PUPPY BITE INHIBITION
By Ann Dresselhaus

Mouthing is a completely normal canine activity that will NOT go away with age, but only become much harder and painful to correct. All puppies mouth, bite, and challenge, some much more so than others. It is up to the owner to define the boundaries of acceptable behavior to the pup as soon as possible. Fully 1/3 of all dogs do not even make it through the first YEAR! with their original owner. The behavior will NOT "wear off" and if one doesn't do something about it BEFORE the adult teeth come in, I predict the dogs will be 'relinquished' to another 'party' - which means they will probably die.

The rules are as follows: No teeth can touch the skin or clothing of a human.

When the pup licks, give it a name like "kisses" and encourage it with high-pitched praise. When the pup uses its teeth on you make a loud abrupt startling sound (which is a mammalian 'interrupt'). He will be SO surprised that he will stop mouthing, momentarily at least. At the instant he is NOT mouthing (i.e,. as SOON as he stops) PRAISE him as you do for licks. Timing is everything. You want to extinguish the mouthing and REPLACE it with licking.

So the rules are as follows: Licking or 'not biting' = lots of gooey praise.  Use of any teeth = large, startling sound right in his face. At six weeks this should only take a few days IF all who interact with him practice it. It will NOT work if even ONE person allows him to bite, so restrict access to those who can implement the above method correctly. Children of 9 or younger are probably NOT capable of performing the above procedure effectively and consistently, so caretakers MUST keep the kids and canines separated until the canine has been completely bite-inhibited by adults. Kids efforts will only serve to weaken your own efforts and confuse the dog. Inconsistency builds frustration and avoidance behavior in canines which can lead to aggression.

It would also help if the pup had littermates to help him practice bite inhibition. Other pups are the best teachers of all. They will refuse to play if a pups bite is too hard. Do not use adult dogs for this since they will allow a much harder bite before correcting if they correct at all. Find a kindergarten puppy class. It is worth traveling for a good one. A good one would include off-leash puppy socialization--in an enclosed area of course.

The reason for replacing the mouthing with SOMETHING (licking) is because one cannot usually simply SUPPRESS such strong innate behavior as mouthing. It will keep coming back UNLESS you 'train' an incompatible behavior (i.e., you cannot lick and bite simultaneously without biting your tongue). Sometimes force methods (e.g., squeezing muzzles, etc.) can backfire in that they SUPPRESS behavior for a while and then it comes back full force at unexpected moments. You should use an 'interrupt' to stop the immediate behavior, and then use a reward for the CESSATION of the biting.