My friend and i walk our dogs together and they get on well together but, my friends dog is a 6 month old staffie crossed with an american bull dog and she keeps biting the ears and neck of my little westie when we are out, this then upsets my cocker spaniel who likes to protect the westie and the cocker spaniel is the top dog so my friends dog doesnt go after her only the westie. so, we have to keep shouting at her to stop, she does but then goes straight back for more. My friend sadly only has one tone of voice and so her dog takes no notice of her at all so it is left to me!. I dont want to have to stop walking together so any tips of how we can stop this?
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How To Stop A Dog Biting Another Dogs Ear & Neck
- Thread starter millie13
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Hello and welcome to Dog Forum!
We had a similar issue with our two, we put the puppy (the one chasing and biting) on the lead more and when we let her off, if she did it again we put her back on the lead for 2 minutes.
We had a similar issue with our two, we put the puppy (the one chasing and biting) on the lead more and when we let her off, if she did it again we put her back on the lead for 2 minutes.
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It sounds like this big puppy isn't being guided much by your friend, so I'd encourage you to think of your interventions being helpful in terms of helping the dog get some more manners and mostly positive because you intervene early and by doing so you prevent problems, rather than waiting and then reacting to them.
I'd work on having them walking 'together but separate' if you could. If the humans walk together then your respective dogs could be on the outside of the humans and at heel so there's a couple of feet between the dogs.
At the very first instance of your friend's dog getting too full on with your westie (well before starting to chew the ears) I'd use an interrupting measure to guide her away from what she's doing and back where she needs to be. At only 6 months old she's still very much a baby and although she's the sort of breed which is hard to train, correction should be at least possible if not easy
The sort of interruption that I'd use would be a sharp 'ah ah' along with putting her back on your friend's other side. I don't use 'no' because the word comes up in conversation constantly in humans and so how is the dog supposed to know which 'no' refers to her and which is just part of conversation? If I even utter 'ah ah' quietly under my breath Molly either returns to heel or goes to her bed, whichever is appropriate, and that's great for both of us because although she's got loads of commands, none of them may cover 'stop hassling the cat while he's eating' or whatever, so a multipurpose 'stop it' command is helpful.
Once this pup has been discouraged from being too full on with your dog then I'm sure you can find something more positive for her to pay attention to, like a treat that's in your hand for paying attention to you or a game.
Another approach would be to teach her a proper leave command and then reward her for leaving your dog alone when you tell her to leave, but that one would include your friend's cooperation in learning and reinforcing the learning. Either way round the important thing is to predict when she's going to start doing it so that you can prevent the real issue by picking up on the earlier behaviour that will lead up to it.
I'd work on having them walking 'together but separate' if you could. If the humans walk together then your respective dogs could be on the outside of the humans and at heel so there's a couple of feet between the dogs.
At the very first instance of your friend's dog getting too full on with your westie (well before starting to chew the ears) I'd use an interrupting measure to guide her away from what she's doing and back where she needs to be. At only 6 months old she's still very much a baby and although she's the sort of breed which is hard to train, correction should be at least possible if not easy
The sort of interruption that I'd use would be a sharp 'ah ah' along with putting her back on your friend's other side. I don't use 'no' because the word comes up in conversation constantly in humans and so how is the dog supposed to know which 'no' refers to her and which is just part of conversation? If I even utter 'ah ah' quietly under my breath Molly either returns to heel or goes to her bed, whichever is appropriate, and that's great for both of us because although she's got loads of commands, none of them may cover 'stop hassling the cat while he's eating' or whatever, so a multipurpose 'stop it' command is helpful.
Once this pup has been discouraged from being too full on with your dog then I'm sure you can find something more positive for her to pay attention to, like a treat that's in your hand for paying attention to you or a game.
Another approach would be to teach her a proper leave command and then reward her for leaving your dog alone when you tell her to leave, but that one would include your friend's cooperation in learning and reinforcing the learning. Either way round the important thing is to predict when she's going to start doing it so that you can prevent the real issue by picking up on the earlier behaviour that will lead up to it.
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