I have an 8 wk old boxer puppy and two children?

Wisest mom: I appreciate your response but I want you to know that my girls are first and foremost and I would never let them be in harms way. I spoke to our vet about the puppies nipping and that was his advise. I never let my girls alone with him and I correct him each time and put him in time out.

We have had the puppy for a less than a week. I was hoping that former boxer owners would let me know if this is a typical trait of a boxer. If it continues I plan to take him to puppy obediance class.My girls are safe and I won't let a dog come before them!

Joanne, that appears to be your name. First I must preface this with I am a mother and grandmother,taught 2 and 3 year- olds in Sunday School, and became Supervisor of the department. Also, after I was married and we had started our family we decided it was time to bring a dog into our home.

He was 6 weeks old, a Cocker Spaniel, and we had two children one 4 and one 6. I don't know what your whole home situation is, and I think all these things factor in because he was just the first dog we brought into our family and eventually ended up with 5 cockers, 1 English Mastiff and a Pomeranian, 2 cats, 2 guinea pigs, 1 rabbit and 1 African Blue Parrot. Every dog had his own personality as did the cats and the Parrot.

I really didn't pay much attention to the guinea pigs and rabbit and they were not long time residents in our household, death or being too messy found them homes else where. The first thing that surprised me was that your dog at eight weeks old is running loose in your home. Where is the crate, or playpen, or very large and sturdy box?

Puppies are so sweet and adorable and you just want to cuddle and play with them and watch them play, this is all very sweet,but puppies as children need training. If you don't train your baby from the get go of who is in charge and who isn't in the household you are going to have a lot of sleepless nights, frustrating days, you'll begin to see less and less of your friends, because even friends and family don't enjoy a baby that is ruling the household. Are you with me?

This puppy of course needs love, cuddling and attention in appropriate times and with supervision. Now that things have already sort of got out of hand, you just need to start over with a crate, playpen or very sturdy box. With our first Cocker we got a large refrigerator box and cut it down to where our 6 yr.

Old could barely see into the box. With the other cockers we used boxes with some and crates with the others. With the Mastiff we used a very large crate, but by then our 4 and 6 yr olds were 13 and 15 years old and we had our third child who was around 5 yrs old.

We got the Mastiff when the Masttiff was 5 weeks old, and was by far the most aggressive even at 8 weeks. Our youngest child was afraid of him and the Mastiff picked up on that right away. So when my eldest son would take his Mastiff out of the crate to take him outside for a potty break, he already knew as soon as he saw our youngest that he was afraid of him and would take off chasing him down the hall and around the house.

The rest of us were never afraid of him and didn't have any of those problems. Even with the crate training, we eventually took him to "Dogs Best Friend" a wonderful facility, somewhat costly with a Mastiff, and he was left there for 3 weeks to be trained. Oh, that wasn't the end of it, we still had to go as a whole family throughout times of those three weeks to work with the Mastiff along with the trainer at first being right there with you and gradually it was one on one.

Our youngest was of course afraid the first time but did it anyway and after that it became very easy for him and after the three weeks, we had a well trained member of the family who loved and respected all of us and really enjoyed his time with any of us but with his knowing his place as each of us being his master and he was the dog. Had our Mastiff not been such a large dog with real potential even at eight weeks could accidentally injure our youngest and it would not have been his fault but mine because I was not first,making sure that our home was a safe and nurturing environment for every member of our household, as mother being in total charge of what was going on in every single inch of our home, and three was teaching all of our children how a home runs by seeing their mother do it. That Mastiff lived to be over 10 years old, was definitely a protector of "his family" which included all the dogs and even the cats except for our oldest dog, our first Cocker.

Our oldest Cocker had a mate who was our oldest child's dog and when the dog went into "heat" I had to make sure my oldest, our daughter had her Cocker kept in her room except when she took her to the front yard as opposed to the back yard as normal for her potty breaks. Our oldest Cocker and our Mastiff got into it only "One Time" because our housekeeper let the female Cocker in heat onto the patio which was fenced off from the rest of the backyard and then let our oldest Cocker out into the yard with the Mastiff and the Mastiff just went to the patio fence to sniff the female Cocker and our oldest Cocker attacked the Mastiff. What a fiasco!

