Aggression when trying to do something

[Min D]

We have a 12 week old puppy, he is doing all the usual puppy things, but there is one thing that he is doing that really concerns us

Two weeks ago at ten weeksold,  we took him to a vet ophthalmologist to have his eyes checked. Granted lights were out, she had a light on her head , and she was trying to look in his eyes however he growled and tried to bite her twice.

I don't think it's necessarily a Vet thing, we had him  to the regular vet and he was fine, mind you she didn't really do anything obtrusive.

We have to put ointment in one of his eyes . Last evening when we tried there was no way he was going to cooperate, He was growling and trying to bite- it took two of us but we eventually got it in.

This morning I tried washing his face, he growled got aggressive and bit me.

We have had his nails clipped, he will lay on his backlit hour ny fuss-  he's friendly otherwise. Any thoughts?          

Suggestions?

Edited June 3, 2016 by Min D

[pkcrossley]

my thought is that 12 weeks is when cairns start their campaign to rule the world. growling and biting are pretty common approaches. cairns seem to know that for small dogs they have really big teeth, jaws and voices, and they use them to try to get the advantage. in this case, your cairn is or was probably truly worried about the vet's behavior, but he has somehow got the idea that he is getting the upper hand. this is classic terrier stuff. he will pull this more and more frequently, about more and more things, as long as he thinks it is working. i would say you have to put an end to it right now, but what i mean is you have to start taking steps to do something about it right now --it could take a while to convince him that you are determined. this is the battle of the wills. cairns are geniuses at being stubborn, and you will have to be too. if you are brave, self-disciplined, and totally consistent, you will win and he will stop wasting his time trying to intimidate you and be happy and proud that he has a human he can rely upon to be wiser than he is. otherwise, you are headed to the land of spoiled, anxious terriers who make themselves and everybody else miserable. 

just on the basis of your narrative i would assume that at some point your response to his behavior gave him the idea that he has a chance to intimidate you. it is only natural --you flinch, or you give up and wash your hands of whatever you were trying to do, or there is just something about your voice or your heartbeat that makes him think he is getting his way. i think the easiest way to convince a little cairn considering a life of crime that you are not afraid is to convince yourself, if necessary by getting the tools necessary. as i have said elsewhere here i had a cairn puppy who was totally unsocialized and showed all the worst traits of a pushy, bitey cairn. between the ages of about 16 weeks (when i got him) and 24 weeks he wore a padded harness and a short leash at all times. when he started getting even a little bossy, it was up up and away to his time out place. no fuss no muss. i had no reason to be intimidated and i didn't accidentally give him the sense that i was intimidated. instead he quickly understood my special power and i think it speeded up his decision to abandon the world-conquest campaign. once he was civilized enough to not have to drag the leash around, i reinforced the messages with shunning --any misbehavior and i simply went into another room and ignored him.

still, i think even the best cairn will occasionally throw a full-on, over the top tantrum --a frenzy. the basic neurology of it is deeply bred into cairns, who were selected for their ability to fight and kill dangerous vermin in very close quarters. anybody seeing a frenzy for the first time will question whether their dog has been possessed by a demon or is just a very bad person hiding inside the charming body of a little dog. frenzy is something any cairn is capable of, by definition, and a cairn bite --especially a bite by the little needle teeth of a puppy-- hurts like the devil. but it does not maim, and i think anybody who gets bitten by a cairn in frenzy probably gets bitten accidentally, but the result will be the same for any cairn who thinks he got an advantage from biting somebody, whether the first time was accidentally or on purpose. as cairns mature i believe they can learn to raise the threshold of frenzy and save it for real life-and-death situations. this is an important reason to stamp out the attitudes that little 12 week olds can develop about the advantages of being nasty -- if you don't deal with it, they will eventually learn to use the frenzy for fun and profit. your cairn must believe, absolutely, that there is no fun and certainly no profit in getting rude or violent. my cairn tried a frenzy or two between the ages of 1 and 3, and i get a pair of woodstove mitts around to pick him up and put him back in his time-out space. again, no fuss no muss. because i knew that he could not bite me, i was not afraid of him and did not even accidentally show him fear. this is important to a cairn (and to most terriers): any self-respecting puppy will assess very closely who they can and cannot intimidate.

