This is becoming a problem now. Toyah my old english sheepdog of 6 months is bang in the habit of jumping up to greet every stranger when on walks or in the house. She doesnt bite and is in no way aggressive, just very excited and annoying! I stop her and tell her no at every opportunity but i think im missing something that can be done to teach her. Can anybody help!?

Hmm, I'm still in the process of doing this with my 7 month GSD so bear with me.

I've been told that when a dog does this, they're showing their dominance over you. Basically, once their front paws are on you they've won.

Have you tried pushing him down with a firm no? If that doesn't work you could try completely ignoring him and turning away.

What I'm doing with Sky (and it's starting to work) is when you know he is going to jump up, lift your knee and turn to the side.

Good luck, there's a lot of threads on here about jumping up x

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I have the same problem with my boy (Rottie/GSD/Boxer) mix, he jumps up when he first sees you, or when we meet people outside, or people come in to the house, it's really annoying.

We were also told it's a dominacen thing, I'm not sure, but anyway we lift our knee and tell him 'Off!', it's work in progress.

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we always just ignored ours, and turned away

I dont think it has anything to do with dominance. I have a very nervous and submissive SBT, he still jumps up and on people. He does it as its fun, and its a self-rewarding behaviour, as he gets attention from me telling him b*gger off. He also just cant contain his excitement or energy, and this is an outlet for it. If hes just been for a walk, he doesnt do it so much.

I found that teaching him to sit helps, as well as ignoring him. I used a tin to teach Oscar, as the more we ignored him, the worse he became as it was a challenge and he liked that.

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Knacker Lacquer - Adds Luster To Your Cluster

I would try ignoring him completely or turning away I know its hard with a dog that size. It's probably more excitement than dominance. Or get her to sit to sit and stay when they come in.

Lift knee up as he is jumping to block him (your not using your hands which he knows is a reward E.g stroking)
Once you have blocked the move you need to turn away and ignore him until he has calmed.

When your out and about its difficult if they are off the lead so ensure you ask everyone to ignore and turn if he does it to them. When he is on the lead you could always have people approach you ... put your foot on the lead up close to his collar and put him in the down position ... the weight of your body on the lead should hold him down and stops you bending down .. thus encouraging him to jump up because he thinks he is going to get a stroke (reward)
Once he is down and you have him 'pinned' down the person can approach but they MUST NOT acknowledge him until he is calm subbmissive.

Now the one thing that will annoy you is when you ask people not to let him jump up and they say "oh i dont mind..." .. Simply say "well i do, please do not let him jump up"

That used to drive me nuts, lol

Yeah, I tend to agree with this much more than the dominance idea. Bailey can get really excited to see you or people and that's the only time he does it, or ocassionally when he's playing. Then again, we were also told that the breeds he has in him (esp. GSD/Rottie) jump and use their paws to play with each other. Now we've seen him do this with other dogs as well and with another much bigger GSD and they both played the same way, so I think it could be related to that.

But hey, I'm far from being an expert, I'm just learning, but I definitely doubt the dominance theory in the case of jumping up.

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