German Shepherds are strong and extremely loyal dogs. There is no doubt that this breed of dogs will stick by you through thick and thin. However, if you go overboard with its training, your GS will grow to become an aggressive dog. And trust me, you don’t want that.
If you have bought a German Shepherd puppy, start training it in its initial days because GSDs can become very dominant if they don’t get the right coaching. One more mistake that many GSD owners make is to treat their dogs harshly. GSDs are not like play dogs or the friendly breeds.
Nature has made them tough and dominant.
If you try to handle them aggressively, they’ll give it back to you. They also need to learn to behave with people. When you have a GSD at home, you wouldn’t want it to bite on the furniture, chew on toys, and much more. And with the help of proper obedience coaching, a GSD can be exactly how you want it to be, i.e. very harmonious.
Contents
Step 1: Imprinting & Socializing
The best way you could train a GSD is by treating it in a sensible and positive way. Teaching your GSD to be obedient towards you and your orders is not an easy task. This type of coaching needs a lot of patience and consistency. If you lose your temper at any point during the process, you and your dog will both face a hard time.
Many stressed GSD owners call training centers to get hold of their dog’s temper. What they fail to understand is that forcing their dog to learn and then getting aggressive when it doesn’t, is not the right way to do it.
There are two parts in obedience training of a GSD, and one of them is imprinting and socializing. This type of training includes a certain type of tricks and commands. Remember, no matter which style you adopt, you will need to use hand and verbal actions.
What is imprinting? When you treat your GSD pup furiously during its coaching, it is likely to grow up to become an aggressive dog. This is called imprinting, as the dog imprints the treatment it gets from the owner.
What is Socializing? Socializing a GSD with people and other animals in its surrounding is a major part of its training. When you get a GSD, you will need to make it comfortable around others so that it doesn’t cause troubles in the future.
Some Tips
The things included in this type of GSD coaching are:
- On leash training and off the leash training – this means that your GSD should be able to walk at your pace and stop when you pull the leash. Leash training is essential as it allows you to have complete control over your dog.
- Offer treats at short intervals while training your dog as it will get bored and distracted without them
- Alternate ways to appreciate and praise your dog include toys and pat on the back.
- Make sure your GDS is learning to retain all the information and commands.
- Do not make your GSD too dependent on treats as it will only follow the commands for a treat.
- Teach it to behave while bathing, ear cleaning, and nail cutting.
- Teach your dog to sleep in its kennel.
- Make use of the word ‘NO’ in the process so that your dog knows when it should stop.
- Make association of different words with actions so that it becomes easy for the dog to learn.
- Train your dog to play, bite, and chew on approved toys only.
- Teach your dog to behave inside the house and live by the house rules.
- Train your dog to chase you when you call its name.
- Teach your dog to walk up and down the stairs in a proper manner.
- Crate train your dog.
- Vehicle-train your dog.
Step 2: Manner & Obedience
In this part of the training process, you will need to teach your GSD to stay calm and listen to your commands promptly. GSDs are extremely energetic and tend to get excited easily. That’s why when you train them; they follow the commands in a hyper mode. To make them understand the meaning of each command and to induce patience in them, you will need to coach them differently.
Some Tips
To teach your GSD some good manners and discipline, you will need to adopt a different strategy and set of instructions. Read on to a few tips to induce this type of behavior in your GSD.
- Tell your GSD to sit and stay for a couple of minutes. You will do this by introducing it to the ‘sit‘ and ‘stay’ command.
- Tell your dog to ‘sit’ and then say ‘stay.’ This stay should be for 2 – 4 minutes. This type of training will teach the dog to stay calm in different types of situations.
- Teach your dog to walk at a normal pace on a lose leash.
- Tell your dog to ‘stop’ when it shows odd behavior like excessive chewing and mouthing of objects.
- Train it to fetch without being too hyper. You may tell it to stay when it becomes overly excited.
- Tell your GSD to stop when it starts jumping on sofas and people.
