Any tips to stop dog jumping up on us?

littlebug

I'm going to have this forum overrun with training Q's:o

We're working on our jumping dog and having some success though it's slow. We've just been using knees and elbows to block her jump and not giving her good attention until she either sits or lies down. The worst jumping is when we come in the front door from having been out. This is regardless of how long we've been gone or whether she's been alone or not.


Grandad arrives on Christmas Eve. He has some health problems and having a manic dog jumping on him would not be good. At the minute I put her in her bedroom (utility room) if someone other than us is coming in the door so she doesn't see them come in so the reaction is a bit calmer though she does still jump. Obviously not jumping at all would be better!

I've a few days to work on it... any tips to fast track training on this one? She has responded really well to the gentle leader head collar and walking is much easier and she is overall much calmer but the jumping remains a problem.

Toulouse

This might be of some use http://www.dogstardaily.com/training/hyperdog but I'm afraid I don't think there's any quick fixes to this problem.

kylith

littlebug wrote: »

I'm going to have this forum overrun with training Q's:o

We're working on our jumping dog and having some success though it's slow. We've just been using knees and elbows to block her jump and not giving her good attention until she either sits or lies down. The worst jumping is when we come in the front door from having been out. This is regardless of how long we've been gone or whether she's been alone or not.

Don't give her any attention when she jumps. Even saying No, or giving out to her is giving her attention and that's what she wants. When mine was jumping up I just turned my back on her and completely ignored her until all four feet were on the ground, if she ran around to my front and jumped I'd just turn around again; I was like a spinning top at times! She soon learned that if she wanted me to acknowledge her existance she'd better be calm.

suziwalsh

Knees etc I feel don't work most successful is turning your back on her....even i you have to do it 15 or 20 times....once she sits, reward and praise. If everyone is consistent it will begin to work.

littlebug

suziwalsh wrote: »

Knees etc I feel don't work most successful is turning your back on her....even i you have to do it 15 or 20 times....once she sits, reward and praise. If everyone is consistent it will begin to work.

thanks.
yeah it's all a mixture at the minute of ignore, turn backs and block with knees. Its obviously harder for the kids to block her. She has calmed a lot... except when one of us comes in the front door after being away a while..... she will jump like crazy, then realise that it's getting her nowhere so she'll run like a maniac back and forward from front to back of house a few times with pure excitement until she suddenly grinds to a halt and lies down on her back . It would be almost funny if I wasn't thinking about what she'll do to poor grandad
Really- jumping on him at all isn't an option so I'll have to carefully think about how he is introduced.

dvet

suziwalsh wrote: »

Knees etc I feel don't work most successful is turning your back on her....even i you have to do it 15 or 20 times....once she sits, reward and praise. If everyone is consistent it will begin to work.

+1 on all this. Especially important is that everyone is consistent... I know this is hard with kids though!

Sounds like you're doing a pretty good job to me, but it can take a while, especially if your dog is the excitable type. Maybe exercise the life out of her for the next few days & while your grandad is around! Although I know christmas week is sort of a difficult time to be adding things to your 'to do' list...maybe you can 'bribe' the kids to throw a ball around the garden with her for an extra 30 mins every evening!!

suziwalsh

I usually play a game with kids that if the dog jumps up they have to stand like a tree with arms out and really quiet and still.....the dog will usually walk away as kids become boring. If a child can manage this once and see it works it makes it easier.

Make sure when grandad comes keep her on lead and only let her off to say hi when she has settled enough and has gotten over the excitement of a visitor

Keep up the good work!

sionnaic

yep unfortunately no quick fixes for this problem!

the standing and ignoring thing is the way to go alright - I know it's hard but don't use your knees or elbows to block her - any voluntary movement from you at all is a form of attention to her. Just stand there and turn your face away from her until she has all 4 feet on the ground, as soon as she does reward her immediately.

You can practice this by encouraging her to jump on you (call her, pat your chest, get her all excited). As soon as she reacts by jumping do the turn-your-face-away ignoring her thing until she stops jumping, and then give her something just out of her doggy little world as a treat (cooked chicken, turkey or something - whatever rocks her world).
Do this like 10 -15 times in a row a few times a day, repetition and consistency is the key. As she gets better at not jumping, gradually increase the time she has to wait for her treat, so at the start it's 0 seconds, then 5, then 10, then 30 etc. The end goal being for her not to jump no matter what the encouragement and then to get rewarded for it.

