(Bite Inhibition) Dog Training: How To Stop A Puppy From Biting And Train Dogs Not To Bite

How To Stop A Puppy From Biting And Train Dogs Not To Bite

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Puppy biting and mouthing is a perfectly normal behavior, and it is not anything you should be worried about.how to stop a puppy from biting

A puppy that’s biting you is not being aggressive, or dominant, or trying to be the boss, he is simply being a puppy and behaving the only way he knows how.

Before you teach a puppy to reduce the frequency of biting (and eventually teaching him not to bite at all) you first much teach your puppy to reduce the force of his bite.

Teaching a puppy the power of his jaw is what we call bite inhibition, and it is something that must be done to ensure your dog is not dangerous as an adult.

You have probably noticed that your puppy has very sharp teeth, and there is a reason for this.

When your puppy bites down, even with a little bit of pressure, it can be quite painful because their teeth are so sharp.

Those sharp teeth are exactly what we use to teach our puppy how powerful their jaw is.

If you were to leave a litter of puppies with each other, they would teach one another bite inhibition.

When one puppy bites down on another puppy with to much force, that puppy would yelp, and the puppy that was doing the biting would stop and learn “that bite was to hard”.

Puppies naturally understand that high pitch yelp means “that hurt”, and if we left puppies with their litter mates for 4 – 6 months, they would teach this to each other and we wouldn’t have to worry about it.

Since most people tend to get their puppies between 8 – 12 weeks, and the litter mates are no longer around after that point, teaching bite inhibition now becomes the humans job.

When your puppy starts mouthing you, you are going to allow him to continue doing so.

Then you are going to wait for a bite that is a little bit harder then the rest.

The second that happens you are going to yelp, shriek, or make a startled sound, and then get up and walk away.

You don’t get mad at the puppy, you don’t say bad dog, you don’t do anything else besides what you just read above.

Simply make the sound that lets him know he hurt you, and then you walk away to show him that all play ends when he bites down with too much force.

After a couple of minutes come back and start playing with him again.

If he mouths you and it isn’t hurting to bad, let him keep mouthing you.

The second a bite has a little too much force, you yelp and walk away.

What we are teaching the puppy here is that when you bite down to hard it hurts, and the thing you enjoy (playing) stops immediately.

In the beginning you are only going to react when your puppy really bites down hard.

After a few weeks, you start reacting when your puppy bites down with even less pressure.

Then after a few more weeks you start reacting when your puppy bites down on you at all.

In the end you will have taught your puppy how strong their jaw is, and now in the future if your dog ever gives a warning bite ( most often this happens when your dog is sick or injured ) you won’t be at risk of getting seriously injured.

Now that we know our puppy has a safe jaw because we have taught him bite inhibition, it is time to start really working on teaching him not to mouth us at all.

The first step is to tell the puppy what we want them to bite, which in this case will be their dog toys.

Another thing that you can do to work on reducing the frequency of your puppy biting you is a reverse time out.

The second that your puppy puts teeth on you, you walk away, completely ignore him, say nothing, and isolate your self for about 10-15 seconds.

Go in a bedroom, bathroom, a closet, somewhere that your puppy wont be able to see you and can’t get to you.

When you do this you don’t get mad or angry at the puppy, you just simply walk away and stay completely silent.

After 10 – 15 seconds you come out of isolation and resume what ever you were doing

Again you aren’t angry or mad at the puppy, in fact you act like nothing happened at all.

Your puppy WANTS to be around you and WANTS to play with you.

When he gets too excited and bites you and you disappear every single time that happens, he learns that biting makes his favorite person go away and he will learn very quickly that biting is NOT a good behavior to repeat.

Unfortunately there is a lot of outdated information out there when it comes to handling puppy biting.

Here is a list of all the things NOT to do when a puppy bites you:

Roll them on your back and hold them there
Grab the back of there neck and shake them
Hold their mouth shut
Hit them underneath the chin
Bite them back (Yes I have actually seen trainers tell people to do this)
Put the puppy on a prong collar and give a leash correction every time they bite
Put the puppy on a shock collar and shock them every time they bite