Hi, my GSD pup is 3 months old. He has extremely high prey drive. However, my wife and I are a little bit concerned 'cause he just don´t stop to bite our hands. We've tried from showing him toys to hold him and said NO. For what Í've read in this forum this is normal behavior, however I would like to know at what age does this behavior end?

If he hasn't stopped by a year old, I'll take him

My pups are 8 months old and do all sorts of stupid things when I play with them.

What are your goals for this dog? Work? Pet? What type of work?

We want to start training him for Shutz. I guess for what I've read that we are doing fine. What videos do u recommend for Shutz training?

Regards

**** MOD DELETE ****

See below.

Edited by Connie Sutherland (11/05/2007 11:25 PM)
Edit reason: hijack

Sharon,

Asking a new question in a thread about someone else's question is called hijacking.

What you want to do is start a new topic. Go here:
http://www.leerburg.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/ubb/postlist/Board/31

Click on "new topic" (in blue, top left") and post your subject and question in the new box.

I have copied your question into a PM to you so you can copy-and-paste into a new thread. So check your PMs.

Meanwhile, please separate the dogs.

Dear Connie: Thank you for helping me, I am new to this and didn't realize I was hijacking, please forgive me.

We have separated them.

Starbuck is 8 months old tomorrow and she is still mouthy.

I wasn't sure what I was going to do with her so I didn’t push hard to stop the biting. I redirect her to a toy whenever possible. She understands “no bite” now and will stop when instructed.

What she does now isn’t really biting. She is just playing with her mouth. The biting was MUCH better once all the puppy teeth were gone. She hasn’t broken the skin since she lost her puppy canines.

I’m sure you will get more replies, but from what I hear; if you want a SCH dog then prepare to have you hands shredded.

I just purchased the Leather Bite Rag (http://www.leerburg.com/784.htm). After 2 minutes she was all over it. It has a long cord and plenty of leather for your pup to bite. So even if he is a bad aim, your hand should be safe. Just watch how hard you play while he is teething.

I hope this is not a hijack. It is the same question as the original poster except my dog is not a GSD, it is about the same size and a mix breed. 3 months old. I have the whole litter (4 males) and one puppy is EXTREMELY high drive. He will run to greet me at top speed and immediately latch on to my arm/hand/wrist with his entire mouth all the way to his little molars and hang on for dear life. His brothers bite too but they will eventually stop; this guy doesn't.

The pups also jump up and grab my scarf, mittens, coat, pants, whatever.

I want to stop this behaviour or at least slow it down. The problem is I am trying to find homes for the puppies and I don't want to do anything to hinder the pup's drive in case the owner wants to train the dog for S&R or agility or even schutzhund. (probably not schutzhund, it's pretty rare where I live).

The puppy 8 weeks to 8 months video says redirect, but he will bite even if I try to pet him. He is like a shark. Also I am afraid if I grab him by the scruff I will hinder his drive.

So... it seems like the rest of you guys just wait until the pups outgrow it? Is this what I should tell the potential new owners?

My pup was not quite that driven (but close) and I can tell you that a scruff shake did absolutely nothing to squelch her drive. If anything, it would escalate it and I finally gave up on scruff corrections because they weren't an effective deterrent for her. As she progressed through the teething process, she got worse with the mouthiness, and now, finally, much better with the mouthing as she is nearly finished with teething. She also would not tolerate any petting without responding by mouthing, but is better now in allowing me to pet her without mouthing me in return (she's just shy of 6 months now). All I can say is redirect, redirect, redirect! It'll get better...
Maybe you'll be fortunate and be able to place him w/ someone that has experience with high prey drive dogs...Good luck!

I have this issue with my 12 week old female GSD pup. Don't take it personally, if you'll notice your pup probably doesn't do this with strangers. It's pack behavior and one of the only ways your dog has to communicate with you, you're a pack member. I deal with it in three ways, 1) light bites I allow, but push away when it becomes annoying. 2) medium bites I cry out or squeal loud enough to stop the bite, then redirect. 3)hard bites, Im give a loud "No!" and either squeeze the pups mouth closed until she cries or pinch the gum/mouth if my fingers are inside the mouth until she cries. Usually she tries to come back and escalate, but I walk away or refocus on toys, etc. It may sound cruel but I think it's important that they realize you can dish it out as well as take it!!! In general, much of this goes away when adult teeth come in, around 6 months.
Also, I'm finding that using a leash inside the house is very effective. Since your arm is longer than the pup, you can control a puppy easily and eventually it will just lie down next to you and you can drop the leash. It will Spaz at first but calm down quickly.