New and Inexperienced.

[Hiraeth]

Thank you so much for the feedback everyone. I am carefully considering my options. I most certainly will rely on the help of my partner, and I am considering all the issues people have mentioned.. My next question. I don't worry about (someone had mentioned chasing after the dog if it has something in its mouth). I can make it to the dog, however, I wonder how you actually get the beast to open it's jaws? I'm confident about doing it, but lately some friends have warned me that you don't want to have a 200 lbs dog angry at you, or unwilling to give you whats in his mouth. Now, I'm sure I'll learn some of this stuff when i meet other dog owners, and once we have classes. However, has there ever been a battle of the wills with anyone and their mastiff? Have you ever had to fight to get something dangerous out of their mouths? I want to be as prepared as can be. I know handling them, bathing, brushing teeth, nail clipping, etc. all get them used to your touch. Although, I have heard about the stubborn streak. So, how do you convince a giant to let you look in it's mouth?Just curious. Thanks for reading!PS- I love all of your photos !

In order to get your puppy to drop something, you should never reach in and forcibly remove the thing from its mouth. In fact, trying to take the thing away from them can often induce a "swallow it before the human gets it" reflex, which will encourage them to swallow the object.

What you do is play trade up games. I started this with Titan pretty young. I gave him a really awesome chew, like a bully stick. And then I showed him an even better treat (small pieces of cheese) and said "drop it" when I displayed the cheese. Titan obviously dropped the bully stick and ate the cheese. The idea is that when you ask your dog to give up one thing, you're giving them something better in return.

The whole "I'm master, the dog should give me anything I want whenever I want" is really domineering and old school, but it still exists. Good lucky trying to convince a 200 lb dog that it needs to give you something it doesn't want to give you. Just taking things away from dogs results in resource guarding behaviors, where the dog thinks that whenever you approach, it needs to guard what it has or you're going to remove it.

Instead, if you make dropping things to get better things fun, he's far more likely to be willing to give up whatever he has in his mouth.

As far as your dog having something in his mouth that he shouldn't - you need to puppy proof the crap out of your home to prevent this from happening. If you wouldn't be physically able to get to your puppy to convince him to drop whatever he has, you need to make sure he never has anything dangerous in the first place.

 

[scorning]

Finn is a pretty sensitive dog, so our battle of wills is not about him being aggressive, but just ignoring me or being passive (i.e. won't willing go into the bathroom without a leash and collar, but will let me bathe him with no problems). We started really young with take it and drop it, and trading games, so he is really good about that. We also abruptly stop playing if he doesn't drop his toy on the first request, which helps. He hates having his toe nails cut, so I usually feed him his bed time snack while cutting his nails. I just have him lie on the couch and give him a couple kibbles after every toe nail.