What do you do for discipling a pet that bites, jumps, get on furniture

[MommytoB]

I'm curious what owners use for if their dogs/cats did those things ?

[nurturedbirth]

The use of "discipline" in this sense seems to imply punishment, which is not a useful tactic for getting animals to do what you want. Dogs that jump are attempting to perform a dog-appropriate greeting by licking/sniffing the muzzle and need to be *positively* trained an appropriate greeting to use with humans. A dog that bites may do so for many reasons: physical pain, fear, resource guarding, etc. and should be evaluated by a trainer or applied animal behaviorist. Applying "dominance" behaviors or "alpha rolls" to these dogs is only likely to make the situation worse. Some dogs are allowed on the furniture; those that aren't should be *positively* trained to stay off by making good things happen for the dog (such as giving treats) when they are not on or get down from the furniture and managing the environment any time the dog is not being supervised so that it cannot physically get on the furniture to reinforce the behavior you don't want.

[MommytoB]

Thanks , I love watching the show it's me or the dog . I admire Victoria so much because I say she has an awesome way of postively training the dogs even the cats too . I should have used the word trained insted of discipline so I was curious of how people train their animal and I have seen some pet owners actually admit they use the harmful discipline to train their pets .

[SquishyKitty]

It took awhile to train our rottweiler to not jump, but we managed.

What we do is do not acknowledge the behavior. No saying "NO", no pushing, no touching, no eye contact. Just step back and don't acknowledge. Dogs view any type of attention as valid, whether it's good or bad, so if you're constantly saying "NO" when they jump, you're encouraging the behavior.

If you're consistent, it can work. It might take some time but it is effective. Our dogs have learned that the only way they get attention is to come to us and sit, not jump, not push into us, no barking. Just sit and be calm, and we will give them all the pets and rubs and smooshy faces they can stand.

I think for our rottie, the worst thing you can do to her is ignore her. She NEEDS attention to survive, lol. So, ignoring behaviors you don't want is an effective way to get her to stop, because she is very smart and learns quickly that jumping = no hugs, while no jumping = lots of hugs.

Just make sure you praise praise praise when she does what you want, to counterbalance the behavior ignoring.

[nd_deadhead]

I'm with SquishyKitty - it's a lot easier to teach a dog what TO do instead of what NOT to do (just like kids!).

First you ignore unwanted behavior, like barking or jumping. We physically turn our backs on the dog. When he has all 4 feet on the floor, turn around, get down to his level, and tell him what a nice polite puppy he is. I think it's helpful to consistently use a word to go along with the wanted behavior (though I can't readily think of one for not jumping). With our dog, barking was the issue, so when he stopped, we'd tell him he was a good QUIET puppy. Within days he learned that barking/whining meant no attention, and eventually he understood what "quiet" meant.

Except when teething, our dog didn't bite, but the same technique should work. I would add, though, that you yelp loudly when he bites - whether it really hurts or not. Then ignore him for a bit, followed by offering him something else to chew on.

We taught all our dogs the command "off", which means "don't touch it". "Off" can also mean to get off the furniture, though I used it to teach my dogs to not pick up something that wasn't theirs, and to stay out of the flowerbeds. It could help with biting too.

[SquishyKitty]

A trick I've learned to keep myself from touching the dog is to put my hands behind my back until they're doing what I want. If they jump, it stops me from touching them to push them down. If they jump, I simply step away with my hands behind my back, no talking, no looking at them. They have learned that the hands behind the back means that something isn't jiving and they need to calm down and sit, you know? That part wasn't intentional, but it really works.