this means that if you have a multi-human household, every member of the household must be on board with the plan. if your puppy comes to feel that anybody is a weak link, it will be hugely more difficult for you to convince him that his cause is lost, and he should start flying right if he wants to enjoy any rewards. 

my methods described above are just examples of many, many strategies you can use. not all of them work for all people and not all of them work for all cairns. but you can certainly find the methods that work for you and your dog. some people know how to roll the dog over and hold him until he calms down (this certainly works for many or most dogs, and is the only kind of physical response i would suggest --cairns hold grudges, and a dog that is hit or bullied will feel it only fair to fight back). there are many, many threads here on dealing with what we are calling "aggression" here. you are already ahead of the game because you realize there is a problem and you are doing what you can to deal with it. just be confident that your dog is very normal. but you have reached the fork in the road that is common to almost all of us (believe it or not there are rare cairn angels who have never tried to intimidate their families or throw tantrums to get their way; little wonders). you need to keep on putting the brakes on this, and you can find at this site all kinds of good suggestions. consistency, consistency, consistency. if your dog finds chinks in your armor (or a weak link in the household), it is going to slow down the process of properly socializing your cairn. 

 

 

Edited June 4, 2016 by pkcrossley

[Hillscreek]

Don't have anything to add to pk's excellent remarks. Time out and shunning worked for me with Angus. I didn't think of it as aggression rather assertiveness. Angus wanted to be the boss, the one who said what was to happen. It took a long time and calm, firm persistence to convince him otherwise. Like pk says it is no good getting mad with a cairn he/she'll get mad right back.

[Malcolm's Dad]

Agree with PK. Cairns do like to be the boss. You can get the behavior straightened out. Next will be him claiming your chair as his own. I have to sit on Malcolm (almost I just go to sit down) then he will get up. Telling Malcolm down does no good.

[pkcrossley]

ha ha malcolm's dad knows where-of he speaks. that sounds exactly right --the chair will be next, or the bed. and the "never disturb me when i look like i am sleeping" rule. and "i'll let you know when you can touch my toys."

[Idaho Cairns]

You have every right to be concerned--a puppy that bites, not play bites, needs to be corrected.  A lot of dogs, of all breeds, have an aversion to having their faces touched--your pup's reaction isn't necessarily rare.  The problem, of course, how do you correct/prevent the biting without creating a bite response from your pup?
Might want to review the "Alpha Roll", there is disagreement about it's use but we have  used it successfully with all our dogs--especially when they were young--to get and maintain control.  Do your research and decide if you wish to try the roll with your pup.
We have also employed a technique of grasping the dog's snout, forcing it make eye contact with a firm "No!" or "NO BITE!" command.  I think, since your dog is face sensitive, that might create more problems than it solves however, so think carefully about utilizing that move.
I'm not sure about "shunning"--we have tried that and aren't sure the dog makes the connection with the shunning and the act that caused the shun.   Sometimes I think we consider the dogs a bit more anthropomorphic than they actually are but, it's worth a try--especially if you apply the shun immediate with the act.
Importantly, serious biting moves in a pup are reason to be concerned, you must do something in order to have a pleasant worry free experience with the dog--any and all potentially dangerous behaviors have to be dealt with early on so your present concern is justified.
Good luck and keep us informed as to how this works out for you.

