# 5 months old…flips out/attacks me?



## lokimonster (Mar 8, 2014)

Loki is 5 1/2 months and since he was pretty young, he has always had moments (usually when he is overtired or overstimulated) where he just totally flips out on me! He goes into full on wolverine attack mode, runs at me and just starts biting the heck out of me, and can't stop! The more I try to physically restrain him and pry him off me, the more crazy and riled up he gets. So I've tried all kinds of things like redirection with a toy, ignoring him, walking out of the room, putting him in timeouts, holding him in place as gently as possible till he calms down… some of these are more effective than others and work some of the time.

Mostly, I have to resort to holding him in place and making him sit till he calms down enough to listen to a sit/stay or a down/stay. Once I get to the point where I can have him listen to a command, he seems kind of relieved to that he has snapped out of it and has a job he can do.

The older he is getting, the less often it happens… but it still happens, maybe once every other day or a few times a week, some times worse than others. But it continues happen, and obviously, that will not be tolerable at all when he is full grown! 

I use a lot of NILIF all during the day, he always has to work for his food and during our playtime. Lots of obedience and exercise. Exercise and playtime helps a lot, as long as I don't overdo it, which also triggers his little freak outs. He gets at least 2 hours per day of activities: walks, dog park, training, playtime in the yard. 

He has been a very different dog compared to most I've been around and trained. He is the sweetest, most loving puppy, and also can be so stubborn/defiant. Scolding and physical corrections seem to only rile him up him and make him behave worse. So I do a lot of redirecting and positively reinforce the correct behaviors. Timeouts and me leaving the room are some of the most effective things for discouraging his bad behaviors.

Im hoping some of you guys will have advise for me! Im getting a little worried. Is this a normal thing that he will grow out of? If you've gone through this with your dog, I'd love to hear about it.


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## Sunflowers (Feb 17, 2012)

Hehehe... I called that gatoring. 
He stopped at 5 1/2 months.
Today I wore a pair of pants with some holes at the knees, from those days. Couldn't bring myself to toss them 

Hans seemed to do that at night, when he was overtired.


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

Since this happens when he is overtired, I would start incorporating scheduled daily nap times. Crate him in a quiet area so he can get some more sleep during the day. Puppies need to sleep a lot - people get so worried about not exercising or stimulating their pup enough and forget to build quiet times into the day.


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## souvik6 (Jan 22, 2014)

HEHE sounds exactly like my max until like couple weeks back.. Noticed this only happened when he was over exhausted after very long play/train session like an hour continuous as I often forget how fast time flies when playing with him after I get back home from work.. His schedule is perfect now and has chilled out a lot!!! its quite hard for me to comprehend still remembering those crazy first five months.. the big change I noticed was due to the fact that his teething stage is almost over he's much more mellow and cuddly now that most of his adult teeth have started to come in..just saw him spit out his two k9 and few molars yesterday.. is this normal also for other people that the once hyper pup suddenly starts to behave like my golden retriever  Will this last?? lol


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## DutchKarin (Nov 23, 2013)

I too have a dog with a Loki spirit... but I did not name him Loki. ;-) I think this is common for high drive protection breeds as well as others but especially the protection breeds it comes with biting. Tygo does it infrequently now that he is a year old, but it still can happpen, usually in the evening. He wants attention. Teach him a tug game and go for it for 5-10 minutes. That usually works for me. I incorporate a little obediance now in the tug to teach him to work in that high energy place. Start slow (in terms of adding obedience), be consistent and use time-outs. 

This too shall pass. I'll let you know when. LOL


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## Shade (Feb 20, 2012)

I had to schedule nap times for Delgado, I called him my energizer bunny with the fast recharge  Patience and consistency and eventually it fades away and you'll realize you've gone a full week without a problem


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## lokimonster (Mar 8, 2014)

Thanks guys! I feel a lot better now! I'll make sure to focus on more scheduled nap times, and being patient lol... he has been crateless for the past couple weeks since he grew out of his old one. Just got a new one a few days ago that will make things a lot easier.
I sure am enjoying raising this crazy little pup, so different than other breeds I've had experience with!


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## carrieincolorado (Jan 18, 2014)

Chevelle only does this when I come home from work and she is in freak out mode that I am back... it's 90 seconds of crazed jumping and biting that I would give my left arm to make stop.. (and sometimes do!) and she just turned 8 months old..... still dealing with it..


