# Playing rough



## GinnyinPA (Oct 31, 2010)

It isn't too late to retrain, but you'll need to be consistent. We got Ben at 3 yrs old and at first he constantly bit our hands and pawed us. Like your pup, he was used to rough play. By consistently stopping him, yelping, squeeking or otherwise saying Ouch, (funny voices work as well as sharp ones) he has gotten the idea that he can't do that to us. We also take our hands away, turn our backs, walk away, etc. to stop the rough play. He has learned that it isn't acceptable. 

Unfortunately, we have friends and neighbors that still play with him roughly, and he loves it. When I say, "Don't let him bite." They reply, "It's okay." No it isn't. So after a year, he doesn't bite me or my husband, but he'll still bite others, especially men who play with him. Fortunately, he has an instinctive gentleness with older people and young children - but we need to work on the older kids who he sees as playmates. It's as much a matter of teaching them as teaching him.


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## baumgartml16 (Jun 19, 2011)

Thank you! That gives me hope. I know my husband is regretting his decision to play taht way right off the bat. Of course it was fun when she was small and didn't weigh much. But she is over 55 lbs now and not so tiny so it is a little more to handle. He can still handle her but I am just over 5 ft and can't handle all of that rough housing.

We will work on pulling our arms behind our back out of sight. That will be my goal while we are in between training classes!! Fix this!


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## JDK (Jul 30, 2011)

I'm with you on this one. JJ is 6 months and he's the exact same way. We never played with him rough as you described, but he gets in the same moods as your doing, nipping at our hands and what not, and would like to stop it with kids in our future.

We've tried several things such as giving him a time out in a smaller pen for a minute or so, yelping, and saying ouch and no. When he starts getting nippy, my girlfriend sprays her hands with bitter apple and that gets him to stop for a few minutes. I don't know if that's the right thing to do though cause I don't want him to be scared of spray bottles and hands, thinking they're not a good thing. What I'm trying to do no is give him 3 chances. Once he starts nipping at me, which isn't all very hard but quite annoying, I say "Don't Bite" in a firm voice. If he continues and won't take the toy I try and distract him with, I tell him again, "Don't Bite". If I have to say it a third time, I get up and either put him in the small pen for a minute and leave the puppy-proof area for a minute. Neither of which really makes a difference to be honest cause he does it again once I return, but I'm trying to be consistent, so I continue to do it anyway.

He gets plenty of exercise, we go outside a lot, he gets about 2-3 walks a day that are about 30-45 minutes each, and we play fetch a lot in the living room. I gotta figure out how to control this as well.

I'll be keeping posted to this thread so maybe the both of us can get some suggestions.


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## Pemphredo (Nov 14, 2011)

UHG I have this problem with my kids and Sharlette. She gets nippy with me but in a deep voice I say "SHARLETTE NO BITING!" she quits with me but my kids think it is funny when she gets all vocal starts jumping and nipping. I DO NOT! I keep telling them she isn't going to be this small forever and when she is a big ol' beats coming at you growling jumping and biting you wont be laughing any more so we need to stop it now. So they are getting better. My husband started playing with her and growling while he played with her and I had to nip that in the butt real fast. I was like " DUDE, I don't want her growling at people when she plays." SURE enough she grows when she gets real frisky. it is crazy how fast they pick up on things. so when she gets overly feisty, growly, or nippy I make her sit until she is calm. That has worked so well. When she is getting real rough with my 4 and 2 year old I have to hold her till she is calm. I swear she tries to eat my 2 year old. He told me the other day after she tried to "eat" him that he wanted to send her back to the people we got her from. LOL poor guy. I think redirecting and positive reinforcement for good play is a HUGE help.


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## mayapaya (Sep 28, 2011)

I am having the same issue with Maya. She understands "drop it" and will retreive the toy, and bring it back to me, but as soon as I pick it up she lunges at the toy in my hand sometimes catching the toy, sometimes my arms or hands. The other day it was pretty cold here, so I put on a pair of gloves, and she went ballistic!!! Biting and lunging at my arms and hands, as if they were chew toys. I'll also be watching this post for some tips. I have tried using "leave it", or a firm "no" when she gets into the bitey mode, but results are hit or miss. This is definately a behavior I want to correct, and frankly I don't reccall having similar issues with our last golden puppy at this age!


