My pup is now 6 months old (bullmastiff/pitbull mix). He has always been a handful since we got him at 8 weeks old. He has a very strong prey drive with the usual attacking feet, pants legs, etc. when he was a little younger. Now it seems when I play with him out in the back yard in the evenings (throw his toy or ball), he will bring it back but will come charging at me and "slam" into me. Tonight I grabbed his drag line and flat collar and told him "no." He immediately twists his head around and tries to bite me. Tonight we struggled, with me calmly twisting his flat collar and lifting his front feet off the ground (like I have been reading on this web site). As soon as I let the pressure off and let him touch the ground, he was back trying to bite me again. This went on for five times. Finally he backed off and started munching on some grass. Then I walked him around the yard for a couple of minutes and then into the house. He refused to sit at the door like he is supposed to do and when I lightly pushed on his rump, he again tried to bite at my hand.

I have the two DVD's (Puppy 8 wks to 8 months and Basic Dog Obedience). He seems much better in the mornings when I take him outside to potty, feed him (after I have my breakfast), and then before I leave for work, I walk him through the neighborhood (on a prong collar since he wants to pull so hard) and we walk a mile each morning, 7 days a week. He walks fairly well and will automatically sit when I stop at each corner or before crossing the street.

He is crated at night (from 9PM till 4:30 AM). I crate him before I leave for work at 7AM (hubby gets home at 7:30AM from work, and he is in the crate all day while my husband sleeps (he works nights). Nickie gets him up at 9AM, around 12Noon, around 2PM, around 4PM (when he usually just stays up and lets Nickie out of the crate, on a drag line in the house within eyesight, until I get home from work at 6PM. When Nickie barks in the crate, my husband assumes that he has to go potty so takes him out in the backyard and will also play a little with him (throw the ball, etc.). Then back in the crate for another couple of hours. As you can see, this is terrible sleep for a person who works nights and has to sleep in the day time.

Things were so bad today as far as hubby getting any rest, that I am going to "day board" Nickie at my vets on my way to work tomorrow and pick him up when I get off work. (By the way, I think we may have been too old to take on this task of raising a puppy (we're both 60) and hubby is not in very good health either!

Is this just a 6month old pup "testing the waters"? Could he be more irritable than usual and not sleeping as well because of teething? We've found three puppy teeth on the floor in the past couple of weeks, but looks like most of those big dog teeth are in.

He weighs 45 lbs now, but I shudder to think what the situation will be when he is older and much bigger.

Please help with any comments or suggestions. Thanks!

diane, i don't know how much help i can be. i have an english mastiff that behaved a lot like yours as a puppy. i was unprepared, too. it's been a steep learning curve, and quite an education, but he is nearly five years old now and has turned out really well.

however, you have a BM/PB cross, which is several orders of magnitude more challenging than a high-drive EM. i'm 51 and my husband is 59, so i hear you on how different it is to raise a puppy when you aren't as active as you might have been when younger.

he's actually smaller at his age than i might have expected, given his breed background, so maybe he won't get a whole lot bigger. maybe he'll be a 70 lb. dog instead of a 150 lb. dog.

when you say he is "biting" you, is he attacking you? or is he play biting? is he asserting/aggressing? or does he think you two are playing a game?

if he was played with roughly until now, he may just think you two are having a fine game, and it may not be a dominance issue. it's a bit late, but you have to educate him that roughhouse play is not OK. say "NO!" and turn your back on him and ignore him. walk away. he then learns that he loses your attention if he bites.

if he is actually biting you, however, as in he is challenging your authority, you need to get yourselves to a dog behaviorist. it would be wrong and dangerous for us to try to advise you without being able to see the dog ourselves. what has happened, if this is the case, is you and your husband have not established yourselves as the pack leaders.

while you are researching dog behaviorists in your area who can evaluate him, tether the pup to your waist whenever he is out of the crate so that he cannot make any decisions for himself about where he is going or what he is doing. and start ignoring him when he makes any bids for your attention. his job is to sleep, eat, and go for walks. that's it.

both bullmastiffs and pitbulls are breeds that should really only be owned by experienced dog owners. they are high drive, they can be very aggressive, and especially bullmastiffs are dangerous in the wrong hands because of their size and power.

if all this makes you think you and your pup are probably a mismatch, at six months he is still young enough that you may be successful at finding him the right forever home.

but talk to a behaviorist first and get an evaluation.

good luck.

Hi Diane,

You all are going through a trying time right now and that comes across quite clearly in your post. I really feel for the three of you. I have a pup, too, so I can only share what I have experienced with him. I am a total novice to the whole puppy/dog training thing.

It seems as if your dog is spending a lot of time in a crate which, when it happened with my pup, resulted in a lot of pent-up energy and unruly behavior. My pup at 6 months could, and did, stay crated from 7am to 12:00pm without kicking up a fuss. Anything longer than that resulted in crazed behavior when he was finally released. Without a good amount of exercise, mental stimulation, and human contact throughout the day I think you are going to have problems. So many people here say "a tired pup is a good pup" and I've found that to be true.

If you don't have a prong collar you should buy one...tomorrow! I found using one with my pup made a huge difference in terms of control and was far more effective than his flat leather collar.

As for the biting, I don't have enough dog experience to advise you but I know someone else will.

