Jack Russell Terrier [Archive]

mydogiscrazyx

12-14-2007, 04:36 PM

I have a jack russell terrier and he is almost one year old. There is no words what so ever to describe, how annoying and just naughty he is. His name is max, and we have had him since he was five-six weeks old. He pulls on your clothes, he pulls on your trousers when you try and leave the room, he growles and nips, when you try and play nicley with him. Max also has a thing for shoes, he takes my school shoes and rips the bottom out, he is distructive and he also chews his lead.
The main problem with Max is, when he had just came into our house, after leaving his mum, he was getting very attached to me, and i liked it because my little sister wasn't getting any attention from the new puppy, i took advantage of this and took Max everywhere with me. Now he just follows me everywhere and it is really annoying. When i try and give him to my mum, when i need to go to school in the morning, he climbes out of my arms and practically sits on my shoulder and turns his head away from my mum. We cant seem to resolve the problem. CAN ANYONE HELP????????
Thanks
MyDogIsCrazyx

Varga

12-15-2007, 12:52 PM

The destructive behaviour could just be because he is bored. Jack Russells need a lot of mental and physical excercise, even though they are such a small breed. Make sure he has a lot of toys. Buster cubes and kongs are great toys to keep his mind occupied and also make sure he gets lots of walks. If you can let him run off leash in a secure place then that's great. But make sure it's a fenched or secure area or he might take off. Jack Russells are very independant dogs with very strong prey drive so if he sees a small animal he will kill it.

The destructive behavior could also be because he is insecure.. which does sound very likely since he seems to be overly attached to you and is probably nervous when you leave the house. The best way to fix that is to first let him know that he can not control you. Let him work for you. Ask him to do tricks before feeding him. Don't pet him when he wants to be petted. Ask him to move for you if he is sitting on the sofa etc. Basically. Don't let him have his way with you. If he keeps insisting to sit on you or climb up to your shoulder. Keep telling him no and put him gently down on the floor and ignore him.
Second. Let the rest of the family do the same. Also, if he whines and looks for you when you leave for school. Tell your family to ignore him and not pay any attention to him until he has calmed down. If the ignoring doesn't work then they should not reprimand him. Distracting him by going for a walk of feeding some treats works a lot better and it will also help to rebuild his relationship with the rest of the family.

You mom and sister should also do some more stuff with him. Let them be the ones feeding him or taking him for walks for a while. It would also be a great idea if they did some training with him.. Teaching him some new tricks for example. Just make sure they (and you for that matter) do it in a positive way and never train for more than a couple of minutes at a time or he will get stressed and nothing good will come out of it.

The biting and growling, while he is playing, is because he was taken from his mom way too early so he has never learnt how to play properly. Puppies learn when they are being too rough by playing with their litter mates. So that's one of the reason it's so VERY important to not take a puppy home until it is at least 8 weeks old.
Anyway. The best way to fix that is to yelp.. like a puppy would do.. or just say a high pitched "ouch" every time he bites you. Then stop the game and ignore him for a while. In time he should learn when his playing is too rough and he'll control his biting.

I don't know if I covered everything. If you need me to explain something a bit better, just let me know.