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How To Deal With A Jumping Dog
By doglover | January 26, 2010
Jumping is a extremely common downside among dogs – or should I say among dog homeowners? It’s rarely a drawback for the dogs themselves – in fact, jumping appears to act as a reward in itself. It’s a different kettle of fish for the exasperated owner, who’s forced to house a brand new set of muddy footprints/gouges in their skin and garments/offended guests/scared children!
Several house owners inadvertently encourage jumping behavior from puppyhood: when a small puppy comes gamboling up to us, fiddling with excitement and making small, clumsy leaps at our knees, it’s nearly natural to lean down and respond in kind. Effectively, we reward that puppy’s “jump-y” greeting by reacting with exuberant affection, hugs and kisses. The puppy learns a quick lesson: jumping is a sensible thing, as a result of it ends up in masses of positive attention and physical contact. Your dog doesn’t understand the distinction between a jump as a little, cute puppy, and a jump as an enormous, hairy adult.
To a dog, a greeting could be a greeting, and simply as a result of he’s aged by some months is no reason to prevent jumping – at least, not voluntarily. You’ll want to require matters into your own hands, and create it perfectly clear to your dog that jumping is no longer an option. When is jumping not appropriate?
Obviously, whether or not or not you’re prepared to simply accept your dog’s insistence on redefining verticality all comes down to personal preference. Several homeowners of smaller dogs actually expect them to leap up – among toy dog owners, jumping appears to be viewed as a sign of pleasure and affection on the dog’s behalf. The great news is that these dogs aren’t probably to knock anyone flying after they’re feeling rambunctious, and they’re small enough that their size sometimes won’t intimidate any but the youngest of children.
On the other hand, there’s rarely a situation where strangers will actively welcome being leapt up on by an unknown dog, irrespective of said dog’s size; really, it’s just plain good form to show your dog the “off” command, thus that you’re prepared for those incidences once you’re not directly available to stop the jumping behavior. For owners of enormous-breed dogs, the “off” (or “no jump”) command is mandatory. Big dogs are usually taller than humans after they rear up on their hind legs (and just imagine the experience from a child’s purpose of view, with a dog’s slavering jaws looming on top of your own head!) – they’re typically heavy enough to knock smaller adults tip over tail.
At the terribly least, a giant dog’s paws are significant enough to gouge long rents in cloth and exposed flesh. Bruising and scratches are unpleasant enough to house when they’re your own problem; however they’re a lot of worse when your dog’s inflicted them on someone else! Really, any quite jumping that involves anyone but yourself is just bad form. All house owners with even pretensions of responsibility ought to arm their dogs with a reliable recall to the “off” command – just in case.
The most reason that almost all dogs jump up is merely out of excitement: it’s an enthusiastic greeting, reserved for times when adrenaline’s running high and the dog’s happy concerning something. Many dogs don’t jump in the least, except when their owner returns home when a comparatively prolonged absence (like the common workday). If your dog is leaping up on you in these circumstances, there’s no sinister motivation at work here: he’s literally jumping for joy. A less common, however additional serious, reason that some dogs will jump is to exert their dominance over you (or over whomever they’re jumping on).
Dogs are pack animals: they live in designated hierarchies of social rank and order. When a dog needs to say his dominance over a lesser animal, one means of doing therefore is to declare physical superiority, that is typically done by “jumping up”: he’ll sling one or both paws over the other dog’s shoulders. You’ll be able to tell the basic reason for your dog’s jumping simply by considering the circumstances surrounding the event. If he solely jumps up in periods of great excitement (like during play-time, or when you come home from work) then he’s clearly simply demonstrating an exuberant frame of mind.
If the behavior occurs in an exceedingly selection of situations, then it’s a lot of likely that he’s expressing dominance over you, which could be a more complicated issue – the jumping’s simply a proof of an underlying perspective and communication issue.
Essentially, you’ll would like to make some serious changes to your overall relationship together with your dog, and brush up on your alpha-dog techniques (tip: Secrets to Dog Training has some fantastic resources on addressing a dominant dog – there’s a link to the location at the underside of the page).
Four paws on the ground, please!
How you react to your dog’s jumping plays a big role in whether or not or not that behavior gets repeated. You’re going to want to form a prolonged effort to be consistent in how you select to accommodate this downside: for your dog to prevent jumping, he desires to be taught that it is never ever acceptable for him to try to to so.
This implies that you’ll be able to’t permit him to leap sometimes, but forbid him from doing it at other times. Your dog will’t understand the distinction between a playful and an irritable mood, or your work and play garments: all he understands is that, if you permit him to jump up on some occasions, he’ll attempt to jump up on you whenever he feels like it, because he doesn’t recognize any better.
Stopping the jumping
Most trainers agree that the foremost effective means for you to weed out unwanted behaviors (like jumping) in your dog is also the best: all you have to try to to is simply ignore him whenever he jumps up. The concept is to relinquish him the cold shoulder: withdraw all attention, even negative attention (so no yelling, shoving, or corrections).
Here’s a way to implement this coaching technique:
Whenever your dog jumps up on you, turn your back straight away. Since dogs perceive body language a heap additional clearly than they are doing the spoken word, you’re going to be using your posture to convey the message that such behavior isn’t acceptable here: fold your arms, flip your back, turn your face removed from him and avert your eyes. ‘ This can be where a lot of folks create a slip-up: they confuse ignoring the behavior with ignoring the dog. You’re not ignoring the behavior – i.e., you’re not carrying on with no matter you were doing as if the jumping wasn’t happening; you’re ignoring your dog. You’re still visiting react; however your reaction is for you to actively ignore him. The cold shoulder could be a really effective manner of communicating your displeasure to a dog – he’ll catch on terribly quickly.
While not the encouragement of your attention and your reactions to his behavior, he’ll quiet down terribly quickly indeed. When to praise When all four paws are on the ground, then – and only then – you’ll be able to praise the heck out of him! Don’t be confused by the proximity of the positive reinforcement to the negative – dogs have a terribly short “training memory”, and are only capable of associating a reaction from you with whatever behavior it’s they’re exhibiting at the time of that reaction. Thus, it’s perfectly OK for you to react with wild enthusiasm the terribly second that his paws touch the ground, whether or not you were cold-shouldering him the split-second before.
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