As a disclaimer... this is my first post, but I am confident the fine folks here at Leerburg forums can help me out.

Short background: I have read MANY articles and have since learned that a puppy taken away from his "family" is NOT good until they are at least 8 weeks old. I acquired a male GSD last Friday, at 6 weeks and 4 days old. A mistake by an irresponsible breeder and lack of knowledge on my part at the time (I now know better!). I attempted to have the pup returned to the litter for a couple weeks, but I couldn't make it happen. I now need to make the best of the situation.

So my question is this- what steps can I take to lessen the effects of the pup being taken away from the litter so soon? From what I understand it can create behavioral issues later in life which can include (but not limited to) biting issues.

Like the rest of you, I want to raise a well behaved and stable dog. I just wanted to pick your brains to see what I can do to make up for the pup not being with his litter long enough.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Do you have any other dogs in the home?

From my personal observations, in the later weeks of litter life the puppies learned bite inhibition (to control the strength of their bite) and how to take discipline from their mother.

So your puppy likely has not learned how to "bite gently" or how to accept a correction.

I had other adult dogs in my home that would "correct" a puppy for rude behaviour, like stealing a toy or jumping all over them. (In my case, the mother did not correct her pups, so it was helpful that another adult dog would). The corrections never hurt the puppy, it was just basically a growl that would escalate into a puppy being knocked down/alpha rolled by the older dog.

I'm not recommending that YOU try this, but if your other dog(s) are doing this naturally, I would allow it (with supervision).

I do not know how to train bite inhibition or accepting discipline, hopefully someone else on here can help.

Thanks for the reply Angela.

No I don't have any other dogs in the home. He does bite (playful) hard sometimes, and I have tried using "OUCH" or a crying sound. Neither one of them are working very well. Sometimes it is actually counter productive and he comes back even harder. Otherwise he is surprisingly very well behaved and has only had a few accidents in the house so far. (handler mistake of course!)

Hey Jake, I think at this point, just try to deal w/it as best as you can. The breeder gave me my puppy at a bit over 5 weeks!! Once, I found out that was wrong, I made an excuse about leaving out of town and returned her for another 3 weeks. It was tough because I had already had her for about 3 days and I was in love w/that lil furball.

After I got her back, she was still a lil terror and would go after my shoe laces and hang on while I was walking. I thought to myself, "Isn't that why I took her back?" Those sharp puppy teeth were always ripping into everything. It's pretty funny now. Hang in there.

Edited by Alex Corral (01/07/2008 04:13 PM)
Edit reason: Spelling

Hey, don't feel like the lone ranger. I just posted the exact same issue under another topic. I took my puppy at five to six wks and after I had had her another two or so, realized that I had made a big mistake. Now I am dealing with the biting and wondering if this is something I can correct. You may want to keep an eye on my post, as I will yours, for answers. My puppy is quite the tasmanian devil (I named her doucette; french for sweet tempered, hoping to offset the behavioral problems!)and am worried sick about what I did now. To top it off, the vet said she is extremely intelligent and very dominant. Ouch.

This post will address biting and bite inhibition from my point of view.

From the research I have done, I do not think it is possible for puppies to learn bite inhibition (biting gently) once they are out of their litter. I think it also depends on the dog - even dogs left with their litter long enough still need to learn that bite inhibition applies to humans (usually the higher drive dogs - my lower drive mix breed never had any trouble with this).

Most puppies eventually grow out of the bitey stage, usually after they are done teething (again, it's individual and depends on the amount of drive the dog has).

Though your pups have not learned bite inhibition, they can eventually be taught not to bite at all, just like any other puppy. But until then, you will have to put up with those sharp puppy teeth. Continue saying "ouch" and redirecting and I think the pup will eventually get it. Just remember - biting and chewing all the time is NORMAL puppy behaviour until like 4-6 months old, the only thing different is the pressure of the bite. Keeping a dog with its litter long enough does not make it bite less often! Trust me! My four-month-old is very mouthy and bitey.

The good news is you both (Jake and Valerie) realize your mistake and are trying to take steps to over come this - which is really a good step - don't give up! You can still raise a great dog. Hopefully the "breeders" of your dogs will either learn the errors of their ways, and/or stop breeding.

And don't beat yourselves up, sometimes even if everything was done right you can still get problems, and sometimes even if big mistakes were made problems don't appear. (If that makes sense). So you just never know. I still wonder how my first dog turned out so perfectly. heh.

http://www.leerburg.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=174054#Post174054

Jake, in the thread above I posted quite a few links to articles and DVD recommendations. They may help you out a bit.

Hi I have a 3 month old puppy.

That I got at four weeks. so I went through the same thing.

One thing is that when she is biting put a toy directly in her mouth.

That will teach her over time not to bite mom or dad so on and so fourth.

Do you have a kennel if not I would get one potty training is much easier with. They gave you good DVDS and such earlier.

I have also taught jewel to no bite command. Which took awhile but it works now.

Also The 6 foot tie off which keeps her at your hip all the time. That way if she potty you can correct it right then and there.

Jewel is still mouthy now but not as much. You can get a good start with her now so good luck and post a pic

I got my puppy at 4 1/2 months and she was ALL about biting.. a LOT. I did similar to what Stephanie said in the previous post. Everytime we would play she immediately started chewing on my hands, so I kept pushing toys into her mouth instead and encouraged her to chew on them instead of me. (One of those rope-tug toys worked really well cause I could hold it by the ends) Anytime she would get too rowdy on me during playtime I would stop playing with her until she calmed down.

She was raised on a farm and lived in a barn, and didn't know how to play with toys at all. It took a couple weeks but now she LOVES chewing on her toys and bones (instead of me!). My hands are much happier.

thanks guys. And Jake, I am finding that putting a toy/bone in her mouth when she bites me works. As does telling her no and gently disengaging those little shark teeth from my skin. Also, distracting her with the "sit" I have taught her and if all else fails (including growling at her, etc) I tell her that she can go into her crate until she calms down and then I promptly put her there. I don't ever underestimate the intelligence of animals. they are generally quite bright and their need to be loved by you will eventually overcome most of their obnoxious instinctual behaviour. When it is close to feeding time, it seems to get worse (I guess they get cranky just like us). Time and patience do reward with wonderful results. the german shepherd I just lost (at 16 months old) was a joy and so smart it would bring tears to my eyes.