Hang in there and good luck

Alice & Sarah,
Thanks so much for your input. We had been somewhat familiar with the bullmastiff breed - a few years ago (when our pitbull Buster was still alive), we had a room mate who had two bullmastiffs - a male & a female. They were more or less couch potatoes! Their owner was very strict with them and had them really whipped into shape (almost literally). I think they were more afraid of him than that they had respect for him. His two dogs and our pitbull would get along very well (under very strict supervision and they all 3 had their own crates. The very first morning that the two bullmastiffs were at our house and I was the one to let them out of their crates to go potty and feed them, the male leaped out of his crate at me and grabbed my forearm in his mouth. It scared me half to death but I held myself in check and didn't panic or try to jerk my arm out of his mouth. I remembered the command "off" from a short training class with our pitbull, and he let go of me and trotted outside. Later, his owner said he was only "showing affection". Hah! Also he said that a bullmastiff will knock an intruder to the ground and hold him there (in lieu of biting). Could this be some sort of genetic thing with Nickie that he wants to slam into me? When he is trying to bite at my hand, it is like he was doing when a little puppy, like "don't tell ME what to do!" It just seems like he is getting stages when he is real bratty but other times he is as sweet as can be.

Perhaps Angelique will know of a dog behaviourist to recommend since she also lives in Las Vegas. Our pitbull was a pussycat compared to this little guy! I could just look at Buster over the top of my glasses and he would go and lay down!

P.S. I do have a prong collar for him and use it on our walks every day. It does not fit up high like it is supposed to - seems like he has so much loose skin around his neck - a handful of skin on both sides. I know he needs a lot more exercise (which he gets a lot more on the weekends when I'm off work). It's just that I'm away at work for 11 hours and there are not enough hours in the day . . .

well, yes, mastiffs love to body slam! lol. that's part of owning the breed. mine actually blew out my knee when he was a year old, and i had to have surgery.

always watch your back when a mastiff puppy gets wild, or they will level you! and teach him to be calm. teach him that wild puppy ways must end.

the mastiff was bred to chase down poachers, trip them, and sit on them until the gamekeeper arrived. if you run around with a young mastiff, they will often instinctively reach out their front legs like arms, grab you around your legs, and make you fall down.

however, the reason the mastiff was crossed with the bulldog was to create a mastiff that WOULD bite. bullmastiffs are 60 percent mastiff, so some are very gentle and sweet natured, and some are quite aggressive and hardheaded. throw pitbull into the mix and you just can't say for sure what you will have when he matures.

if the prong slides down, try removing a link.

and a six month old mastiff puppy should not be walked any more than you are already walking him. not until he's at least 18 mos. to 2 years old. you have to wait until his growth plates harden or you will set him up for arthritis.

mastiffs also have a habit of grabbing their owners by the forearm and taking them for a walk. this is just good-natured play, not aggressiveness. that's why it is hard for me to tell from the little bit that you write whether you really have a problem or not. now from your second post i am starting to think he's just being a puppy. but he's a big puppy, so it can seem more threatening.

this dog needs lots and lots of groundwork. he needs to earn everything he wants--pets, food, affection, walks. he's still a bit young for adolescence (usually kicks in with giants around nine months), and he's definitely too young to be showing you his adult temperament.

i would socialize, practice NILIF (nothing in life is free), tether him to you, ignore him when he demands attention, keep up on his obedience, keep up with the walks, and get a behaviorist to evaluate him.

he could turn out to be a great dog. pups are almost always a handful. it doesn't sound to me like you necessarily have a problem, but i can't see him!

Thanks Alice,
Nickie was very cautious about coming out of his crate to go potty at 9:30 last night. In fact, he just looked at me with his head on his paws and would not come out until I offered him a treat. (Usually he is very eager to leave the crate). Now I'm thinking that the corrections that I gave him yesterday evening were too much for him. Anyway, this morning, he was just like normal - went out to potty, ate breakfast, went on our mile walk with fewer problems than before (less pulling, more attention to "leave it", etc.)

I dropped him off at our vets this morning for day boarding. He was really wild because when we got out of the car (he rides very nicely in the back seat), there were some landscapers by the front door using a power blower and it really freaked him out. He gets really scared when anything new is in his environment. We will work a lot more on socializing him to new experiences - he has really seemed to enjoy our little jaunts on the weekend.

I know nothing about these other breeds, but I can tell you that my (18) week old Golden Retriever puppy likes to run right into me when he returns on the Fetch. I figured it was a subtle dominance thing combined with puppyhood, and I tell him Off and push him Off. I make him sit between Fetches.

He likes to mouth and he is teething, again more puppyhood with some dominance IMHO.

Most of the time the pup is very good with me .. but he has his moments. I'm more concerned with training him with my son and TRAINING my son with him, but that IMO takes time too!

ASIDE: Now that our pup knows the Fetch Game, my son will play that with him in addition to their daily run. I got a chuckle yesterday when the pup finally was able to out-run my son, but in the end slow down and just kept pace with him.

Hi Louanne,
If our puppy had some young kids to play with instead of just us two old people, he would probably wear out faster! All I can hope for is that this puppy stage will pass and we can look forward to a great, dignified, calm dog!

If it is an exercise thing ... The Monks talk about Road Work in their book, where you work up to exercising your dog while you're bike riding, rollar blading or even driving a car.

When I was (30) I used to Rollar Blade with my Pup. Now I'm too old (my feet hurt when I do it), so I just make my son go running with him. But Road Work would be a good option for a dog, too IMHO.

Good Luck.

Nickie is walked one mile every morning and has several play sessions in our back yard each day - running and retrieving his toys. He is way too strong to consider bike riding with him on a leash (we have bikes) but fear it would be an accident waiting to happen! As for roller blading - never tried it. At six months old, I've been told that a mile of walking is plenty each day for him. When he gets older, I will increase the distance.