Hi all,

Last week, i adopted a puppy from my local animal shelter. He was a stray
lab/terrier mix that was about 8 weeks old when he was brought into the
shelter. No one knows how long he had been on his own. I noticed when
handling him in the shelter that he had no bite inhibition. (His mouthing
was hard) My wife and I however, loved him, and decided to adopt him so
taht he can be trained properly.

We suspect taht very early on, he was either taken from his litter mates too
soon or that he was handled roughly by his previous owners then dumped on
the street when he bit back. He plays VERY hard and his bites even when
friendly lack control.

Every day my wife and i train him using positive / luring. He has picked up
very quickly (very food motivated) coming when called , go get it, and sit
to the point where he follows us around sitting thinking he's getting a
treat. He is an adorable puppy.

however, a few times a day, he will get super riled up and start biting our
feet and hands. Also, he nips at everyone he meets taht tries to pet him.
we have done much research on this and decided to try to teach him bite
control on our own, but yelling ouch with him or withdrawing attention seems
to get him riled up more to the point where he'll chase us and bite us.
Because of this we tried giving him tiemouts in both a bathroom and his
crate.

He also does not like being picked up and will try to bite his way down. In
fact, he bites when im playing wiht hi spaws sometimes ( though not as hard)
and when im trying to get him used to being handled. We took him to the vet
on the weekend because of a respiratory infectino, and he all but freaked
out on the vet lashing out and biting.

Ive tried redirecting him to his toys which will work when he's not
determined to bite us, but other times he will ignore the toy and go for our
limbs or face. Ive also tried holign his muzzle closed but he all but
attacked me after that. The only thing that seems to work is to squirt him
with a water gun. He doesnt get riled up but stops when he gets squirted.

We had a trainer come to our house this week to asses him, but he was sick
with his infection so he was sleeping most of the time and she assesed his
behavior as normal pup mouthing. She did not see his vicious streak. We
have her coming again on friday so hoepfully she will be able to see him at
his 'worst'.

if anyone has any suggestions or comments, please help us. We are almost in
tears trying to correct and train this lovable, intelligent puppy and fear
that we are doing him more harm than good.