Ruff Housing

southerngirl

southerngirl

Honored Member
I absolutely hate it when people ruff house with dogs. I feel that it causes behavior problems. My older brother(21) ruff houses with Piper and I HATE it!! She gets really ruff and I don't want her to be encourage to act like that. And when she bites to hard my a$$ hole of a brother hits her! I really want Piper to be gentle being that she could get up to 60-100 pounds, I do not want a dog that big rough housing with me or anyone. And being her breed she needs to be very gentle and well behaved. Oh and there is no making my brother stop he just says he doesn't care about what I say.
What are your feelings and thought about ruff housing?
 
I'm not a huge fan. I'm not sure that it actually causes bad and aggressive behavior, I just feel bad for the dog. My older sister (21 :) ) always used to rough house with Chloe and I always felt bad for Chloe and told my sister to stop but she said Chloe was having fun. Chloe was an adult dog when she started rough housing with her and Chloe would not bite us for anything, she knew it was bad and knew that it hurt us, so she didn't want to do that. So as my sister tried to rough house with her she would just sit there growling, trying her hardest not to bite, and I'm pretty sure she wasn't having very much fun.
 
Without knowing to what extent you mean by rough housing - there is a difference btw play fighting/wrestling and teasing. We could get our dogs worked up a little - real biting was never ok - but some mouthing was allowed as I figured I was trying to imitate dog play. But we also worked in a Start and STOP command. We could say one word and our dog would play attack us like those police dogs biting our arms (best done with a winter jacket !) but then just as easily say off and all play ended instantly. Same with wrestling.
Our dogs enjoyed wrestling with us ( more like restraining hugs bellyrub runaway type stuff ) but must always ended instantly with a command so it never got to frenzy biting stage.
and I would never do it with a dog who had little self control - thats just asking for trouble.

Maybe you can find an acceptable level for your brother that he will abide by - else just kick him in the nuts and tell your mom he was mean to you. ( just kidding just kidding )

Oh and despite rough housing - my dogs were 2 of the friendliest gentle dogs around.
 
When I say rough housing I mean he is pushing her one her sides back and forth between his hands, smacking her muzzle(which is open because she is swinging it all around trying to bite his hand. He'll push her back and she'll come running back. He will allow her to bite him, but as soon as she starts to get to rough(bites too hard or scratches him) he hits her. Also she is just a 6 month old puppy. Basically right when he start rough housing with her she starts getting too rough. She really needs to learn that she has to be gentle when putting her mouth on us before she is plays like this and I still do not like how my brother play is with her. I will every once in a while playfully push Missy around for a few seconds but not as roughly as my brother and not nearly as long. But Missy knows better and I do not get her so riled up that she bites me too hard.
 
Okay so I guess I don't hate "rough housing" I hate how my brother does it. When I think of "rough housing" with a dog, how he plays with them pops into my mind...
 
What my sister does with Chloe sounds similar to what your brother does with Piper, especially the hitting her muzzle part. That's the main thing that she does, and Chloe just sits there growling, wanting to bite, but restraining, sometimes when they are doing it Chloe will just reach down and bite the carpet, because she can't bite my sister but she needs to bite something to get it out of her system.
 
I rough house with all three of mine. They truly enjoy it. Id they didn't, I wouldn't do it. However, I have an off switch... all I need to do is look away. It does not cause aggression, it just causes too rough of play, if not done right. Ollie especially loves a good rough and tumble game, but he would never, ever, put his teeth on me...Mouse, however, does! Lol
 
Since the dog is "yours" and not the family dog you should be able to control how she is treated.
Maybe whenever he "plays" with your dog, you take something of your brothers and "play" with it a bit too roughly for his liking and see how he likes it.
 
I sometimes play with Holly like that. It's usually fine and she doesn't intentionally get too rough but her teeth are very sharp, so sometimes when she is swinging her head back and forth she will scratch my arm. She doesn't mean to and she doesn't close her mouth at all, it's just her teeth scratching me, if she starts doing this then we end the game because she has gotten a bit careless. She stops as soon as I stop and doesn't try to get me to play again.

However, when she was a puppy she was very nippy (hands and legs) and my brother rough housed with her, we had to get him to stop because he was letting her be too rough and she was getting too nippy. Soon after he stopped playing with her (we tried to explain to him that he could play with her as long as he used a toy and not his hands but he decided to just not play with her any more) she did get gentler. I think he thought it was funny letting her bite him because she's so little. But little dogs should not bite either.

So maybe you could encourage your brother to play tug with her, and only let her mouth toys.
 
648117 said:
I sometimes play with Holly like that. It's usually fine and she doesn't intentionally get too rough but her teeth are very sharp, so sometimes when she is swinging her head back and forth she will scratch my arm. She doesn't mean to and she doesn't close her mouth at all, it's just her teeth scratching me, if she starts doing this then we end the game because she has gotten a bit careless. She stops as soon as I stop and doesn't try to get me to play again.

However, when she was a puppy she was very nippy (hands and legs) and my brother rough housed with her, we had to get him to stop because he was letting her be too rough and she was getting too nippy. Soon after he stopped playing with her (we tried to explain to him that he could play with her as long as he used a toy and not his hands but he decided to just not play with her any more) she did get gentler. I think he thought it was funny letting her bite him because she's so little. But little dogs should not bite either.

So maybe you could encourage your brother to play tug with her, and only let her mouth toys.
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Thanks 648117. Okay this gave me an idea. When he is rough housing with her maybe I toss a toy rope over to them he'll play tug with her instead. This way I'm not directly confronting him on playing to rough with her, because I know he'll just yell at me if I do.
Oh and if you don't mind what's your name or nickname I feel weird calling you 648117 or Holly's mom.:)
A bit off topic but he's looking at houses, so hopefully soon I won't have to deal with him hitting and yelling at the dogs anymore.:D
 
My feeling on rough housing is...it all depends.

It depends upon whether or not both parties are enjoying it. I also think that like any other "game" it needs to be played with "rules"; meaning neither party gets so riled up that the other actually gets hurt.

That said I think controlled rough housing can be a good way to teach impulse control; if you take breaks in between to de-escalate...and it it can be used in a sense sort of like the Control Unleashed "On-off switch" game.

This is our version of rough housing and V. LOVES it! :p

 
Brody also loves to wrestle, like "amateur" said, more like restraining and hugging. I will also grab his collar with both hands and pull him toward me, put him in a head lock, give him noogies, etc. I am always on the floor in the human version of a play bow, and he responds with his play bow. When I release him, he always comes back with his puppy face, and tail wagging, so I know he enjoys it. Because he was a mouthy boy at first, I would usually only do it if he had his tuggy in his mouth, but now he knows the game, so he doesn't put his teeth on me. The only problem I can see with what Danielle's brother does is his response when Piper puts her teeth on him. Rather than hitting her, which is going to escalate the problem, he needs to stop the game by turning away immediately. If he continues, unfortunately, Piper might make him sorry.
 
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