At the end of my tether!!!

Hi everyone,

As you probably all are aware I have had a few issues with Joey. He is now almost 2 years old and his behaviour is getting to be too much now. We have tried all sorts of training and have taken the advice I have received before but to no avail. My 5 year old son absolutely loves him but can never play with him. Joey will jump at his face with his mouth open and end up catching him with his teeth or nails, he play bites me and my partner, he keeps running off out of the garden and will not come back, his recall is non existent, his energy levels are tiring despite him getting two walks a day for 45 mins plus plenty of playtime in the garden. He cannot be around any of my families children even though they love him because he is just to rough, he jumps up at people in the street when we go for a walk, and he cannot play with other dogs. He will not take their warning when they want to stop. H pushes and pushes them and has been bitten twice due to this. This is making it hard to continue socialising him i just don't know what to do with him!!!! He was taken from his mum at a very early age (i was told around three weeks) so don't know if that would have affected him. Sorry rant over :-)

Oh dear... Deep breath.

So the good news here is that all the family and friends love him.

Being taken away at such a very young age will most certainly have affected him as he doesn't know the dog rules. I'm sorry to say but I don't think there are any short cuts here, he's now a teenager and full of energy and you can only be strong and keep up with the training. In fact the more training you do the better things will become. I know it can be tiresome but it really is the way to go.

The trick here is to make sure that everyone, including the small people, all do the same. Make him sit when he's too boisterous and focus on the person with the treat. Similarly when out walking, give him time outs when he's over excited by making him sit and focus on you till he calms down, then reward.

He will learn and get better.

The key here is that everyone must respond the same way with unwanted behaviour.

PS... This forum is the one place you can rant and get a sympathetic ear

Thank you so much, i feel like I complain about him a lot but I just want to be able to get him sorted so he can join in with everyone else. When my kids come in from school I have to alternate with him spending some time in the kitchen on his own then coming in the living room and back again till the kids go to bed because he just gets too rough and the kids end up getting hurt. I know he is just trying to play and he doesn't understand, he doesn't have any aggression issues or anything he's just happy all the time and likes to play.

I do feel for you, this must be so hard.

I agree with Ian that consistency from everyone has to be part of the answer, and to keep on training. It sounds like you've tried lots of things, and that might be part of the problem. Things take time for a dog to learn sometimes, and if you change what you're doing he'll get confused. I'd sit down and think about what has worked best and stick with that.

Re your son, how about teaching him to do some training? Instead of high energy playing that boils over, maybe he could spend time with Joey teaching him things? I know I've just said to keep to one method, but a training technique that's actually quite easy for kids to learn is clicker. If the idea appeals, say and we can find some videos and stuff to help you get going.

This might change how Joey sees your son and help him calm down while, at the same time, giving them both something fun and beneficial they can do together.

You could also get friends to ask him to sit before they say hello so that he starts to learn not to jump up, and if any strangers want to say hellow ask them to do that too.

This staffie rough play is one of the reasons I pop Chaos on the lead when we see other dogs. His idea of a quiet hello is to bulldoze in with what we call 'duff'! That might be worth doing with Joey, letting him say hello to other dogs but on lead, and call (not pull) him away and praise him before he gets carried away.

Be strong - the terrible 2s will pass and he should settle down!

Oooooh the terrible 2's I remember them so well! I feel for you and feel free to rant away here. Axl is just coming out of his terrible 2's he's going to be 3 on 17th Jan. It does get better!

Consistency is key, as advised above

It can be a testing time, Vin gets very excited still when people come to the house I usually tell him time out to his crate which seems to work here

i done mias training at 5 minute inervals if something didnt work id keep at it till it worked. unfortunately i hadnt owned a staff previously just read a few books i seen mia after thinking id love a staff and well the rest is history.

Thanks everyone for the advice . I've done some training with him today and just gone back to basics and i've gone and got a clicker. I'm going to stick with this type of training instead of keep switching cause you could be right Lizp. The kids are getting more involved with the training now so fingers crossed lol.

There are loads of videos on clicker training, this one's not bad to get you started if you need it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC367wKGi4M

We're doing 'look at that' with Chaos, like this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fU1gAI42MH4. That's another video that shows how you build up from something the dog will do naturally to whatever it is you'd like him to do.

Hope it starts to come together. Let us know how you and the kids get on!

What food do you feed him? Could he be reacting to some of the ingredients - colours/flavours etc?

Very good point Gilly ^^^ Food can really play a big part on behaviour problems

Had he been neuted. I know there are many opinions about this. But I remember my old boerboel male. He got a bit out of hand at a similar age and we neuted him and it was the best thing we ever did. May be worth a try.

Also you mentioned two walks a day. Does he get let off the lease in those walks. Sometimes a walk is not enough. They need to run their hearts out.

Diet is definitely a good point to consider!

A tired dog is a good dog...do you let him off at all? He needs minimum 2 hours walk a day preferably somewhere they can really stretch their legs....even if you need to get yourself a 50ft training lead!

High energy play time is a fantastic way to tire them out and you can incorporate recall with fetch etc, a 'flirt pole' may be an idea to train sit and focus on you which can be handy when you have visitors.

Patience and consistence....as long as every on gets involved in the training and you all follow the same rules then Joey will soon snap out of it. Good luck and keep us posted!