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## Benny Boo's Mommy (Nov 18, 2013)

Hey Lokimonster, I just found this thread of yours with the exact same behavior as my dog Ben! I can say he's one and a half and the "gatoring" as someone called it here, only happens once in a while...like maybe once a month these days. He does seem to have to be "snapped out of it" like you say, with redirecting/commands.

We don't know if it would have happened more if he were younger bc he was already around 9mos old when we got him and he was pretty sick...two or three months or so of rehabilitating before he was a "normal" healthy dog. 

I wonder if it's stress or something. He does nap a lot (sleeps on the floor all day), but it does happen at night. Let me know what has been working for you. We are trying the treat/command thing since Ben is food motivated.


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## namvet4 (Jun 11, 2014)

Thanks for this thread everyone! Sarge - "Sergeant Major Bratt" - now almost 4 months old has started demonstrating the rapid run and tear around trying to bite. I had never seen this type of behavior and was getting concerned. Now I know that he will require more naps and rest time to discourage this type of behavior. He is _active_ and loves to run the yard and play fetch. Now we will try and adjust the amount of time downwards and allow more for quiet time.


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## Jmoore728 (Oct 17, 2013)

My dog was a land shark. I'm not trying to hijack the thread. My 10 month old will still mouth me occasionally, especially when running around and playing in the yard. He will go for my arm when he approaches me at full speed...He is only playing, but should I put a halt to this?


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## onyx'girl (May 18, 2007)

I think playing tug helps this type of pup get out that need for oral exercise. You control the game, always, let the pup win often. Mix up tug with obedience commands and use it as the reward.
I know when pups are teething tug is put on hold or played more gently, so it may not be helpful when they are in that full blown teething stage. If the pup or young dog learns to carry a toy/ball it helps as well if you can't tug during the painful teething times.
Like Lucia posted, pups should learn to have quiet crate times and owners should be proactive to help them before they get overtired. 
Crating/processing time after a training session is also very important(as important as the training!)


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## badbananas (Nov 4, 2014)

Update?? Just curious if they truly grow out of this stage or if it is a myth! I am in the land shark phase (12 weeks old now)! Some days are good. Some days are terrible. He is just lucky he is adorable with his giant ears.


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## lokimonster (Mar 8, 2014)

Loki is a year old now and I'm happy to say that he has pretty much grown out of it! I think it was at 6 and 7 months that he dramatically improved to where this would happen maybe a few times a month. Now that he is a year old, he is great! I think being mouthy and jumping at people is sort of how he naturally responds to overstimulation. So if he does have a situation where he gets really overstimulated, he sometimes will have a version of those little spaz attacks. He might jump up on me and bite at my sleeve but he bites softly and calms down easily. 

These episodes for Loki were/are definitely always related to being overtired, over heated or overstimulated. So it helped to start being really aware of those things so I could stop the crazy attacks before they started  

Trust me, it does get better! I think 12-16 weeks was the worst and things only got better from there. 

I found this book extremely helpful, I should've read it sooner! Has a lot of great info and things to help develop self control and calmness in my crazy pup! I highly recommend it! Fired Up, Frantic, and Freaked Out: Training the Crazy Dog from Over the Top to Under Control: Laura VanArendonk Baugh: 9780985934927: Amazon.com: Books


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## Stlramsgrl (7 mo ago)

Hi. Just curious how Loki and the other pups in this thread are doing. My puppy just turned 5 months old and I have been struggling to extinguish these puppy attacks since I got him at 9 weeks old.


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## David Winners (Apr 30, 2012)

Stlramsgrl said:


> Hi. Just curious how Loki and the other pups in this thread are doing. My puppy just turned 5 months old and I have been struggling to extinguish these puppy attacks since I got him at 9 weeks old.


I suggest you start a new thread. This one is 8 years old.


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## iheartpups (10 mo ago)

Stlramsgrl said:


> Hi. Just curious how Loki and the other pups in this thread are doing. My puppy just turned 5 months old and I have been struggling to extinguish these puppy attacks since I got him at 9 weeks old.


Hi! I was just wandering through these threads because I am dealing with the same behavior. My pup is 16 weeks and we've hit an all time high of random freak outs. I did post a thread about it titled 'Concerning Puppy Behavior - Insight/Advice Please' if you want to check out some more current discussion on a similar topic. Hope you find relief soon!


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