The Mastiff took the oldest Cocker by the neck and was just shaking the daylights out of him. I was not at home at the time, and my oldest son, who was the true master of the Mastiff went out and had to hit his dog several times with a metal pole to get him to drop the Cocker, which then my son immediately picked up and brought him into the laundry room and I walked into little short of a wasp nest loose in the house between our housekeeper all the children and a bloody Cocker who after I convinced our dear housekeeper to please not quit, immediately took the dog to our vet. He required stitches and being kept in one of our smallest bathrooms away from the main parts of our home and his neck was strained and he was given medicine and a cool calm place to heal.

That mistake never took place again. I could go on and on with stories about every single dog, each of the cats, the Parrot and even the rabbit and guinea pigs and of course my children, who are all now adults two with two children of their own and the youngest an Attorney who practices in Washington, D.C. And by the way to this day even though he loved our Mastiff who after he was trained would tie a rope to his collar and his skateboard and have our Mastiff would pull him around our driveway, still prefers small dogs and cats. In short, get a crate, or if you still have one of your children's playpens left or a sturdy appliance box and start being the Master now or after having dealt with so many pets and our children and their friends around our pets, you will have to bite the bullet and pay for training and all the time out of you, your children's and your husbands life to get the puppy trained correctly and if those are not options check on line for "a Boxer Rescue Kennel, or person,etc." and make that tough decision and discuss it with your children that you'll were just not the right family for that particular dog, give it awhile and then when "you" are ready and have the time to deal with the enormous job of taking care of a 4 and 5 year old, and also have the time to be in charge of and take care of a new puppy(be sure to check out the puppy's parents and meet them and see where the puppy really comes from and also read up on different dogs tendencies), then and only then when you, the Mother are ready to make the decision to or not to get a new puppy.

Hope this was helpful, sorry if too long, but I enjoyed some of the memories from my childrens' childhood and their and our critters if no one else did.

I've owned many puppies and three of them were boxers. Here's a simple solution. Whenever the puppy starts to nip, have a toy on hand to give to him.

This is showing him the correct item he can put in his mouth. Teach your girls to do this. Instruct them not to run from the puppy.

This has become a game and will only get worse, and as he grows, he will be knocking them down. Boxers love to play tug-o-war. Make it a game when you give him the toy and play tug-o-war.

Teach your girls the same thing. In the beginning, supervise your girls and the puppy together. If the girls are in the room and you don't have time to supervise, the puppy should be crated.

You will solve this problem quickly if you are consistent. Boxers are my favorite dogs. They are great with children, but they are a lot of dog and have to be properly trained.

Please take your dog to obedience training. So many of these dogs end up in the shelters, because the owners thought they could just bring them home and all would be well without any work. Remember train your girls too.

They will love and remember this dog for the rest of their lives.

Almost all 8-week old dogs display nippiness, I don't think this sounds like aggression but it is important to change the behavior. Here are some sites with advice on various techniques to break a puppy of this habit, I haven't used the clicker training method but have used the squirt bottle to let a puppy know his actions are undesireable: gopetsamerica.com/puppy/puppy-nipping-bi... amrottclub.org/nipping.htm clickertraining.com/node/168 groversdogpound.com/How_to_Stop_a_Puppy_....

He's a puppy...he's playing. Get a squirt bottle and fill it with water, keepit close by and when he nips or demonstrates a behavior that you don't like you first correct with a firm "NO" and then squirt him in the face immediately following the "NO. " The squirt must always be after the verbal correction.

Try it...it will work. I too have a 9 week old boxer...we got him yesterday. I have a 17 month old and a 28 month old.My boxer was doing the same nipping yesterday and after dealing with it like a explained he has already stopped.

I thank you all for your advise. My boxer puppy has been listening and he has stopped nipping after using the firm command Off!. He is a great puppy and is not an aggressive boxer.

He is very smart and is learning what he can and can not get away with.

All puppies regardless of breed do this kind of behavior--they are teething. The children should say no to the dog and give the dog something appropriate to teeth on--a chew bone or toy. BTW puppies should stay with their mothers until they are 12 weeks old.

Mother teaches the puppies not to nip. Now you will have to teach the puppy appropriate chewing and non-appropriate chewing.

First, enroll in a good, positive training puppy kindergarten class. The positive training and socialization with other puppies will help teach your puppy bite inhibition. Second, do not let your puppy run free while your kids are running around.

What you are telling the kids about not running is correct, but I think 4 and 5 year olds are too young to absorb this. The dog should be on leash and carefully monitored and trained and supervised at all times.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.