[sanford]

Agree with the helpful comments above and would like to add one more. Like many, (but not all) cairns, Ruffy is extremely sensitive to scolding, which was implied in the above techniques, but I just want to focus on it a bit more:

Luckily, I've had only a very few occasions where I needed to deal with bad behavior on Ruffy's part. But at those times, when I would scold him in a harsh, forceful voice, expressing my disapproval and disappointment,? it always amazed me how instantaneous his reaction would be - dramatically cringing, crouching and flattening himself on the floor, almost as if I had struck him, (which I've never done and never would do)! This technique, by itself, or combined with shunning, ignoring, etc., helps to drive the message home!

P.S. None of this applies, once the famous "cairn frenzy" gets underway. Then, all bets are off, except maybe for the "alpha roll", which works with many, but not all cairns.

[bradl]

Older dogs over time use thousands of interactions and experiences to develop extensive physical vocabularies to help them communicate with us. Puppies have teeth, relatively uncoordinated movement, and no experience. 

Mouthing needs to be nipped in the bud (so to speak) and many excellent suggestions above to give you tools and hopefully the sense that there's more than one way to achieve a goal but pretty much *all* of them require absolute consistency. 

Tiny puppies must emit a pheromone or something that let's them get away with murder with older dogs — behavior that would get them smacked down or killed in a heartbeat if they tried it on another dog as an adult. I've heard it called the Puppy Pass.  

Littermates and puppies learn a lot from exploring (and exceeding) boundaries with their mother and any other adult dogs in the household during those very early days.  If you have ever watched a litter of puppies playing you are going to see that much of their play is based on fighting and biting.

It's undeniably cute to watch the tiny goofballs pounce and wrestle and it is crystal clear that it is a form of playing and has elements of socialization. A perfect example is watching a tiny pup jump up to put its paws on the back of a huge adult (in a laughable display of dominance) and then watch the big adult roll over on its back in a demonstration of submission. "Oh fearsome pup, you GOT me!" 

They teach other bite inhibition (how hard is too hard, etc.) If you move the slider of time over to the right a bit though and imagine the exact same behavior in bigger dogs, it reads as horrifying aggression. In a puppy it is still play. But that doesn't mean it's not time to graduate and go to a more advanced school  

At twelve weeks and newly away from mom and littermates, it's time for the Puppy Pass to expire. Littermates are gone and you are taking over from mom. It's your job to teach him that humans have delicate skin and it's not to be touched with teeth. We like to play, but we don't play like other puppies, with the growling and chomping and mouthing. 

Adding a couple more tools to your arsenal in addition to the many good ideas above, two that have been effective on one or more pups of my acquaintance include briefly holding the muzzle shut with a soft but authoritative "nope" until the pup is still for a microsecond. Lather, rinse, repeat. 

I've also had luck when a pup puts its mouth on me just pushing my hand *deeper* into the pup's mouth — further than it wants and for longer than it wants. While effective it can certainly lead to minor scraping because there doesn't seem to be anything sharper than puppy needle teeth.

Your pup sounds pretty normal for his age. Despite these early challenges enjoy the time. It passes so quickly.

[Sam I Am]

Jock was always bad with anything to do with his face. ALTHOUGH I WAS "his"  he would listen to my DH way before me. So when as a youngster he would growl if I tried to take his bone away, with my DH, Jock tuned into the fact that Richard's deep voice and body language ment that he was the alpha dude not Jock. But even as an adult dog there were times I had to put a soft cloth muzzle on him to do grooming. Not always but depending on his Cairnish moods it was used. He hated it, but for a long while after he would behave himself. 

In Jocks case the alpha role just brought on more aggression, so we never used it. So as Sandford mentioned works for some dogs but not all. Shunning definitely worked. Jock would be glued to my side constantly looking up for approval. As his breeder said, all of them have different temperaments, but share the same characteristics. Love this breed!

