Dog
and cat pet tips - on Pets.ca
Cat illness, dog is sick, behavior
problems....Once a week Pets.ca will publish a pet tip.
Tip
55 - Dog jumping up - jumping on people
A
common problem that many owners have with their new dogs is jumping
up or jumping on people. This typically happens when you, your
family members or anyone the dog thinks is fun comes into your
home. The dog gets so excited to greet everyone that it jumps
up on them and makes a big ruckus. This might be cute with
a little dog but it's a definite problem with a bigger dog who
might well knock you off balance, intimidate guests, or even
mistakenly scratch you with its paws. Dogs do this as part
of their normal greeting ritual. In the wild, dogs greet each
other by touching noses and that's what the dog is usually trying
to do.
Stopping the behaviour
In
order to get your dog to stop this behaviour you have to stop
rewarding it. What do pet owners usually do when the dog jumps
up? Usually they look at the dog and say something like "OK,
Rover, OK, down, down, OK, good dog, go away now, enough, OK..."
and may even pet the dog during the episode. All this attention
is
PURE
REWARD
to the dog, and only encourages the jumping up behaviour. What
needs to
be
done
is
the withdrawal of all attention. When the dog jumps up, quickly
turn away from the dog, fold your arms, make no eye contact and
say nothing. Once the dog has settled down THEN give it loads
of attention and serious petting. The dog will need to learn
this with every family member and everyone should act the same
way to be consistent.
Once
the dog learns that jumping gets up gets it
NOTHING, the behaviour should lessen or stop. Often the
combined use
of the sit
command to
refocus
the dog's
attention is a great way to speed the whole process. As the
dog is calming down, give the sit command and reward the dog
for
the good sit. This is especially good when you are on walks
and the dog encounters a human it
wants to greet. Just before it gets excited, give the sit command,
then reward the dog with food, petting, toys, etc. Get the
human to come down to the dog's level and greet the dog that
way. A dog that is busy sitting can't jump up if it's on a
leash.
© Pets.ca
2006
www.pets.ca
See the
other pet tips here:
