Is your puppy or teenage dog jumping on you and your guests? Do your kids get mauled by your dog’s excited jumping behavior during playtime?
Let me guess. You have tried yelling at your dog to stop the behavior or throwing them in their kennel as “punishment.” Has that stopped the jumping? If you read further than this, I’m guessing not.
Ignoring your jumping dog WILL NOT MAKE THEM STOP. To teach a dog not to jump the act of jumping must be intolerable.
What does intolerable mean? It means unbearable to the dog. Whether that is a squirt of water to the face, shaking a can of pennies, a bonker thrown at the dog, a prong collar correction, or any other method you have found that works for your dog. In order to stop a behavior the behavior must be intolerable.
A lot of people would like to teach their dog to sit and get a treat instead of jumping. Great! However, I don’t want to DISTRACT my dog from jumping…I need my dog to NOT jump even when I’m not there, or I don’t have a treat in my hand. The only way to accomplish this is to put an inhibition in the dog’s mind by making the act of jumping intolerable.
With my personal boxer mix we tried turning our back to the dog, ignoring the jumping, or trying to get him to sit and give him a treat FIRST. All of that failed. It wasn’t until we made jumping intolerable for him that we finally got his attention. Then we were able to go ahead and train him to sit and give him a treat.
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