Settle Down command for dog?

[madskye]

Hi,

We have an 8 month old black lab who is GREAT, but every night she gets crazy. I think she wants to play, but she starts jumping and mouthing and it's no fun. I throw the ball for her or will play with a toy, but that devolves into her jumping at me and mouthing. I think she wants to wrestle?

She's very sweet, but I am wondering if anyone knows how to teach settle down? She knows down, but she is too keyed up to stay down when she's in this mood. She also seems to understand "gentle" but again, when she is racing around the house and jumping it's tough to get her to focus.

Any tips?

[elsie123]

We are teaching this now as well. Our dog is 15 months.

We catch him in quiet moments, when he is laying still, and say, "Good settle!" and give him a little treat. It is working pretty well! As long as he's gotten enough exercise throughout the day, he settles quickly.

[kythryne]

One of the first commands we teach our dogs is "go bed." We designate spots in each room as "bed" - in the kitchen it's a rug by the door, in the living room it's a specific spot that usually has a blanket tossed down for them, in our offices it's a blanket in one corner - and we teach them that "go bed" means they have to go to that spot and sit/stay. If we're also working on sit/stay at the same time, we take them over to the spot, gently position them into a sit, and then use a leash tethered to a nearby piece of furniture to reinforce the stay.

"Go bed" is a very useful multi-purpose command - I can use it to get them out from underfoot when I'm cooking, to get them to settle down if they're roughhousing or just being nudges, to divert them from begging, or to get them to chill out when we have company over and we don't want dogs racing around. We've also used it when traveling with them - we take a spare dog blanket along and when we go into a new place, we pick a corner and put the blanket down, and establish that spot as their bed.

[ChristyMarie]

My lab does this just about every single night with my husband. But HE started it. It is their time to rough house.

Sounds like your puppy needs to get some energy out. How about a walk after dinner or in the afternoon?

[Alyantavid]

My Weim gets wound up at night too. I usually go out to water after the kids go to bed, so I take her out and just let her run. We play a little, but she spends most of time, she just runs laps around me and our other dog.

I'd take her out and let her burn some of that energy off.

[slimkins]

Lots of good advice already, but I also found that turning your back and ignoring the behavior seems to get the point across. Even leaving the room if you need to. Your pup just wants to play or get some attention and doing that will give him the exact opposite reaction that he was looking for. Therefore ending the behavior at that moment.
I would teach a "relax" or "settle" command at another time. I don't think you would be setting your pup up for success if you taught him at that time of night when he is so wound up.

[VisionaryMom]

We do a hand with palm toward the ground and say "off." That's usually for attacking us the moment we walk in the door, but I think it would work at night, too.

[SquishyKitty]

Well, there are two parts to this.

First, you need to exercise her in the evening. We do an after dinner run/walk with our mutts. She is a lab, and she is 8 months old. Therefore, you take the amount of exercise she is getting, and likely double or triple it. Throwing a ball for a few minutes isn't enough; run her, bike with her, walk a couple of miles every single day. She will eventually calm down, but if you don't channel that energy, she turns obnoxious as you can see.

Second, you can use any command you want, but I was at a seminar and commands were talked about. One of the things they said that really stuck with me is that, the general commands people use "Sit, come, down etc" have all been chosen and used as a standard because they all sound distinctly different, and are therefore easy for the dog to understand. So when you choose a command, make sure that it's distinct and unique to what the dog is used to hearing.

We tend to ignore unwanted behavior; like a pp said, if she's doing something you don't want, you stop engaging, turn around and do not acknowledge. Don't even say NO, just STOP. It may take awhile but the message will get through if you are consistent.

[madskye]

Originally Posted by SquishyKitty

First, you need to exercise her in the evening. We do an after dinner run/walk with our mutts. She is a lab, and she is 8 months old. Therefore, you take the amount of exercise she is getting, and likely double or triple it. Throwing a ball for a few minutes isn't enough; run her, bike with her, walk a couple of miles every single day. She will eventually calm down, but if you don't channel that energy, she turns obnoxious as you can see.

Well, yes to tripling her exercise but there's not enough hours in the day!

Yesterday, in addition to throwing the ball inside for her we
*spent an hour at lunch time with the neighbors dog, running around their yard and wrestling
*took a 20 minute walk at 6
*followed my DD on an hr long bike excursion on the boardwalk from 7:30 to 8:30

And she still got the puppy crazies. That said though, we've had extreme weather here, heat and thunderstorms for the last week, so I'm sure she has plenty of energy stored up to burn off. I'll keep at it. And I like the idea of distinct commands. She is so sweet, but not as smart as my old dog, who was an evil genius. And almost 12 when he passed away. Plus she's a pup and sometimes she does just seem confused to me. I'll try to be clearer with with her.

[madskye]

Originally Posted by slimkins

Lots of good advice already, but I also found that turning your back and ignoring the behavior seems to get the point across. Even leaving the room if you need to. Your pup just wants to play or get some attention and doing that will give him the exact opposite reaction that he was looking for. Therefore ending the behavior at that moment.
I would teach a "relax" or "settle" command at another time. I don't think you would be setting your pup up for success if you taught him at that time of night when he is so wound up.

This makes sense to me too, I think she is too wound up to learn anything at that point.

[SquishyKitty]

If you want my honest opinion, here goes:

*In addition to throwing the ball inside for her

That shouldn't really even count as exercise. It's play.

*spent an hour at lunch time with the neighbors dog, running around their yard and wrestling

You should have spent that hour walking or running her, not playing. Playing is playing, not exercise.

