# Cooper the aggressive biter



## Cooperthegolden (Feb 9, 2016)

Hello All I am new to this site as of today. I have a 6 Month Old Golden named Cooper who we love! We also have 2 children a 3 year old and 11 month old. (yes my hands are full) Cooper is not my first golden but he is definitely my most challenging one. So Cooper has always been a biter (yes i know normal for a pup) But he tends to get very aggressive with my daughter who is 3 and also with myself. I have tried it all to train him to stop and nothing seems to be working. Please help me with any advise you may have.. i am at a loss. Any helpful training books would be soo appreciative also. I love my boy and i want to help him be better. this seems to be the only issue we have with him.


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## quilter (Sep 12, 2011)

Is he really aggressive, as in trying to hurt someone, or is he rambunctious, physical, and not controlling his mouth? There would be different answers.


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## Holly♥ (Jan 9, 2014)

I would immediately stop playing with our Zebco and ignore him when he would get too rough with us. I would say no or no bite. Leave the room or put him in time out. It was awhile before he finally realized we didn't like it when he did those things. He never gets that way now. It must of just been the puppy wanting to see what he could get away with. I worried about it a lot because my first golden was so gentle from the day we brought him home. My son was 8 and I still supervised when he was showing those wild puppy mouthy dog behaviors. They are sweet dogs but with small kids puppies can hurt them without really meaning to do so. They get so excited. Thankfully Zebco grew out of that phase and he is a gentleman now. Hang in there!


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## bixx (Sep 8, 2015)

Indeed it's best to get more info on whether it is aggressive biting (angry, growling) or just being plain mouthy and not having learned bite inhibition. If it's the first, I'd take a step back and try to figure out what led to that behaviour (ie..what did you do and what is dog's answer). If it is the second, ignore and walk away. Don't even bother reprimanding as this only rewards the dog with attention and reinforces the behavior. Once you feel teeth, yelp OW, turn away, walk away. Hope that helps! Good luck!


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## glorygirl (Feb 26, 2016)

I am new to this site today as well. I'm so frustrated with our beautiful golden girl, Glory. She has been very mouthy since she was a pup. She is now 15 months and still shows this behavior no matter what we've tried. I spoke to our breeder about this problem quite a few times and she told me I needed to be forceful with her by putting her on the ground and holding her until she submitted. Didn't work. We have sent her for training and we did see some improvement in day to day commands but she still exhibits this aggressive behavior. The gentlemen at the training facility gave me the old you need to be the leader of the pack pep talk. I told him that I haven't done anything differently in training her from my other goldens. The thing is that I can deal with the mouthiness in the house because I can redirect her with her favorite things. We've played the "trade" game since she was 8 weeks old. The real problem is outside in the yard. If she is intent on something (i.e. digging a hole, having a neighborhood dog greet her through the fence, etc) and the dog leaves with its owner or I tell her it's time to go inside, she get crazy and starts jumping at me and biting, barking & growling. It's like she's mad at me and wants to punish me. I've had 7 golden retrievers, all so beautiful and gentle and she is nothing like them at all. I'm sitting here crying because this morning after a horrible rain and wind storm, I took outside for her morning ritual and she saw an object on the ground that caused her to bark and act fearful because she wasn't familiar with it. I guided her over to it showing her it was only a bird house that had fallen and spoke to her in a calm, gentle voice telling her that it was just a birdhouse. The minute I turned and put it up where she couldn't get it, she attacked me. I turned and raised my arms out of her reach and she jumped and bit the back of my arm. It was all I could do to get away from her. I can't figure it out. I don't know if it's a fear based behavior or a possessive behavior because she doesn't do it inside. I can take one of her soup bones and put it in my mouth next to her mouth and she doesn't do a thing. I can put my hand in her food, share a banana with her and she waits patiently until I tell her it's her turn. I'm desperate here. Can anyone help me as well?


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## ceegee (Mar 26, 2015)

There's a difference between aggression and mouthiness. If you're dealing with full-blown aggression, you need to get a trainer involved right away, before it escalates. If, on the other hand, you're dealing with a mouthy dog who "bites" people because he wants attention and hasn't learned bite inhibition, one thing you might try is to put him in his crate, in a time-out, every time he puts his teeth on a human being. Associate this with a verbal command (not "no", but something specific: "don't bite" or whatever). Leave him in the crate for a minute or so and leave the room. If he howls or protests, leave him in the crate, alone, until he settles, even if it takes an hour. Repeat every time he puts his teeth on you. There's no reason why you should tolerate this. Time-outs are the best way of signalling that it's not acceptable.

You might also let him practise "acceptable" mouthing: gently mouthing your hand without hurting you. When the mouthing becomes too hard, you withdraw your hand, say "ouch" and stop the game. This worked with a very mouthy, unhibited labrador that we adopted from a shelter at 6 months of age, many years ago.

Another thing you might want to try is to give him a job: something to do instead of biting you. Play with him: tugging, retrieving, whatever kind of game he and you would enjoy. You could also buy a clicker, get some treats and initiate short (5-minute) training sessions and teach him some tricks: sit, stand, spin, turn, crawl, hide, sit up, shake a paw, whatever. Give him a verbal cue word that will signal the start of the sessions, and give him a starting position: sitting in front of you, for example. So whenever you say that word, he will sit in front of you and wait to be trained.

The first commands you might want to work on are "in your crate" or "on your cushion", so you can send him away when he gets too overwhelming.

Lastly, you shouldn't ever leave him unattended with your children. Pups or young dogs and young children are a very bad mix. If he bites (mouths) your 3-year-old, simply don't allow him to have access to the child. When the child is on the floor, the dog is in the crate. The dog only comes out of the crate when the child is asleep or out of reach.

It sounds harsh, but it's the safest thing to do, and it's not something that will last forever - just until you have the mouthing under control.

Best of luck, hope you find a solution.


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## nolefan (Nov 6, 2009)

If you can give some information:

1) examples of what kind of incidents are occurring and in what context? If you have video to share, that helps people see what you're talking about.

2) have you taken any formal obedience classes with this dog? Have you had any input from a trainer at all??

3) what is this dog's daily routine and exercise schedule like? Is he receiving set periods of obedience practice and set periods of exercise every single day? What is your definition of exercise?

If your puppy is putting teeth on your child for any reason, it needs to stop TODAY. Use whatever methods needs to be used, baby gates, exercise pen, tether the dog to your waist or to your wall or use a crate but your management needs to be that your dog does not have access to your children whatsoever until you feel that you have this issue under control. It's not fair to the children or the dog to let this continue until something serious happens.


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