Excited nipping?

[brookitar]

One of my border collies named Loki has recently gotten really enthusiastic about going up and down the A frame. Just the A frame. Well this weird new behavior developed from excited barking to trying to nip at other dogs.

 

Well today he got an ear full. Now when he comes down off the A frame he excitedly barks, jumps, and then proceeds to bite my hand and forearm as well as when my fiance works with him. I think he got the point this was not okay to do after being shouted at several times...

 

Has anyone had this problem before?

[borasaurus]

Not during agility, but Kieran used to do it when I would get home after I was gone for a few hours. He's only about 14" at the withers, and he would be jumping and snapping his teeth near my ear. However, he seemed to consciously avoid actually pinching skin. I made it a habit of turning my back on him and ignoring him until he stopped.

[brookitar]

Not during agility, but Kieran used to do it when I would get home after I was gone for a few hours. He's only about 14" at the withers, and he would be jumping and snapping his teeth near my ear. However, he seemed to consciously avoid actually pinching skin. I made it a habit of turning my back on him and ignoring him until he stopped.

 

That's about the size of our Loki but makes up for size in energy. Our Effie is about 21" high and a mellow girl. That's good he didn't pinch the skin. We try the whole turning the back thing to Loki and he never gets the point...just does it to your rear end instead it drives me crazy!

Today he broke some skin so he got a good yelling at so hopefully this won't become a worse habit.

[borasaurus]

That's about the size of our Loki but makes up for size in energy. Our Effie is about 21" high and a mellow girl. That's good he didn't pinch the skin. We try the whole turning the back thing to Loki and he never gets the point...just does it to your rear end instead it drives me crazy!

Today he broke some skin so he got a good yelling at so hopefully this won't become a worse habit.

 

Ouch...I've actually seen a lot of blood at agility. A couple of dogs have nipped their owners so hard that they made gashes in their arms. I stand there going, "I can't look!!"

[CptJack]

Because it's an over excitement behavior, I haven't at all found yelling to work. No kind of 'correction' of the typical sort has worked, at least with Molly. Bottom line, the same crap that would make her get over-excited about a ball and keep running with a torn off toenail and streaming blood made her perfectly willing to keep going through the 'discomfort' of being yelled at to keep nipping.

The only thing that worked in either case was making her STOP to get her head back and think.

So she'd get wound up and I'd either stop her preemptively - and before I started seeing that mindless kind of crap and if I didn't catch it the second she tried I crated her. Yeah. In agility. I dragged a portable crate with me and set it up. She lept at me I'd immediately catch her and crate her just like I thought that was what she wanted and then walk away.

Took about 3 times to fix a fairly well established problem that all the "Come to Jesus" meetings and even once flailing and hitting her in the face (not hard, but it hurt and I thrashed) didn't touch.

[brookitar]

Because it's an over excitement behavior, I haven't at all found yelling to work. No kind of 'correction' of the typical sort has worked, at least with Molly. Bottom line, the same crap that would make her get over-excited about a ball and keep running with a torn off toenail and streaming blood made her perfectly willing to keep going through the 'discomfort' of being yelled at to keep nipping.

 

The only thing that worked in either case was making her STOP to get her head back and think.

 

So she'd get wound up and I'd either stop her preemptively - and before I started seeing that mindless kind of crap and if I didn't catch it the second she tried I crated her. Yeah. In agility. I dragged a portable crate with me and set it up. She lept at me I'd immediately catch her and crate her just like I thought that was what she wanted and then walk away.

 

Took about 3 times to fix a fairly well established problem that all the "Come to Jesus" meetings and even once flailing and hitting her in the face (not hard, but it hurt and I thrashed) didn't touch.

 

Yes that is the same with my boy no pain ever phases him! Does she bark a lot during agility? It all started out with excessive barking when he comes down the A frame, then jumping, and now nipping. Today I worked with him some I think he is starting to catch on I can see him start to process for a second what he's going to do when he comes down the A-frame. He tries to still jump on me though so that is the next behavior that needs to be stopped.

[CptJack]

No to barking, yes to jumping.

Honestly, the jumping thing was handler error with us, both times it has occurred and if it crops up now.

 

If I don't give her cues fast enough and get her out to the next obstacle, she's going to get frustrated and jump up toward me. If I am moving fast enough she's okay, because she's moving away from me, and doesn't have time to whirl in to me and pounce on me.

 

We briefly had issues before that, but even then it was just not really getting the game and having more handler focus than obstacle focus. The cure for that was still just putting her focus FORWARD on the obstacles instead of back in on my arm.