[pkcrossley]

think of your puppy as the Incredible Hulk was as a baby (that's a retcon, of course david bannerman didn't have his powers as a baby). he has the power of frenzy that will come over him when he is overwhelmed, but it is also something he can invoke if he wants to. it is connected to the face, that is very true. cairn's shaggy faces are partly to protect their eyes, which would be vulnerable in a fight with a badger deep down in a burrow (we don't see many badgers these days so it is easy to underestimate the dangers these dogs were bred to deal with). the trick for david bannerman was to learn to control his special power so that he wasn't constantly wiping out friends and neighbors. he had to learn self-discipline. your puppy has a super-power. he has a nuclear bomb of his own. i believe that well-raised cairns can control their frenzy trigger 99.99 percent of the time, and the rest is probably when you want them to get on a good frenzy to protect themselves or you. having a cairn with, say, 70 percent control is not going to cut it. socialize him to get him comfortable with a wide variety of situations, including occasionally having harmless objects near his face. until you are sure, get him a soft muzzle (they are comfortable) for dodgy moments so that nobody flinches around him or actually gets hurt (most vets have these, so i'm surprised at a vet who gets bitten). but in addition to socializing, train him to train himself to be polite, patient, thoughtful. he will think that it doesn't hurt when you get nipped, since puppies nip each other all the time. scream and act hurt, more hurt than you are. it will surprise him and give him something to think about. as brad and idaho have said, never let him think it is okay for his teeth to touch you (i always barked "no teeth" and walked away; my dog learned English really fast).  in other words, work all dimensions --teach yourself to be comfortable and consistent, provide familiarity and information for your puppy, and use direct discipline (authoritative shouting --with pointing-- as sanford describes is very effective, though screaming and crying does nothing but teach your dog that he can push your buttons). the odds in your favor are massive. 

Edited June 4, 2016 by pkcrossley

[Idaho Cairns]

As a service to new Cairn owners, I like to share a video that shows  the kind of snappy response that a persistent owner can come to expect from their dogs after months and years of solid obedience training.  This video clearly indicates what is possible with the "intelligent" and "willing to please" Cairn Terrier!
 

 

[Sam I Am]

Yup... That's about it! 

[Hillscreek]

I remember you posting this before Idaho. Making me chuckle again.

[pkcrossley]

yep, that's a classic. must be your authoritative voice that does it. don't let the K-9 recruiters see this, those dogs will out there on SWAT duty before you know it. 

[hheldorfer]

Love that video.  "Come?  Nah, not yet.  Well, maybe.  Is there anything else going on around here?  Nope.  OK, I guess we can go in the house if you insist."

[Lupinegirl]

Braden: "I've also had luck when a pup puts its mouth on me just pushing my hand *deeper* into the pup's mouth — further than it wants and for longer than it wants. While effective it can certainly lead to minor scraping because there doesn't seem to be anything sharper than puppy needle teeth."

 

i have done this, too, with success. I had a Siberian husky long before my Cairn and my whole fist fit in his mouth even when he was a puppy (I was nine when we got the husky). Instead of being afraid of my Piranha puppy, I grabbed his tongue when he insisted on mouthing my hand. It startled him enough to get him to let go of my hand.   My cairn puppy's muzzle was a whole lot shorter and harder to catch than the husky, so it took me longer to figure out a way to stop him from biting. I even bit his ear to get the point across, and I knocked my own teeth against his muzzle and glared at him with my teeth showing, trying to speak "dog" to him.   I think he thought I was an alien.

 Nikki was especially "aggressive"/assertive with me when I sat on the floor to play with him. He worked his mouth around the toy until he was able to chomp on my head while he stared directly into my eyes. Sometimes he growled.  Shouting or quietly saying No or feigning hurt did nothing to stop him, and the Alpha Roll made him even more nasty. Seriously nasty. Or scared?  I don't know what he was feeling at the time.  I acquired a lot of bleeding scratches from his toenails as he clawed me for all he was worth and attempted to nip.  

