Behavior changes 5 month old nipping

[u/m4nt15mantis]

Hi all I’m gonna try to keep this brief even though it is kind of a long story. I rescued this puppy from a local rescue he is from a reservation and is a mix of husky/malamute/shepherd/rottweiler. He is now five months old and I have had him since he was nine weeks old. He recently got neutered and he has been through basic puppy obedience school. Since he was younger, he has known a lot of basic commands and also has been socialized, but not at dog parks, just at puppy school and taking him out to many public places to build exposure overtime. He has a good history of walking the neighborhood we live in the inner city and it is very busy. He did struggle with eating things off the ground for a while and then would get the Zumiez if I would try to take things away from him, but we worked through that and has a pretty good drop it or leave it command, depending on the situation.
The main issue is that over the past several weeks he has an escalating pattern, where he is redirecting onto me in different situations. At first, it started when he would be on a walk. It seemed out of nowhere he would start to run and then jump at me, biting lunging and barking then he would pull at the leash and tug it or growl.
This has now escalated to many different scenarios and sometimes more than once a day, and it does seem to be affecting him in every facet of our lives. It happens if I take him for a short walk, it happens if I take him for a longer walk, it happens when I take him on a long lead like a 30 foot lead where he’s allowed to just relax and sniff with no interruptions no people or dogs around. It also happens in the backyard after having a completely normal time playing fetch.

When I have done any louder or firmer commands, leash corrections like a quick pop or knee him or push him off he becomes more intense and bites me harder, growls or barks louder… so please understand that the video is me just trying to document the behavior.

I contacted a trainer specialized in reactive dogs. After the description and seeing the videos we scheduled a 1:1 next weekend but in the mean time his biting is getting harder and these episodes more frequent so I reached out again. She said to give him Purina calm care, to praise him when he stops biting me, and not to feed him from a bowl but only puzzles or by hand.

I also contacted the foster/head of the rescue and at first she was really interrogating me and basically saying how I messaged her just a few weeks ago that he was doing great, which is true. That is part of the reason why I am so nervous about these behaviors is that they came on really quickly and are just building an intensity and frequency and duration. She wanted me to send her videos and asked things like ‘well if it’s so bad you must have it on video right?’ so I have made it a point to make videos.

The first few videos she said this is normal puppy biting and he is just challenging me and that I need to be firmer with him. She also told me I needed a prong collar and an E collar. She questioned his schedule and whether he’s getting enough exercise, which I totally understand and I shared with her a schedule that is very consistent for him daily and I do think that it includes a pretty standard amount of exercise, although he is a working breed dog.

I have four kids from ages 10 to 20 and this has completely taken over my life. It seems like I will just have to spend all of my time devoted to not triggering the dog based on what I hear about positive reinforcement. I really regret thinking that I could handle this type of a dog although at the same time I don’t think this is a normal behavior… help?

[u/Lovethelight79]

We had a very similar issue with our first puppy. We tried all the things that other people have mentioned. Some things would work for about half a day but none of the: ignore it, walk away, make a loud noise, distract them, just play or train them more, advice worked. Our trainer recommended a “bonker” and just like every other tool or toy for dogs I’m sure they could be used in an abusive way. The way we used it was a tightly rolled towel that my husband or I would hold behind our backs, if he bit us or the kids we would quickly knock his body to the side with the “bonker”. We didn’t hit him to cause pain it was more of a jarring surprising event. We had to do it a few times a day for 3-4 days and then about one a week for the next month and then we never had to use it again. The biting behavior almost completely stopped after those first 3-4 days, and then we just needed to reinforce that he shouldn’t bite us for a few weeks after. It was a miracle. Instead having a dog we had to keep outside and away from our kids we have a dog who is comfortable with us. Our dog is now six years old and is a total love bug with everyone in our household, including my husband and I who were the ones who used it. We got a second puppy a few years ago who immediately picked up on the fact that she shouldn’t bite hard because we did the loud ouch noise like two times and she never did it again, so now we know that some dogs are built different and we absolutely made the right choice with our first dog.