Another tip my trainer gave me for when you're out on a walk and you meet someone you know and stop to talk - but it might work if you have her on a lead when she meets your granddad. Have her on a loose light nylon leash around the house, just trailing along behind her (so has to be a light one or else it'll be too noisy dragging around and also it'll annoy her). Before new person approaches just have her sit/lie and pick up the leash so that a bit of it is left touching the ground. When new person approaches just stand on the bit of the leash that's still on the ground so that when/if she tries to move from her position or jump she won't be able to.

Anyway...trying to think of anything else our trainer taught us but can't remember!

Another thing you could do, is that if your granddad is going to spend most of his time in the sitting room or upstairs, you could put a babygate on the kitchen door and keep your dog in the kitchen, so that she can't catch him unawares and knock him over. At least then he knows to be careful if he's going into the kitchen, or someone could go ahead of him and just grab her leash or something.

I've a similar situation where my elderly dad doesn't like my dogs and we pretty much have to keep them separated from him when he comes or we go to visit.

littlebug

Thanks everyone,

First I should specify that it's not my grandad but my kids grandad

Aside from that we've just had an incident When we came in from school she knocked my eldest over and she banged her head so there were tears and the dog was reprimanded and sent straight to bed. When i let her out again it was the first time I'd seen her looking really sorry for herself... so maybe that'll help things along a bit.

I was wondering about keeping her on a lead alright and only letting her go when she is calm/ sits. She's quite good at sitting on command when she is calm. I might actually start that this evening when my husband comes in so that it's not just associated with my f.i.l. I might even enlist some little helpers to come in the front door on purpose tomorrow and work on it . I did wonder would it not be counterproductive in making her want to get to them more?

Toulouse

littlebug wrote: »

I did wonder would it not be counterproductive in making her want to get to them more?

That's where timing comes in. You have to be very careful to make sure she's only rewarded when she's displaying the behaviour that you want her to and you have to be consistent in this.

Dogs are smart, they figure things out pretty quickly as long as you get message across properly.

Good luck with it.

aspireone

Littlebug,

The best way to get the your dog to stop jumping, as mentioned is to completely ignore her. When a dog comes to a house, if she's the centre of attention she will establish herself as the leader of the family. This is why she jumps over you and your family.

However, for the first 15 minutes that you see here every day / when you come home / early morning etc, you should completely ignore her. It's important then that your family also does the same. This will calm the dog down and establish you as the leader - the dog shouldn't be the centre of attention (though this is hard to resist!) and by ignoring her she will fall in line as she will see herself as being a 'lesser being' in the family - as she is being a dog!

Hope this helps

sionnaic

aspireone wrote: »

Littlebug,

The best way to get the your dog to stop jumping, as mentioned is to completely ignore her. When a dog comes to a house, if she's the centre of attention she will establish herself as the leader of the family. This is why she jumps over you and your family.

However, for the first 15 minutes that you see here every day / when you come home / early morning etc, you should completely ignore her. It's important then that your family also does the same. This will calm the dog down and establish you as the leader - the dog shouldn't be the centre of attention (though this is hard to resist!) and by ignoring her she will fall in line as she will see herself as being a 'lesser being' in the family - as she is being a dog!

Hope this helps

Sorry but I completely disagree with this. If you completely ignore the dog no matter what, regardless of whether she displays good or bad behaviour how is she ever going to know what's the good behaviour you want. You have to tell the dog when she's being good and tell her when she's doing something wrong, that's the only way she will learn.

The whole "dominance" based theory of dog training is very outdated and not a very nice wet to treat your pet. I mean why would anyone want to ignore their happy little dog for 15 mins after not seeing them for 8 hours? One very confused and upset little dog. Reward based training on the other hand is something they understand because it's cause and effect and they get the hang of it very quickly

suziwalsh

Completely agree with sionnaic, dogs don't think that way and the dominance theory is out dated and inaccurate, you will just confuse your dog

Stick to what you were doing and you'll get there in the end

dvet

sionnaic wrote: »

Sorry but I completely disagree with this. If you completely ignore the dog no matter what, regardless of whether she displays good or bad behaviour how is she ever going to know what's the good behaviour you want. You have to tell the dog when she's being good and tell her when she's doing something wrong, that's the only way she will learn.

The whole "dominance" based theory of dog training is very outdated and not a very nice wet to treat your pet. I mean why would anyone want to ignore their happy little dog for 15 mins after not seeing them for 8 hours? One very confused and upset little dog. Reward based training on the other hand is something they understand because it's cause and effect and they get the hang of it very quickly

I know what you mean about it being important to reward the dog when it is good, and for this dog's problem I'd agree with that. But the technique described by aspireone (i.e. ignoring all behaviour for 15 mins) is useful in some cases, e.g. dogs with separation anxiety, as the idea is to make the owner's separation AND return as unexciting/uneventful for the dog as possible, so that they are not as upset by it.

