# 5 year old very mouthy



## slomikey (Feb 2, 2014)

We are trying to break my 5 y/o Vs habit of mouthing. Either when he meets someone new he greets them by trying to grab their hand with his mouth. At home it is easy to work on as we can give him a toy. While in public however it is much more difficult. Anyone have any recommendations?


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## bertrand (May 17, 2017)

slomikey said:


> We are trying to break my 5 y/o Vs habit of mouthing. Either when he meets someone new he greets them by trying to grab their hand with his mouth. At home it is easy to work on as we can give him a toy. While in public however it is much more difficult. Anyone have any recommendations?


When we were looking at some of the characteristics of the Vizsla breed before getting our puppy, we read that Vs like to show their affection by using their mouths and by holding hands in their mouths, so I would think that this behaviour is fairly normal and natural for your 5 y/o, which is going to make it fairly difficult to stop.


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## Gabica (Jan 20, 2018)

i have seen vizslas doing that with very soft mouth when they were trying to draw their owner`s attention to something, like a 
birth of a last pup in the litter when everyone thought the dam was over or aware mark on the ceiling caused by broken roof etc.it would make sense to evaluate why your vizsla is doing it, i.e. what is he trying to communicate and go from there.


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## slomikey (Feb 2, 2014)

It’s definitely a sign of affection. He does it when he wants to say hi and play. The trouble is when it is a bit too hard to people who don’t know him or again think that he is trying to bite or be aggressive, when in fact it’s the exact opposite


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## gingerling (Jun 20, 2015)

It is a sign of affection, but it could easily be misinterpreted by a stranger!

The easiest way to address this is to...wait for it...inform the stranger to keep their hands up and out of reach, and redouble your training at home..whatever you're doing isn't getting thru. What do you do?


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## einspänner (Sep 8, 2012)

I've never tried stopping this in my dog so I'm really thankful that she only does it to very select group! 

Do you allow him to mouth you at home or do you always sub in a toy? They're smart dogs and capable of learning distinctions, but for the sake of eliminating a very natural behavior, probably best to never allow it. When he goes for your arm, rather than moving it out of reach, I would say "no" or whatever sound you know stops him in his tracks. I do a "eh, eh" kind of sound. Then I'd follow up with a separate command like sit, and then praise him. So ideally he's learning that instead of mouthing hands he should sit or exhibit whatever calm behavior you would like. 

You could also carry a small cloth or something that will fit in your pocket for public interactions. Give it to him before you approach people. The other day I watched this video on deer tracking where the dog was trained to indicate he had found the deer by putting a tab clipped to his collar in his mouth and run back to the handler. If you search for "dog training tab" you'll find similar products. I think something like that would work well and then you wouldn't need to carry something separately.


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