My well-behaved 1-year-old dog suddenly started biting. What's wrong?

Hi and thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! Sorry to hear about Bruno. When a puppy shows aggression, I immediately advise neutering him to remove the male hormone-driven behaviors. I would advise taking him to your veterinarian for their opinion also. He may have some medical reason for his sudden onset of aggression. Your vet can gather a history, perform an exam and then offer a diagnostic/treatment plan based on their findings. Possible tests include fecal/blood/urine tests and x-rays to look for underlying medical problems that could cause aggression. If a behavioral problem is suspected, then neutering, behavior modification, and drug therapy can be tried. I wish you good luck with Bruno

Oh dear! That is a worry for sure! It's really important that you don't get hurt, because dog bites can be pretty serious. I would suggest making an appointment with your vet to talk about possibilities. They might be able to link you up with a behaviorist, or dog trainer that could help a lot. There also could be medications that might help. Or, like you said, there could be a medical problem that is upsetting him.

You should definitely have him neutered and getting professional help is a great idea. In the meantime, you could start teaching him the "look" command so you can use this command when you want him to focus on you instead of another dog.

I'm sorry to hear that you're having this problem! Aggression is a complex behavioral issue, so it's often hard to give a succinct answer in this format. It would help to have more information about what kinds of situations seem to trigger the aggression, as well as some details about how your dog acts in other contexts. In general, I can tell you that most cases of owner-directed aggression like this are related to insecurity and guarding behavior over resources - like resting places, and sometimes food bowls or chew toys. Many of these dogs will bite somewhat unpredictably when lying next to their owners on a couch or bed. If you want to try and address this behavior, I would recommend making an appointment with a veterinary behaviorist who can evaluate your dog in person and help you determine what is causing the aggression, and also give you a detailed treatment plan to work on the problem. You can search for a behaviorist in your area here: www.davcb.org In the meantime, I would recommend avoiding situations that tend to trigger the aggression as much as possible - this may mean blocking Sam's access to the couch, bed, or other areas where he has tried to bite you. Punishment of any kind for this behavior is not recommended, as it tends to make the dog more defensive and worsen the aggression over time. Instead, if he growls or tries to bite, calmly walk away or call him to you for a treat to help diffuse the situation.

If Rocky is close to a year old already, he definitely has all of his adult teeth unless there is some sort of abnormal pathology. A dental exam by a veterinarian would be able to reveal if this is an issue. Assuming that the teeth are normal, it sounds like a behavioral issue that needs to be nipped in the butt as soon as possible. Pitties are great dogs, but they are very powerful and even playful bites can results in some serious damage. Whenever you see Rocky biting or destroying something that is not meant to be, his attention has to be diverted to something else. You should be carrying a toy with you at all times as well as treats in order to praise the appropriate behaviors. If you find that he is biting people, I would recommend teaching him the "touch" command. This can be utilized in order to divert Rocky's attention from something negative and to get him to touch something else. Since he likes to bite, I would not have him start with touching your hand. Use a wand, stick or anything you would like. Eventually once the command is taught effectively, Rocky should be able to come and "touch" from across the room. Depending on his age as well, neutering him might also be an effective way of altering some unwanted behaviors. Hope this helps!

Sometimes that type of mourning behavior is more dominance behavior than sexual behavior. In the future a safer way would be to try to entice with food, or distract with a loud noise. You may want to consider neutering to decrease this type of behavior. If you were bitten I would also suggest seeing a physican as dog bite woulda commonly get infected. Thanks for using Pet Coach.

This is a training/behavior issue. You can get him neutered to start. You will need to enforce the rules and reward him when he does well. If he jumps in the table, then he needs to stay in a kennel during that time until he learns what is expected. When he growls or bites it is important to stop and correct him right then so he understands. Make sure he has plenty of toys to bite and chew to help with boredom You may need to consult a training that can come to your house to help or talk to your vet about medication to help while he is in training.