Posted By: Duck Buster
Puppy- Hard mouth? - 03/12/20 03:33 AM
Looking for insights from people that have trained dogs more regularly and recently than myself. I haven’t trained a dog in 14 years, and my previous dog didn’t have this issue. Internet searches come up with many different results, so trying to see if there is a consensus.
I rescued a lab puppy the first week of February. We think she is 5-6 mo the old now, but not entirely sure since she was found as a stray. But she seems full lab in looks, behavior, and sweetness.
I’ve been working with her and she now sits and stays on command unless she gets distracted- but she’s doing a ton better than 3 weeks ago. We work on this specifically during 2-3 10 minute sessions a day in the garage with no distractions, and obviously enforce it throughout the day.
She has a strong drive to fetch and has a good nose. I have been primarily playing fetch/training her with a training bumper duck, and she fetches it and brings it back as well as I could expect for her excitement. She doesn’t chew or bite it, and has a pretty soft mouth with it. 50% of the time she drops it before getting all the way back to me within 10 ft) and sits and waits again, but 50% of the times will bring it all the way and hold it until I tell her to drop it. I’m confident in time she will get better with that.
My concern is I tried introducing her to a wing, and she fetches it with extreme enthusiasm but on the way back is chomping on it hard and trying to eat it. And she doesn’t want to bring it back to me unless I have a treat in my hand, or I have her on a long lead and pull her back to me.. So I’ve stopped using a wing until I know better how to correct this behavior. When I try to just hand her the wing, she won’t take it from me without a lot of coaxing. So this is only a behavior during fetch it seems. Given my goal is for her to hunt birds with me, I don’t want this to become routine.
So my main question: is this chomping on wings going to turn into hard mouth and should I be concerned, or is it just excited puppy behavior because it’s new and tastes good? Any recommendations on how to fix the behavior at this age, or should I wait to see if she grows out of it? Should I wait longer to introduce her to wings and continue reinforcing fetch and the other commands? Am I introducing too many new things at once in too short a time frame?
Thanks.
I rescued a lab puppy the first week of February. We think she is 5-6 mo the old now, but not entirely sure since she was found as a stray. But she seems full lab in looks, behavior, and sweetness.
I’ve been working with her and she now sits and stays on command unless she gets distracted- but she’s doing a ton better than 3 weeks ago. We work on this specifically during 2-3 10 minute sessions a day in the garage with no distractions, and obviously enforce it throughout the day.
She has a strong drive to fetch and has a good nose. I have been primarily playing fetch/training her with a training bumper duck, and she fetches it and brings it back as well as I could expect for her excitement. She doesn’t chew or bite it, and has a pretty soft mouth with it. 50% of the time she drops it before getting all the way back to me within 10 ft) and sits and waits again, but 50% of the times will bring it all the way and hold it until I tell her to drop it. I’m confident in time she will get better with that.
My concern is I tried introducing her to a wing, and she fetches it with extreme enthusiasm but on the way back is chomping on it hard and trying to eat it. And she doesn’t want to bring it back to me unless I have a treat in my hand, or I have her on a long lead and pull her back to me.. So I’ve stopped using a wing until I know better how to correct this behavior. When I try to just hand her the wing, she won’t take it from me without a lot of coaxing. So this is only a behavior during fetch it seems. Given my goal is for her to hunt birds with me, I don’t want this to become routine.
So my main question: is this chomping on wings going to turn into hard mouth and should I be concerned, or is it just excited puppy behavior because it’s new and tastes good? Any recommendations on how to fix the behavior at this age, or should I wait to see if she grows out of it? Should I wait longer to introduce her to wings and continue reinforcing fetch and the other commands? Am I introducing too many new things at once in too short a time frame?
Thanks.