[R-Teddy]

Originally Posted by gemy

The most common complaint I hear from folks who for want of a better descriptive are medium to large dog owners, is that the small or toy dogs, usually are very poorly behaved. They got the nickname ankle biters for a pretty valid reason. And of course many owners do nothing to control the bad behaviour.

And yes there certainly is a pack leader and all humans in the family should be shown to be in charge, and not the dogs!

There are a couple of more dominance behaviours that might seem silly in a way, but trust me they are dominance actions. Your dog always wants to go up the stairs ahead of you or out the door ahead of you. The leader of the pack always goes first, or gives permission for the other member(s) to go first.

Now I never say never ever let them do that, but every so often once a week sometimes more often, I make all the dogs wait at the bottom of the stairs while I go up, or vice versa while I go down. Tripping over a small dog is fun for no-one, and having a large dog bowl you over can be pretty painfull not to mention dangerous on a long flight of stairs.

Another good skill to teach your Yorkie puppy is to move out of the way of human feet. You should not be walking around your dog, but move slowly through your dog, they need to move out of your way!

Second is to teach your Yorkie awareness of doors. That they open and they close, and they don't want to get caught in a closing door.

The head butt especially to your rear end is another typical large dog behaviour that should not be tolerated.

We have a practice that places the dogs outside of the kitchen when we are eating, or when I get tired of them being in my way when I am cooking. All my pups love to be in the kitchen when I am cooking, partly that is my fault, as often when I chop veges fruit etc, I will give them a piece for an obedience command. Not to mention the wonderfull smells from the oven.

My dogs are trained to accept obedience commands from any-one. Many working dog owners don't feel the same way I do. But living in a family, with a sister who is brain damaged they had to learn to obey her too! And not to mention she is not too steady on her feet!

I like the rough rule of thumb, of if you would not accept this behaviour in a 100 lb dog, then don't accept it in a Yorkie!

EXACTLY, this is what im talking about.