Dogs Training Blog

Hi, I really desperately need some tips!My mum’s got a 12 month old terrier mix. We got him from a rescue centre and he’s been house trained, and knows basic commands like ’sit’ and ’stay’, and can also do tricks.When we got him he was quite nervous and followed us around everywhere - he was really sweet-natured though & loved jumping up to greet people and playing etc.We’ve had him about 2 months now, and he seemed to have settled down quite a bit, but in the past month he’s been getting aggressive.I’m not sure how we’ve done it, but we must’ve been teaching him that aggression and misbehaving gets him more attention. It’s not really a problem for me, as he aims most of it at mum & my sister.He nips at their feet & legs, and basically pesters them for attention constantly. In the evenings when mum’s on the couch he jumps up and properly lunges at her and tries to bite her. He doesn’t do it with a snarling face, and he’s never drawn blood. But he is getting less and less careful about that, and he has left bruises with his bites.Mum takes him to dog walking training every sunday, but it took her so long to get him started in a class that I think we’d already had him for a month and the bad habits had already taken hold.She’s tried distracting him with toys, but that’s rewarding him with the attention he craves. She’s tried ignoring him until he gives up, but obviously it’s really hard, and it hurts when he’s biting at her. She’s also tried squirting him with water, but it only distracted him momentarily, and now he sees it as a new game & lunges at the water with his mouth open, trying to bite it.I’m trying to teach him to associate the commands “stop”, “sit”, and “stay” with getting a treat and some petting - hoping that when he’s in biting mood, hearing the command will be enough to get him to stop. When he gets into his biting moods though he gets quite worked up and doesn’t listen, so I’m not sure how successful it’ll be.Does anybody know how we can get him to stop? It’s got to the point where my mum doesn’t think she can cope with him; he never leaves her alone & is just getting more & more aggressive!P.S. He’s been neutered.

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