puppy has split personality

Edited by Admin. Thread allowed to stay open because Op's question was never answered.

my issue is that dozer has almost a split personality... hes one thing within the courtyard, and another when we're outside.


in the couryard hes:

fiesty
dissobedient (half the time)
agressive (he bites at my legs, shoes, knees, and growls sometimes while doing it).
hes not submissive when i say "no bite!" he barks back but does not keep eye contact.


when were outside:

he will sit when i tell him to (hes a puppy, so it takes more than once)
he follows me with or without the leash (without the leash hes not as great at following though).
he doesnt bite aggressively when i pet him like he does when hes inside.
he usually does what i want him to do.
hes submisive



can anyone explain why exactly hes acting this way?


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and so no one says "they didnt know" heres proof i've made threads of dozer from BEFORE.
http://pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=73849

http://pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=73896

http://pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=74170

http://pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=74233

Well sorry, I don't understand why you expect comments on your first posts in other posts. Or if you expect them here? But anyway, here goes.

It is absolutely normal for your puppy to appear to have what you call a split personality. :) Calm, attentive and compliant versus wild, crazy, excited disobedience. What I do note is your puppy sure has it backwards from mine and most others I've known.

Calm, attentive and compliant is what mine are IN the house, or our own yard, where there are far fewer distractions. Until they learn how to control themselves, from repeated exposure and lessons in behaviour, yep, they're wild and crazy outside the house.

Now, you can see Dozer seems to have some kind of contrarian bent to him, he's opposite. But the remedy is the same. Training.

If you have achieved Dozer's good behaviour outside with relatively little effort then my guess is that he is a little overwhelmed by the big, wide world and is behaving out of a little apprehension. THIS IS GOOD. He is relying on YOU to look out for him. This probably won't work for long, they do grow out of that period where they look exclusively to you and become more brave and sure of themselves. My guess is you should use this now while you can, it likely won't last.

Dozer is not that young a puppy and mine would have been out of this period long ago. Do watch out for "fear periods", actually he may be in one now. they go through stages where things they have seen everyday all of a sudden are frightening. With us it was garbage cans, they all of a sudden were very suspicious objects.

Hope that helps, best I can come up with without observing the two of you in action.

SSS Longblades is right its really hard for us so far away to see whats happening! When Dozer is in those moments how are you behaving? are you yelling when you are telling no bite? how about trying this? when he goes to nip at your pants for example snap your fingers and say "hey" but in a calm voice..not yelling. See what kind of reaction you get.

This is just one example of many things that can be done for Dozer. Considering he will be leaving you soon can I suggest you not worry about it right now and just polish all of his other skills to assist in making him adoptable to potentional adopters? Polish up his sits, down, down stays, taking food gently from your hand, waiting to be fed or all of the things you have taught him.

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the advice given to the OP. Some members doubt the intentions of the OP - others support the OP. Either way - the answers we give to ANY member serve to educate all future members. Please feel free to PM the OP on this matter if you wish to offer additional advice. I too am in PM with the OP on this issue and this thread will now be closed.

That said, I can easily add anything to this thread by any member that wants to offer additional advice to the OP.


Thanks,

Marko
Admin