6 Month Old Puppy Jumping Up On Strangers

[Tofuloaf]

My 6 month old staffy boy still jumps up at strangers. He almost never jumps up on me and my family, because we've trained him since the day we got him not to, but he seems to have gotten it into his head that while jumping up on his family is forbidden, strangers are fair game.

This is stressful because he weighs 17kg now and any child he jumps up to say hello to tends to go down like a felled redwood. Most parents at the dog park are good humoured about it, and tend to shrug it off with a "Hey, we're the ones who were daft enough to bring a toddler to a dog park" attitude, but he's only going to get heavier and it's only a matter of time before a kid comes away with bruises, or worse.

So how do I train him not to jump up at strangers? It's not as if we can use negative reinforcement when he does it at home, because he doesn't jump up on his family

[Gayle.]

I have a similar problem, although mine jumps around them, not on them. It frightens kids, even though he doesn't touch them (he's trying to herd them).

My solution is to not let him off the lead where there's strangers, and if he jumps up while on the lead (and he has done this from time to time) give him a good telling off, and when he ignores strangers as we walk by, give plenty of positive reinforcement.

My next step will be to find a couple of kids willing and confident enough to be test pilots, let him off the lead near them and start training him NOT to jump and praising when he doesn't. I need to find fairly small kids though......my youngest is 13 and he doesn't jump around her and her friends, but he does do it with smaller kids.

My negative reinforcement is to lean over him (I'm not very tall, so the higher I can get the better), grab the hair/skin either side of his neck, get in his face and use a BIG DEEP VOICE and tell him NOOOOOOOO!!!!! BAD BOY!!!!!!!!!!! It works cos he usually drops on his belly and looks at me with a sorry expression and acts very submissive.

My boy is a 6 month old Aussie Shepherd, usually quite well behaved but rather bossy if he's allowed to be (I don't allow him to be the boss at all!)

[poodlefan]

Train a solid recall... then you can call him AWAY from people he's rushing at.

Teach him that he only gets pats when he's sitting by your side.

In the meantime, keep him on lead. Same deal.. no pats unless bum is on the ground. Being that he's one of those social butterfly staffies, he'll be planting his bum and burying into the ground in no time.

Edited September 3, 2007 by poodlefan

[Poodle wrangler]

I put my 8 month old pup ~25kg on lead for this reason. His recall is about 90%. It's now rare for him to jump up, but still does rarely when very excited.

At our local dog offleash beach, some people have had common sense surgically removed and bring toddlers who scream and run away from dogs, clearly terrified :rolleyes:. Parents seem mystified that this interests dogs

[Danois]

Try having a toddler running towards an 85kg adult dane and 51kg puppy dane who are playing together (including jumping) and me having to scream - STOP at her - they barely bumped into me at one stage and it caused me to stumble - and I would have outweighed her by a heck of a lot!

[Tofuloaf]

My negative reinforcement is to lean over him (I'm not very tall, so the higher I can get the better), grab the hair/skin either side of his neck, get in his face and use a BIG DEEP VOICE and tell him NOOOOOOOO!!!!! BAD BOY!!!!!!!!!!! It works cos he usually drops on his belly and looks at me with a sorry expression and acts very submissive.

For the last couple of months I'd been using the recall method that Poodlefan recommended which worked pretty well, but only if I was constantly on my guard for toddlers with irresponsible parents at the dog park. If he jumped up on adults I would just say "No!"

It's amazing how much difference grabbing his face has made. I only started it yesterday morning, and while he was still jumping up on some of the dog park regulars (they love him and don't mind, which makes it more difficult to train him not to!) there was definitely a marked difference after only one day. There was a woman who was crouching down to leash her dog (ordinarily his favourite kind of target), he bolted straight for her, and then just before take off he realised he was probably going to get into trouble and skidded to a halt without me having to say a word.

[Poodle wrangler]

Making progress!

It's a pain to have to watch out for other people's kids, but best to protect your dog. Not everyone understands the difference between mouthing and biting, either.

Sorry, OT, but we witnessed an accident on the weekend. Kid sitting on skateboard, racing down a hill ran into the side of a car :p. First words out of his mouth were to his friend, "I've been run over". Thank God there were witnesses . No way the driver could have seen him coming and he hit the side, rear of the car. Lucky to get away with what looked like a broken leg.