- To make your GSD learn to behave in real situations, you will need to introduce distractions between training. This will help you get to know how well your dog is trained and can ignore the distractions when you command it to stay, stop, etc.
- Say a lot of ‘NO’ during the entire process.
Your Long-Term Family Member
A GSD’s obedience training should start at 8 weeks of age. You will need to define the role of your dog in the family. Make sure you don’t drag the training session as it will frustrate the dog. Once you have taught your dog to be obedient, patient, and calm, you will know that your GSD is your lifelong partner and your best buddy. When trained properly, GSDs prove to be the best dog breed.
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Last Updated on October 15, 2021 by Shepped Team
2weeks ago ,we acquired a 4month old gsd ,female,she was and is in general well behaved, then all of a sudden she jumps ,bites and really hurts you, we don’t play rough with her for this reason,we try to be calm and assertive. We have had 3gsd dogs before and still have an old one now, never had this behaviour before.
Nothing was known about her other then the other dogs would not accept her..
Any advise please.
Thank you, Bob and Rita
This is the same as my case
Have had two German shepherds before and nothing like our new 4 month old
He is being randomly aggressive some times with his biting
Don’t know what to do because he won’t stop
Hi, I adopted a German shepherd puppy at a very young age, say around 21 days. I had asked for an older pup but the fellow brought this young pup and I didn’t have the heart to let it go. The problem is the pup is now one and half months old and very destructive when left alone in the room. He bites off the newspapers into pieces which i have to use to cover his pee or potty, even pulls down whatever he can manage like sofa covers etc. How do i control such behavior? Please advice!
I have a 1year old and my key is exercise. She used to be destructive but now I toss the ball with her daily and play mind games like “hide and seek”. she loves it. Tucker your dog out, and you may see better behavior.
Victoria
Hi, I adopted a German shepherd puppy at a very young age, say around 21 days. I had asked for an older pup but the fellow brought this young pup and I didn’t have the heart to let it go. The problem is the pup is now one and half months old and very destructive when left alone in the room(which i often have to do due to certain compulsions). He bites off the newspapers into pieces which i have to use to cover his pee or potty, even pulls down whatever he can manage like sofa covers etc. How do i control such behavior? Please advice!
We purchased our male german shepherd at 8 weeks and he has been pretty well overall. He only took about a week or 2 to potty train. He does well with sit and stay commands. We have introduced him to some people, friends and family. We would like to take him to the park or on vacation but we are worried because he’s not a fan of strangers but we want him to listen to us and not go crazy barking! He is 5 months, is it to late to introduce him to things like this? How would we go about it-if we take him to the park? Thank you!
Heather
I have the same problem with my 1 year old GSP. She goes crazy around certain other dogs.
If he doesn’t like strangers make him spend more time with them so they could know that they mean no harm. Let strangers pet him or stand next to him and over time the dog will get use to them there
2year old fad goes after adult family member. Help
Love your ideas
My GS is 4 months now. I have been training him for around 3 weeks now. The hard part is getting him to listen to me and my boyfriend. Of course I believe he will listen to him more because he smelled his hand before me. My question is how do I get him to know and obey both of our commands and make him aware that we are both his leaders?
my german shepard is very disobiedent… we tell her no and she keeps doing it like biting… and jumping up on people. and grabbing our pant legs and shoes and biting them… im at my wits end with her…
We have a 10 week old German Shepard male and we have only had him since he was 6 weeks old and he will only come to me and wont have hardly anything to do with the rest of my family especially my husband. We are caregivers and eventually wanna get him to be a therapy dog but I’m afraid I’ve spoiled him. What do u do & or what can I do? Thank you
Abi
We recently brought a GS into our home. He seems to be comfortable with our family, of 5. 3 small children and has done adapting to our environment. Last night we had company that had small children, 1 of The Kids walked to up him while mom was near and our GS bit the 6 ur, old in the face! Is this a sign that he will be aggressive and we need to get rid if him or what can I do to help understand what I need to do to make,sure this Doesn’t happen again?!! Now, I am fearful he will bite another child or our own. HELP!!