*took a 20 minute walk at 6

Should be longer, our dogs get at least another 45 mins in the evening.

*followed my DD on an hr long bike excursion on the boardwalk from 7:30 to 8:30

Hop on a bike and take the dog with you. Seriously.


The first and best way to combat obnoxious behavior is to ensure that the dog has burned off her execess energy. First thing our trainer taught us, and something we take to heart, is that a tired dog is a good dog. We get up stupid early to exercise our dogs, even though we don't want to. You make the time, or you deal with the behavior.

[GoBecGo]

I just wanted to second the exercise thing. We had a labXpyranean mountain dog (and he was WONDERFUL). We didn't get him until he was 5 years old, and he still had 2hours minimum walking a day plus in addition a 3hour ramble every weekend and 2 hours of agility once a week (he was like me with running - terrible but loved it ). Without it he just had too much energy and got obnoxious (not mouthing, he was too big for that, but ripping up tissues, stealing socks, that sort of thing). That boiled down to 20mins at 8am, 20mins at 11am, 20mins at 4pm and 1 hour at 7pm every day. In between those he had free access to the garden (which wasn't huge but was big enough to run in). We played with him on top of that, though we never wrestled because he weighed about 180lbs (and was not fat) so we felt it was foolish to let him think it was ever ok.

[Tjej]

With our lab/hound mix the only thing that made her sane as a puppy was running. She NEEDED at least a couple of miles a day, really thrived on more. We bought something called the running guard (for biking) a number of years ago and it has gotten a LOT of use. I think until she was 2 1/2 years old she'd go absolutely bonkers without a good hour of exercise, which INCLUDED some running - just walks wasn't enough for her, but part of that is her hound nose would slow her down a lot as a pup.

ETA: I think it is hard to buy them nowdays, but really, if you just get your dog accustomed to running beside your bike and hook him/her to the frame/back wheel area it goes well and is very stable.

Tjej

[madskye]

Originally Posted by SquishyKitty

*took a 20 minute walk at 6

Should be longer, our dogs get at least another 45 mins in the evening.

*followed my DD on an hr long bike excursion on the boardwalk from 7:30 to 8:30

Hop on a bike and take the dog with you. Seriously.


The first and best way to combat obnoxious behavior is to ensure that the dog has burned off her execess energy. First thing our trainer taught us, and something we take to heart, is that a tired dog is a good dog. We get up stupid early to exercise our dogs, even though we don't want to. You make the time, or you deal with the behavior.

The dog was part of the bike ride outing.

[SquishyKitty]

But she was walking. Run her.

[slimkins]

I would like to respectfully disagree with the PP about running your dog. I don't think any puppy (and yes, 8 months is still a puppy when it comes to formation of bones) should be put under that much forced exercise, especially, running next to a bike. I would wait until at least 12 months and start with really short trips. I think the free exercise you were doing with the other dog was very good. People have different opinions on this, but I would rather be safe than sorry. Especially, with a dog breed that is already prone to hip problems. I remember my dog used to always get wound up in the evening, when she was a puppy, before she would crash around 8pm.
Another thing you could do at that time is exercise her mind. This is when I use to play hide & seek with my pup. Practice having your pup stay in one room or leash her to something if you have to, go hide a treat (even high reward to get her started) in another room. Come back to your pup, release her and say "find it". Mine would not stop until she did indeed find it, and would be exhausted after about 20-30 minutes of it. Now I just use her tennis ball. This also works really well on days where it is SO hot outside.
OR you can put one of her toys wrapped up under a blanket and she will dig forever trying to get it out. This worked really well at exhausting her, too.
LAbs are smart dogs and need just as much mental stimulation as physical.

[SophieAnn]

Originally Posted by slimkins

I would like to respectfully disagree with the PP about running your dog. I don't think any puppy (and yes, 8 months is still a puppy when it comes to formation of bones) should be put under that much forced exercise, especially, running next to a bike. I would wait until at least 12 months and start with really short trips. I think the free exercise you were doing with the other dog was very good. People have different opinions on this, but I would rather be safe than sorry. Especially, with a dog breed that is already prone to hip problems.

I agree with this completely. The rule of thumb I have heard for agility dogs is to wait until age 18 months before really getting into agility training. To be on the safe side, with a dog breed that is prone to joint problems, I would wait the 18 months before you take your dog running.

Maybe add an evening walk (or move a walk to the evening) and aim to get out on the walk before that time hits.

We had a similar thing with both our dogs (and they both grew out of it) - but they would go nuts running laps around the house. We called it "Psycho Puppy Hour" and we'd sometime sing "Psycho puppy, qu'est que c'est?". Aren't puppies fun?

[Tjej]

Oh, I know it is developmentally inappropriate to over-run a young dog. I should have given that caveat. Some dogs just NEED to run or they chase their tails. It was better for my dog to risk her hips a bit than to leave her insane. I didn't consider it "forced" exercise either - my dog was so raring to go that the bike even held her back a bit - we did not over extend her in the least with the bike riding (now the quad chasing she did at the cabin might be a different story, but that was all free running for her).

Tjej

[SophieAnn]

OP I was thinking about you and have a suggestion.

Have you taken your puppy to basic obedience classes? If you haven't I would highly recommend it. If you have, then this crazy puppy time in the evening would be the best time to work on your obedience. Work on sit, down, stay, wait, leave-it, drop-it. Teach her something fun like shake a paw, roll over or get creative and make something up. Use a mix of treats and her kibble to keep her motivated.

Mental exercise like obedience training is usually much more exhausting than any physical exercise, IME.

[SquishyKitty]

Nevermind.