Play biting issue

anamaria

Hi everyone,

I have had my little westie X for about a month now. She is five months old and I love her to bits. She's a very friendly happy little dog. The only problem is that in the last week or so she lightly nips at you when you are playing with her or putting her lead on or petting her. Now it doesn't hurt and she never breaks skin but I am worried that this might be a but scary for some of the kids that spend time around my house.

Is this normal?

As I said, she has a lovely nature and isn't aggressive at all. Here she is

Shanao

Sounds normal enough for a pup, best way to stop it is to make a yelping sound the moment her mouth goes around your hand or finger, etc. When pups play with their littermates, its all fun and games until one gets hurt and a loud yelp quickly stops the game. It might take a couple of tries before she gets it, but it shouldn't take too long.

drongal

Shanao wrote: »

Sounds normal enough for a pup, best way to stop it is to make a yelping sound the moment her mouth goes around your hand or finger, etc. When pups play with their littermates, its all fun and games until one gets hurt and a loud yelp quickly stops the game. It might take a couple of tries before she gets it, but it shouldn't take too long.

That's right - it's normal for pups. But you should get use to something like this:-). Westies favorite play is something what has been called "Tug - a - war": fighting with everyone about everything:-). My westie enjoy it a lot:-)Of course everything must be under control :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qz1zBTWwjf8

SillyMangoX

It may also help if when she bites you firmly (but gently!) wrap your hand around the dogs muzzle. In the wild, the dogs own mother would put her mouth over the pups mouth to discourage rough behaviour, so using the muzzle grip and saying 'no' in a low tone voice might also help, but the yelping suggestions would also work!

anamaria

Thanks for the advice everyone. I'm not too worried about it. The only concern I have is that there are a lot of small children in and out of the house. But having watched her with them she's very gentle.

drongal: I didn't realise this about westies. It's funny although her mum was a purebread westie, she looks nothing like She's a bit of a dolly mixture. No idea what the dad was.

Graces7

We had a Siamese cat used to do this; it was sheer affection and not understanding that our skin is thinner than a cat's. We used to pull a sleeve over our hands to set that to rights; he was after all treating us like his kin.

Cherry Blossom

anamaria wrote: »

Hi everyone,

I have had my little westie X for about a month now. She is five months old and I love her to bits. She's a very friendly happy little dog. The only problem is that in the last week or so she lightly nips at you when you are playing with her or putting her lead on or petting her. Now it doesn't hurt and she never breaks skin but I am worried that this might be a but scary for some of the kids that spend time around my house.

Is this normal?

As I said, she has a lovely nature and isn't aggressive at all. Here she is

This is very normal for a Westie, you can do things like teaching her sit and wait while you put her lead on and reward with a treat when you get the desired behaviour. Also if she nips when being petted stop petting her as soon as she does it otherwise you'll just be teaching her its acceptable. I have 4 kids under 6 years old in a house on a daily basis with a Westie and no problems, you just have to learn to recognise situations that can easily escalate into the dog getting over excited and either stop it or take the dog out of the room. I have the older 3 kids doing obedience things with her like getting her to sit and give her paw, its a much safer way for them to interact with her than games which can easily get out of hand. Fetch is also good but the kids have to understand that they should not try to take the item back from her if she decides she'd rather play tug of war with it than swap it for a treat. She has to sit and let them have it before getting the treat as she will try and sit on the toy and still get the treat before running off with it in an effort to make someone chase her :rolleyes: