S/O dog traing--dog people please chime in...

[Hikin' Mama]

I just read Katie's post about poorly behaved dogs. My dog is very good when out and about with me, but jumps on people when they first come over to my house. How do I break this? I usually put him outside while I answer the door and then let him back in and hold his collar while he says hello to my guest(s). However, I would like for him to be able to remain in the room and be able to control himself from jumping. He doesn't jump on anyone in any other situation.

Thank you!

[ktgrok]

A few schools of thought here. 

1. Teach him "place" and have him lay on a mat/dogbed/rug when people come in. 

2. Get a can of pet corrector - it's just compressed air that makes a loud noise when you press the button. When the dog goes to jump up (before their paws hit the other person) spray it to startle the dog. Make jumping up not fun and they stop doing it. Reward dog for staying 4 paws on the ground. 

3. Put a leash on him and correct him firmly for jumping up. Make jumping up not fun, and they stop doing it. Reward the dog for four paws on the ground. 

Personally, I'm in the camp of use the spray or a leash correction, but I'm probably in the minority. Actually, I also teach place, but not in that context. I've known too many dogs who the alternate method just didn't work. Or rather, they (or me) were not willing or able to put in the amount of training time it would take to make it work. How long it would take depends on the dog. Methods 2 and 3 can work very quickly. How big your dog is and how much of a danger they are to people if they do jump is a consideration here as to which way you go as well. I have big dogs. As in, Newfie mix 🙂

Edited December 28, 2018 by Ktgrok

[Alice]

I am not at all a dog expert, we have a minimally trained 5 year old dog (and it’s our first dog).

She likes to jump on people too. One thing we taught her was to go to a specific place on command. For us it’s her mat/bed which happens to be near our front door. We taught her to do that when it was just us and family by using treats. Then we worked on having her learn to stay there until we say to get off. Once we got her to learn to stay, we worked on going to the mat when she was excited but it was just family (she gets barky and jumpy when the kids play loud music or dance around). I added the command Quiet/Calm and wouldn’t give her the command to come get the treat until she was lying still and calm. Now when someone comes over, we will usually tell her to go to her mat and then let her off to get a treat if she is calm. It’s also useful when kids are over and she gets overexcited. 

[hornblower]

 

[gardenmom5]

we did this with a puppy training class.

I would also recommend looking up ian dunbar, or zac george's youtube channel.  he demonstrates all sorts of techniques.

you may need outsiders to help you train so he gets the message strangers are off limits for jumping too.

get them in a situation they'll jump - when they get close, say off.  if they do not jump, give them a treat.   if they do jump, say no and back away so they fall down.   repeat.

with  puppy, 1ds would step backwards when it looked like he was going to jump.   he eventually got the message.  now, he doesn't really jump anymore - even though he gets absolutely hyper when he sees me.

this advantage of this technique is it works with small dogs too.

 

I will admit - In the past I would grab the front paws of larger dogs (doesn't work with small dogs.) and tell them what a nice doggie they are and how much I like them all while holding on to their front paws as they're trying to figure out how to get down. (which has included mouthing my hand - dog slobber doesn't really bother me in those situations.) I'd hold onto them for about 10 - 15 seconds (depends upon the dog), all while telling them what a nice doggie they are and how much I like that in the saccharine sweet voice.  most dogs learned the first time and never jumped on me again.

dh's colleague's akita came zooming at me the second time we met - jumped up on his hind legs -  and realized who I was. his paws never touched me before he was back on the ground.   and I was very happy to tell him what a good doggy he was while petting him.

[Hikin' Mama]

Thank you!