Well.... this additional information is certainly helpful (she says calmly).

Vicky, you have to stop allowing the puppy to attack the female like this. Period. It is not a training issue - it is a management issue and it is up to you to manage the situation.

It is totally unreasonable to expect a 5 month old puppy to watch two other dogs playing and expect him to figure out/understand that he must be calm before he gets to play. This is simply NOT going to happen. Exercise him separately and then put him in his crate (he does have a crate?)

Train him separately. Feed them separately. Walk him away from the other two until he is trained and understands.

To put a prong on this puppy under these circumstances and begin correcting would be cruel. IMHO.

 Quote: barbara schuler

... I'm not opposed to the prong collar at all - but if it is being used to simply increase the type of corrections, without adequate training for the behaviors you do want, it can be unfair to the dog.

 Quote: barbara schuler

... you have to stop allowing the puppy to attack the female like this. Period. It is not a training issue - it is a management issue and it is up to you to manage the situation.

It is totally unreasonable to expect a 5 month old puppy to watch two other dogs playing and expect him to figure out/understand that he must be calm before he gets to play. This is simply NOT going to happen. Exercise him separately and then put him in his crate (he does have a crate?)

Train him separately. Feed them separately. Walk him away from the other two until he is trained and understands.

To put a prong on this puppy under these circumstances and begin correcting would be cruel. IMHO.

Thank goodness Barbara and others posted calmly; I admit that I became a little overwrought.

This is indeed management. Your job is to keep the female (and all dogs in your care) safe from attack and harassment.

It's not the job of the other dog to "correct" him. (You are very lucky that she has not yet done so.)

Please read Barbara's (everyone's!) post carefully and ask any questions you may have. I'm so glad you posted!

Whoo boy. I just learned something huge: Ask what the situation is before I ever give a simple "what age to use a prong" answer!


Vicky, I am so glad you knew to ask before just going to a prong (or corrections of any kind) for this excitement-run-amok issue.

Ed says that going from 2 - 3 dogs is a very significant step. You now have a pack of dogs and you have to be the leader. Your pup (what is his relationship to the other dogs?) is running amok because he is a 5 month old - coming into adolescence. Expect way worse before it gets better!

He is overwhelmed with the situation, and he doesn't know what to do with himself. He needs your undivided attention to help him learn new behaviours for when he is over-excited. Now is a good time to start, because you are probably going to have more issues than simply going medieval on your female.

Can you describe the circumstances that brought these three dogs together? What is your relationship with each dog? Which one have you had longest? How old are the other dogs?

Having a big fenced yard is not going to solve your problems. The kind of exercise these dogs needs exceeds what they can do on their own in a yard, or playing games. Do you take each dog out for a structured walk? That is, a walk where the majority of the time they have to walk when you walk, stop when you stop? You give them the signal that it is time to sniff and mark?

Do you have a strategy for dealing with distractions from the environment? Your pup needs a consistent way to process incoming, overwhelming sensations. Is the female spayed? Is the pup neutered? What about the other male? What is his reproductive status?

BTW - we started Jethro on his prong collar under the guidance of our trainer. She helped us fit it properly and showed us how to handle Jethro when he was wearing it. Ideally, it is self correcting, but there are still times, when it has slipped and Jethro is in full reaction and I need more savvy than simply relying on Jethro to correct himself with the collar.

These young dogs - their brains get flooded and it takes a big effort to get them back. That's why you need to know what his triggers are and work to keep them at a low enough level of arousal that he can respond to direction, even self-direction from the prong collar.

When your pup is not paying attention, try not to think of it as if he is making a choice to be disobedient or disrespectful of you. Think of it as his brain is flooding and he needs your help to get back to some sort of equilibrium.

Vicky, I just want to point out that you know have a pack of dogs vs two dogs. It would be very easy to assume one more pup isn't a big deal, but I want to stress that the third dog changes the dynamics tremendously.

A very simple example; I have two dogs which play really well together (now that Falcon is old enough - they were not allowed to do so when he was a pup.) We have family whose property is next to ours and they own a labrador. Both my dogs get along beautifully with the lab. They are all great buddies... but I can't let all three play together. Falcon and Sadie can play. Falcon and Moses can play. Sadie and Moses can play. However, the MOMENT I let Sadie off lead when the other two are playing - she "flips a switch" and her prey drive is in overdrive. She can NOT "just play" with two other dogs - but either one, one at a time is perfectly fine.

This can be done, but it is going to require some very significant changes in how you have raised the two dogs alone. There are lots of folks on the forum who do have multiple (more than two dogs) and hopefully then will chime in.

ETA: I was typing/thinking while Jenny was posting.

Just to be clear, I didn't mean to imply that allowing the older dogs to correct the puppy is OK. I apologize if it came across that way. I was just trying to get a better guage of the situation.

The answer could be as simple as exercising them seperately for a while and working obedience into the games with the pup when he gets too worked up. It will help you establish better control over him and learn his threshold.

 Quote: Vicky Merry

I have a 5 month old strong headed German Shepherd male puppy. I can't seem to get his attention with his nylon collar when he is around other people or animals..he just goes wild and does not listen. When is is safe to start using a pinch collar. I have used them only other Dogs and they work great and are such behaved family members but this guy does not want to understand no matter what I do or how many corrections I give him. He just keeps pulling and when he is in a sit he still gets up and jumps and pulls me around. He does great when I start obedience training him alone but when on a leisure walk he does not listen to me around other people or animals.

Where in Washington are you?

Good catch Aaron!!

Ok..let me start over. I have been training my puppy since he was about 3 months old..hes very smart and understandable to me..he is a edgy little guy. This puppy is from my female and male. So these two dogs are his parents. When he plays alone with my female he still trys to dominate her and always biting on her so I keep them serperated at all times. He has never been corrected by his mother when he does this, she is so ball driven she ignores him. I take him away from her the minute he does this, I have been trying to correct him when it happens by grabbing him and saying NO!! I then make him sit and try to correct him with the word no the minute he trys to stuggle away from me. I then put him in his kennel after I correct him since it doesn't seem to register in his mind what I am saying. I am thinking he is over stimulated as stated in this post and can not stay focused. So I am going to continue to train him separately and do everything separately. All he wants to do is jump on her shoulders and bite her all the time..its out of control. It just started happening and I have been trying to stop this behavior. He can't seem to just play ball with her he just wants to dominate her. So I am at my wits end on how to train him correctly for this. I am not going to use a prong collar now since I have an idea on whats going on with your info. I never want to hurt him and I have the greatest patients with our dogs..they are my protectors and friends. I will work on this no matter how long it takes, we love this puppy hes a great dog. We live on a huge farm and they go places with us on it. He is very well behaved and always stays with us on walks when we go with him alone.