Nipping Shepherd puppy - 2008-06-13

Question

Hi I have a 8 month old female German shep pup she has been nipping a few months and has been having obedience training to correct this, problem is the nipping with us isn’t working 4her so now she has resorted to biting us when we try to place her on the chain at the end of the day (as she tries to jump the fence at night so she on chain at nightime) or after we finished her training we then play then bites us when have finished she isn’t aggressive natured just bites us when things not going her way please help I don’t want to have her put down!

Answer

She knows that the chain is not a nice thing and response to that…. She is young and confident and wants attention and results to making herself known to you by biting. She is a young dog and can be easily trained out of this. You need to ensure you are seen as the leader and she has to learn not to want to play the boss. Jumping the fence is another sign that she thinks she is the boss. I would recommend that you get a good dog trainer to help you with this as this will get worse and also may result in real biting rather than nipping.