Question about Humping
Comments (0)This is a recent question from a reader of my website:
Question: I recently adopted a dog from an animal shelter. She’s precious. She keeps trying to “hump” my children’s teddy bears, though. She’s been fixed so I don’t understand why she does this. Can you please help me?
Answer: There are a few things to understand about your dog:
1- Fixing a female dog has nothing to do with sex drive. Fixing a male dog may alter certain behaviors that are characteristic of sex and gender but that is not the case with females.
2- Mounting is not a sexual behavior. Mounting is a dominance behavior. What your dog is doing is her way of exerting dominance over those stuffed animals.
The problem is easy to fix. Engage her in obedience training and teach her what ‘no’ means. Good luck.
No need to accept bad behavior
Comments (1)In dealing with dogs and dog owners every day it is inevitable that a bulk of my conversations revolve around dogs. There are several phrases and philosophies that I hear from time to time. One of those phrases is, “Oh, he does that because he is a puppy.”
One thing I really help my clients to understand is that, yes, your young dog is jumping, chewing, nipping, peeing on the floor, pooping on your rug, etc. because he is a puppy. I then go on to explain that although these are very natural puppy behaviors they are not acceptable puppy behaviors.
A lot of people reading this may say, “Well, of course they aren’t acceptable. I know that.” The reason I write this, though, is that many people have consigned themselves to the fact that they are going to have to put up with a year of hair pulling, teeth clenching moments before they can actually enjoy their puppy. I think that many believe that part of raising a puppy is just putting up with these horrible behaviors as training and age begin to take effect.
I am here to say that it is important to recognize the limitations of a puppy mind when you begin training. There is no need, however, to allow yourself to fall into the mindset that you just need to accept certain bad behaviors. There are solutions to every negative puppy behavior. Some take longer to implement but none of these behaviors need to be accepted.
I encourage you to seek out the best methods. If you have been working on a specific puppy behavior without success for a time realize that you must seek out a different method, not throw in the towel and hope the puppy ‘grows out’ of the bad behavior.
Good luck with your puppy training!
Crate training a Boxer
Comments (0)This is a recent question from a reader of my website:
Question: I recently adopted a Boxer from an animal shelter. According to them he had been with a family for a short time then sent the SPCA due to inability to care for him.
We tried a crate the first two nights and he was able to get out the second night. We have realized he needs to be near people. Example, he doesn’t like to be outside on a chain unless we are outside, even if we go inside for a few minutes he will whine some and want to come in.
We are having problems housebreaking him. He urinates and defecates in the house when we are gone or sleeping even if he has done so outside prior. This behavior seemed to decrease over the first month we had him. We then went away for five days and had a house sitter and he was horrible. She would walk him and he would do his business or seem to then once back in the house he would urinate and defecate more. It has been two days since we have been back and he has continued this behavior though not to the degree he did while we were gone.
Now he has started going through the garbage and taking items off the kitchen counter. He is a loving dog but exhibits this negative behaviors (inconsistently) and we cannot find a reason for it. Any advice?
Answer: No need to analyze in depth the reason why he does these things. He simply does these things because he hasn’t been trained not to.
First things first, you need a better crate. Yes, he does need to be around people. All dogs do. The purpose of the crate is to teach the dog to be calm when people aren’t around. Getting your dog crate trained is going to fix the house training and garbage diving problem and will once and for all teach your dog how to be alone.
A Dalmatian housebreaking question
Comments (0)This is a question from a reader of my site:
Question: I was wondering if you could help me? I have a five month old Dalmatian who is deaf or believed to be as the previous owner told me. She was house trained and doing really well with it but then my husband went away and she has gone backwards. She was fine for the first few days but now she urinates everywhere and anywhere. She only urinates out side if she has a walk even though she has access to the outside all day long. She still pees around the house if you go to get her lead to take her for a walk.
She is also biting everything. I give her a bone to try and discourage it but although she loves the bones she still chews everything. She also has a thing about jumping up at my children and nipping them. It only happens now and then with my youngest child but its all the time with my eldest.
I’m at my wits end and don’t want to be telling my dog ‘off’ all the time. I would like to enjoy having a dog although its very hard to at the moment. She still gets attention and her regular four walks a day please could you help me?
Answer: Sounds like you’ve got some work on your hands. Here are some tips:
- A five month old dog that isn’t house trained should never even get the chance to go to the bathroom in the house. A dog of that age should be either under constant supervision or in a crate.
- The easiest way to supervise at this age is to keep the dog on a leash at all times. If the dog is on a leash you are in a position to correct her if she tries to pee in the house of if she tries to jump or nip at your children.
- Keeping the leash on her will eliminate her excited association with the leash that causes her to pee.
Good luck.
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