The Difference Between Teething and Biting
Puppies are sometimes difficult to deal with, as they require plenty of love, patience, and care. However, sometimes there is little tolerance when it comes to helping your puppy attempt to understand the concept that biting an individual is painful, as well as wrong. One that that must be understood however is that the type of biting that your puppy is doing can mean a lot of different things. There are two main distinctions that need to be made; the difference between the act of biting and teething. While both are very common, they unfortunately somewhat difficult to deal with if you are a new and inexperienced dog owner. The most important thing to understand while dealing with this stage of a puppy is that you as an owner must understand the difference between biting and teething.
There are many points that distinguish biting and teething. An important strategy is looking at the actions leading up to the incidents that you are having with your particular pup. Some biting can be the result of playing aggressively with a puppy, scaring the puppy, or even scolding him in a manner that is perceived to be threatening.
This dog is purposefully biting and it is most commonly that the dog is biting out of fear, insecurity, or lack of trust. Teething is not caused by your dog's emotional state, but instead by their physiological stage of life. Babies and puppies go through the similar struggle of acquiring their first teeth. For that reasons, just like babies, puppies need to gnaw on things. It is then of little surprise that if you are playing with them, and they all of the sudden wrap their teeth around you; it is more often to be an act of teething.
Once you have established whether or not your puppy is biting or teething, it is then possible to take corrective action. Though biting is never an appropriate act, biting is instinctual to a dog if they sense you or a loved one is in danger; their biting comes from a perceived need to protect themselves or their owner. A key way to reduce this type of biting is through socialization, which eases your puppy's temperament and level of comfort around other dogs and people. Socializing your puppy with other dogs and humans is a way for them to see how they should interact with other creatures, and furthermore provide a learning experience that they will be able to understand and practice. Teething on the other hand is a natural process, which all dogs have to go through. It will most likely start to diminish as they start to mature.
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