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## samsdad (Aug 18, 2011)

I can't even play fetch with Sam for this reason. Sometimes he'll drop the ball in my hand or at my feet, but normally he won't, and he never really picked up on Drop It. I saw another method for training that, which I will have to try. Anyway, when I get the ball from him, he'll start to mouth my arm gently, which while unacceptable during fetch, isn't a big deal. As I get myself free, he'll escalate, to the point where he's jumping, growling, baring teeth, and nipping. Turning about is hit and miss. Not that long ago, (an hour and a half, maybe two hours before this post) he actually nipped my choulder blade. By now, he needs to be put in his "naughty corner" as he is ramped, and not in a good way. saying ouch, or yelping, any of those expressions of pain, never helped at all (from day one). I was away for two months. My wife wouldn't put up with this, but I have no idea what my parents did while I was away. I know my father actually encouraged jumping up by tapping his own chest! :doh: I really need to know how to curb this... his weight is already complicating it a bit as he's 6 months and 50 lbs, I can only imagine what it will be like if it's allowed to continue.


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## mayapaya (Sep 28, 2011)

SamsDad, treats work well for me teaching "drop it". But if I happen to not have any, then I can tell you Maya typically won't drop whatever is in her mouth. At 8 months, Maya is also over 50 pounds, and I weigh about 100, so she's come close to knocking me over when the lunging, jumping and biting craziness starts. When new people enter the house--she's a lunatic, first jumping to give kisses, but then she starts mouthing people's arms and hands. As soon as the holidays are over, we're enrolling in another training class! Other suggestions welcome!


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## baumgartml16 (Jun 19, 2011)

This is the exact same way with us. She has learned to play a little better now that we have put our arms behind our back and ask for a sit, then play resumes. So far so good! We also carry treats around now and ask for drop it, only works with treats though. 

Koda is nutso when people come over too, same scenario!! We sometimes hand people a toy to give her when she starts mouthing them because we don't want her mouthing guests. 

Koda has until Jan 9 before her next class..can't wait!!



mayapaya said:


> SamsDad, treats work well for me teaching "drop it". But if I happen to not have any, then I can tell you Maya typically won't drop whatever is in her mouth. At 8 months, Maya is also over 50 pounds, and I weigh about 100, so she's come close to knocking me over when the lunging, jumping and biting craziness starts. When new people enter the house--she's a lunatic, first jumping to give kisses, but then she starts mouthing people's arms and hands. As soon as the holidays are over, we're enrolling in another training class! Other suggestions welcome!


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## brotherbrown (Mar 20, 2014)

*Teaching Boudaries*

We had 2 Golden's that both played this way only with me, my father and other dogs. Our playing consisted of the same kind of hand nipping but there was never biting allowed.

What I mean is that we would play rough and the dog could use his mouth but he couldn't bite down. This isn't an easy behavior to teach and I'm unsure of how to describe it but the same way dogs socialize and learn boundaries of play with playmates can be set up with people. Both the dogs were extremely careful never to put an pressure when the would get some part of me in their mouths. 

The other things was both dogs were very good about strictly rough housing with only me and my father. The dogs never played rough with my mo, sisters or strangers. 

It sounds like your dog is still young and if your husband is anything like me than to completely taking away the rough play isn't an option so just make sure that your husband sets strict boundaries about whats allowed and whats not. Teaching a dog to playbite and roughhouse but also not lose control is time consuming, and difficult. 

The one thing your husband should be doing is to try and make himself transparent. The happy and fun playtime has to immediately stop and the posturing has to change when he actually bites down or gets aggressive and any hand biting when it is not play time should be discouraged. We also only allowed playtime in a ruckus room we had for the dogs to use or outside so when the dogs were in the rest of the house it was time to relax.

I hope I wasn't too long winded and that anything I have said is useful but I would hate to hear that your husband would have to give up playing with the dog the same way he got to enjoy his dogs growing up.


Oh one last thing. A calm down command is really useful for young high strung dogs. We used "chill time"cause it was fun and people seemed to think it was cute but getting a dog to know that when he hears the command its time to back off is extremely useful for rough play and over zealous greeting for new people and dogs.


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## mfullmer (Mar 29, 2014)

I have the same problem my puppy Maggie. She is 6 months old. She only tries to nip and rough play with my 9 year old son. He has played with her like that since we have had her at 8 weeks. She doesn't do it with anyone else. I keep telling him to stop. Im afraid she is going to hurt him as she gets bigger. I really think being consistent and stern with them helps. Goldens never want you to upset with them! This my second golden. My other one played aggressive with my husband only. But he would never bite. He would stop when my husband told him to stop. 

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## Shellbug (Nov 14, 2013)

baumgartml16 said:


> Hey all,
> 
> So my husband has always had goldens growing up but this is the first one he has had to train...soooo he proceeded to treat our puppy how he did our dogs from day one which meant rough playing..hands in her face and all that..
> 
> ...



I would sign up for training classes! It will help y'all learn how to train her and deal with some bad habits she may pick up along the way 


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