But status related training is very important for dogs, especially those with behavioural issues e.g. most types of aggression/anxiety. Once a dog knows where it stands in the family, it usually calmer, happier, and more secure in itself. It doesn't mean you're punishing or upsetting the dog at all, in fact that is completely unrecommended.

You can still give your dog all the love and affection that you want, as well as using reward based training. Most dogs are much happier and calmer once they know their 'position in the pack'.

sionnaic

dvet wrote: »

I know what you mean about it being important to reward the dog when it is good, and for this dog's problem I'd agree with that. But the technique described by aspireone (i.e. ignoring all behaviour for 15 mins) is useful in some cases, e.g. dogs with separation anxiety, as the idea is to make the owner's separation AND return as unexciting/uneventful for the dog as possible, so that they are not as upset by it.

But status related training is very important for dogs, especially those with behavioural issues e.g. most types of aggression/anxiety. Once a dog knows where it stands in the family, it usually calmer, happier, and more secure in itself. It doesn't mean you're punishing or upsetting the dog at all, in fact that is completely unrecommended.

You can still give your dog all the love and affection that you want, as well as using reward based training. Most dogs are much happier and calmer once they know their 'position in the pack'.

But this assumes your dog sees you as a pack, but you're not a pack because humans are not dogs and don't look, act or communicate like dogs. The human - dog relationship is a different dynamic.

I've had to deal with a case of fear aggression and how we addressed it had nothing to do with dominance or pack related theory. It was about gaining my dog's trust and confidence while socializing him with situations while rewarding him for good behaviour and clearly indicating what was inappropriate behaviour.

You don't need to assert yourself as a pack leader or put a dog in his place to get results, there are other nicer and effective ways to get where you want to be.

dvet

sionnaic wrote: »

But this assumes your dog sees you as a pack, but you're not a pack because humans are not dogs and don't look, act or communicate like dogs. The human - dog relationship is a different dynamic.

I've had to deal with a case of fear aggression and how we addressed it had nothing to do with dominance or pack related theory. It was about gaining my dog's trust and confidence while socializing him with situations while rewarding him for good behaviour and clearly indicating what was inappropriate behaviour.

You don't need to assert yourself as a pack leader or put a dog in his place to get results, there are other nicer and effective ways to get where you want to be.

When you say there are 'nicer' ways to get the results you want, status related training has nothing to do with anything unpleasant - as I mentioned above, punishment is not a part of it at all. It's mostly gentle reinforcement or using cues so that your dog recognises his place in the pack, as would happen between himself and another dog in the family.

I don't claim to be an expert, but I have been taught the basics of dog behaviour by a true expert, one of the top behaviorists in the country. I would never claim to know even 5% of what she knows!!, but there are some basic principles.

If we're talking about aggression, there are many types of aggression - fear based aggression, maternal aggression, territorial aggression, status related aggression relating to the owner, status related aggression between dogs in the family, aggression towards strangers/unknown dogs, aggression towards new infants in the family, idiopathic aggression etc. It's a hugely complex area, with treatments/solutions differing hugely depending the cause, and also depending on the dog itself and it's personality.

Some dogs become seriously dangerous in their own homes because they do not accept their owners as being higher in the family hierarchy than them. Examples are when a dog will not let an owner touch its food bowl/sit in certain areas/will not allow interaction between certain family members without growling or attempting to bite. But at a less serious level than that, it plays a role in the relationship between all dogs and their owners. In homes where there is no such problems, it's usually that the dog knows its place in the family without it having to be reinforced.

And if you're wondering what I mean by 'reinforcing' the dog's position in the family, this is done by giving basic certain social cues, e.g. feeding yourself first, and then feeding the dog, or not allowing the dog onto your bed/onto the sofa. For severely aggressive dogs, 'ignoring' bad behaviour and rewarding good behaviour is a big part of it. It doesn't involve punishing the dogs by any means - this would if anything make things much worse. (In case you're wondering why so many dogs can sleep on their owners beds etc with no problems, it is because the majority of dogs 'get' their position in the family without needing to reinforce it.)

Sorry sionnac, I'm not trying to start a big debate (I swear!), but I think you might just misunderstand what status related training is really about. It's definitely not a punishment based system at all.

P.s. I hope things worked out with your dog.