Ignoring her only causes shredded clothes and bloody bites. Toys and treats don't distract her. Water and noise deterrents don't work. She even knows basic obedience commands and cannot deterred by hearing a command that yields a reward.

We know that the issue stems from Puppy not being taught any bite inhibition by her mother, because the breeder informed my friend that Puppy was weaned at 6 weeks (which made me furious), so now we are stuck trying to teach this puppy bite inhibition from the ground up.

I have already suggested that my friend give Puppy a frozen Kong when she's inside, and to feed meals out of a Kong for stimulation, but Puppy becomes Piranha at potty time.

Any thoughts? Today she went BONKERS and shredded her pee pads, and seemed to hyperfocus on attacking feet. Any help is appreciated at this point. Thank you!

 

[silk.spectre89]

Man. I'm definitely not a pro dog trainer at all, but did you try to put her in timeout after biting too much? I know it sounds silly; I've learned over the years that the greatest punishment for dogs is usually cutting them off from their greatest source of entertainment- their humans.

My puppy was super bitey when I first got him from the shelter three months ago. It was constant nibbling to the point my nail beds bled. OUCH screams didn't do anything because, like you said was the case with your pup, he was never taught bite inhibition.

I read a book by Nigel Reed in which he said that any time a dog nibbles or bites, or is pushy in any other way, you put her in a small room where not much is going on for 10 seconds. In other words, maybe a small bathroom with nothing she could easily grab and shred to pieces. You put her in there without looking at her or talking to her. After 10 seconds, you open the door back up, again without looking at her or saying anything.

If she continues to go bonkers with her biting after you open the door, lock her up again. Make it such that the whole thing is completely unexciting and bores her to death. It took me multiple tries until my dog understood he messed up with the biting. He calmed down eventually and now he pretty much doesn't nibble at all or nibbles occasionally.

You can also try just the "OUCH" approach, where you don't actually stop the biting, but say loud and clear OUCH when it starts to hurt. It kind of supposed to work like dog mom and puppy teaching bite inhibition, but that didn't work with my dog. He would just look at me like I'm an idiot and continue his biting frenzy.

Good luck! I know how terrible biting can be. It's annoying.

 

[LeoRose]

What lines is she from? In sweeping generalizations, show BC are intense, performance BC are really intense, while working BC are.... really intense....

For the biting, redirect, redirect, redirect. If that doesn't work, then puppy teeth on skin means that all interaction stops, and the owner either leaves the room or puts the pup in her crate or pen for a minute or so. The pup also might think that the yelling and being squirted with water are play on the part of her owner. Typically, age will help. My friend's working line Tervuren was shredding her at 10 weeks. At 16 weeks, he's not nearly as bad, mainly because she gives him lots of options besides her hands.

And an 8 week old puppy actually knowing obedience commands is highly unlikely. They are just starting to learn how to learn at that age, and while they might be easily lured into doing things, it doesn't mean that they actually make the connection between cue-behavior-reward.

When you say the pup was weaned at 6 weeks, do you mean she was removed from her littermates at 6 weeks? Or did mom just stop nursing then at 6 weeks, and she still stayed with mom and her littermates until she was 8 weeks old?

Ditch the puppy pads, and teach her to potty outside.

Give her lots of enrichment things, like cardboard boxes with some paper and kibble inside, so that she can rummage for her food.

Being focused on feet makes perfect sense in a herding dog, especially if they are from working lines.