 I tried numerous other ways to work with my little devil/angel while he was going through his terrible twos phase.  He was difficult to handle from four months old until three years old, balking and lunging on his leash, growling and attempting to pinch my fingers when we played, snarling and snapping his teeth when I picked him up, screaming when I clipped his nails. Ignoring me totally when I wanted his attention, but pestering the daylights out of me when I was working on homework.  Walks did not tire him.  Playing did not tire him. car rides made him pant like a steam train and made him more anxious and hyper until he exhausted himself.  Leaving him in a crate alone in the house invited screeches and howls of protest.    If I left him loose in the house while I went outside to get the mail, I'd come in to find several trails of pee and a smug looking dog. Every room in my house has pee stains on the carpet since the cleaner I used seemed to set them in instead of removjng them.  He was obsessive about licking other dogs' private parts when he socialized.  He used to bring in deer poo from the yard and spit them out on the floor after a walk, and he would purposefully dive to grab something if I told him No.  No just meant move faster when there was something he wanted.  

I got mad. Nikki got madder. I tried holding him against my chest and just gently pinning him to the floor so that he could not squirm away or bite me.  That didn't work. I tried playing and walking more frequently but he turned that into a twenty four hour revolving marathon for me, keeping me constantly on my toes, and he still peed in the house when we came in, even if I praised him profusely for peeing outside.  I taught him "Quiet" by closing his mouth and holding him still every time he whined or barked while we were waiting in an air conditioned car for twenty minutes.  He fought me the entire twenty minutes. He leapt over a tall blockade in the kitchen when he was four months old. He got up on my mom's bed to steal a stuffed animal, drag it into the hall, and chew an ear off, and he managed to strew twenty other chewed collectibles down the hall and steps.  He peed on my bed, on the Christmas tree skirt, on my aunt's suitcase, and on my dad's birthday present. He pushed doors open with his nose if they weren't completely closed and I heard his head bang against the wood if he couldn't open the door on his own, followed by a whiny huff.  I had no control over my obnoxious pet and I had no clue what I was doing wrong.  Being calm and gentle with him made it easier to work with him but he still did what he wanted when he wanted to. 

 

I'm not sure what changed when he turned three years old, but he gradually stopped challenging me and started listening when I asked him to do something, and anticipated what I was going to ask by doing it before I said anything.  Instead of lunging after animals outside, he sat and watched the deer walk by.  He ignores other dogs now after a good sniff. He is totally trust worthy with anything on the floor, even food. I can take anything out of his mouth without resistance, and take away his food. He just wags and waits for me to give him something else since he trusts me to be fair.  Our communication levels are incredible.  I know Nikki so well, I can tell what he is doing and what he wants just from the sound of his breath or footsteps. He still manipulates me by asking for a bone every night, usually around the same time.  He still squeaks and barks if left alone in the car.  He still growls when I pick him up, but then he hangs limp in my arms and relaxes happily, even when I put him in the bathtub. He goes placably along with everything I do, with minimal resistance.  My little devil turned into the best little angel I have ever had the pleasure of living with.

I feel for everyone who has a demanding puppy.   I'm not sure if I really want another cairn in the future, but I know Nikki has taught me a ton of valuable lessons about Cairnhood, adolescence, thinking outside the box, enjoying little things like leaves floating in the wind (he used to think those were fun to chase and munch), forgiving, and aging gracefully. 

[pkcrossley]

beautiful story. how many people will we scare if we say nikki was a fairly typical cairn youngster? they do change mysteriously around age 3 or 4, and they become the best, most communicative, most intimate friend you could have. i think adolescence is about as hard for them as it is for us to deal with them. they seem to regard it as a bonding experience. 

[pkcrossley]

i just accidentally on purpose watch idaho's "spoiled cairn terriers" which is totally hilarious. bonnie's deadpan is incredible. what timing!

[Idaho Cairns]

PK, to this day Bonnie expects me to shake squirrels out of that tree it there is one there and if not, will still stare and stomp her feet if she "thinks" there's one there.  She is just that quirky.  That video has had a ton of interest right from the get go.  It has been fun.