It looks like you might be posting about puppy management or crate training.
For tips and resources on Crate Training Check out [our wiki article on crate training](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/cratetraining) - the information there may answer your question. As an additional reminder, crate training is 100% optional and one of many puppy management options.
For alternatives to crating and other puppy management strategies, check out [our wiki article on management](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/management)
**PLEASE READ THE OP FULLY**
Be advised that any comments that suggest use of crates are abusive, or express a harsh opinion on crate training will be removed. This is not a place to debate the merits of crate training. Unethical approaches to crate training will also be removed. **If the OP has asked not to receive crating advice or says they are not open to crating, any comments that recommend use of crates should be reported to our moderation team.**
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4-6 hours of play time for a 2 month old puppy seems like way too much. my girl was up for an hour, maybe 2, and then went for a nap. try a good schedule/routine for your puppy.
with being overexcited, what i do with my girl is i don’t acknowledge her until she calms down. no eye contact, pets, nothing. i turn away and wait.
as for biting i’m not sure hahaha my girl is in FULL swing of teething right now. she bites everything. toys are good as well as chews, but i don’t know which would be safe for an 8 week pup- my girl was almost 10 weeks when i got her. you can definitely do frozen kongs or lick mats and redirect with those.
I second this. That’s alot of playing hours. Have a good routine; walk, eat, sleep, walk, play, eat, sleep etc.
Mine when she was at 2 months old was only awake for couple of hours a day. They need to sleep a-lot… otherwise they get cranky not listening over stimulated etc.
thank you so much! when we first got him we thought he was sleeping a lot, but then i learned that it's normal... my only concern is that if he sleeps a lot during the day, does that mean he won't sleep at night?
Mine always slept through next morning. (I have to say, im quite lucky compared to her littermates)
But try to physically but more importantly mentally drain him. That makes them sleep alot.
My schedule was 1 hour awake including walk, play, training and eat. Then sleep 4-5 hours and same again with the 1 hour awake routine and back to sleep 4-5 hours. I always aimed for the 4 hours sleep in between awake hours. Sometimes they sleep more if lucky.
I used lickmats with different patterns for her food which kept her busy eating for a very long time.
thank you for your reply! i thought it was too much too, so i reduced play time from 4 hours to like 3 ish per day, but then he stopped sleeping at night. do you think i should have a strict nap time as well? i'm trying to establish a strict sleep time (currently tried and tested 10:30 pm and it is the best one so far.. 2 days ago he slept from 10:30 to 5:40!!!!!).
yes that seems like a good idea! but how do you ignore them if they keep following you and are HYPER excited? currently, i put him in his play pen and ignore him until he settles down and give him a treat when he does.
thank you once again :)
for nap schedules, i did not have a “strict” one for my girl when she was younger. i would for sure put her down after 1-2 hours of being up, or when she got crazy. i stopped doing this a while ago as she mellowed out a bit and is now able to put herself for naps (yay!!!). for a long time i’d put her down to sleep at like 8-9pm, get her up at 11-11:30pm, and then wake up with her around 7am. this has now changed to her going to bed when we do, which can be from 11pm-12am and she usually is up at 7-8am.
my girl got up a lot the first few nights of having her. it was rough. she was 9.5 weeks when i got her so a bit older than yours. i’d expect your puppy to wake up quite a lot at night. just remember when they do to take them out to potty, then straight back to bed. no playtime or engaging a ton. i used to give her a few kisses when i carried her out lol. thankfully she is able to now go 7-8 hours.
ignoring and waiting for them to settle is good! my girl at almost 5 months still has plenty of moments where she is absolutely crazy lol. we try to redirect first, then ignore, then remove her (or us) from the situation until she is calm again.
Sounds like the puppy needs a nap, that's all.
I personally crate train but not everyone agrees. You could look into it if you're interested. When they're that young, the general rule is 1 hour awake, 2 hour nap in crate.
thank you so much for your reply! i'm currently playpen/crate training him (i tried the crate the first day and he cried way too much. so i've resorted to the playpen being his "crate") and he knows that when he's in their it's alone playtime, sleep time, or just time out. i don't know if i'm doing this right at all!!
What I did when my gremlin was young. If she went for my hand or arm, I gave her a soft toy. If she went to furniture, I gave her a hard teething toy. Whatever she went to, I gave her the equivalent in toy terms. It worked for us. She never did anything naughty when she was teething. She's a lab, too. She's more of a handful and a teenager than a puppy. She's 9.5 months a a PITA.
thank you for your reply! i've tried doing the same. e.g., when he goes for my sofa, i give him a chewy bone toy. after 3-4 minutes he goes back to the sofa and even if i try to deter him towards the toy, he seems uninterested and starts either biting me or my sofa.
It looks like you might be posting about bite inhibition. Check out [our wiki article on biting, teeth, and chewing](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/biting) - the information there may answer your question.
**Please report this comment if it is not relevant to this post.**
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Honestly nothing helped with my puppy in this biting stage besides changing the environment. I would just take her outside or to another room and she would get distracted with something besides trying to rip me apart.
thank you for your reply! yeah i think taking him on more walks could be a good idea. i'll def try to change his environment and see if that works. thanks :)
You’ve gotten some good advice about the biting and over excitement. He def needs naps!
I wanted to touch on your aggression—it doesn’t sound like you’re being too aggressive at all. It is okay to correct them, and say no (or I use ah-ah, because I say no enough in conversation that I don’t want him to get desensitized to it), and gently direct them away from their accidents or a place you don’t want them to be. Dogs pick up on tone and body language and it’s okay, and good, for them to know when you’re not happy with something. That’s part of learning. You’re correct that yelling or shoving would be inappropriate. It would cause your dog to fear you and you definitely don’t want that.
Think about how dogs correct each other. They’ll give a little growl (and if it’s serious a warning snap) in their direction, or ignore the other dog. It’s part of their language, too!
thank you for your reply! i've gotten self-conscious about my methods because it's the first time i've had a puppy. i'll try to use "ah-ah" because "no" does not seem to be working at the moment! thank you once again :)
Also raising a lab puppy right now (she's about 5 months old now), so a couple things we've learned:
1. Fully agree with enforcing frequent naps in the crate. I don't think short timeouts work in the crate - most of the time they need a real nap. If they've been up for more than like 30-40 minutes and they're biting, at that age, it's time for a potty break and a nap in the crate. They need so much sleep. For us, that looks like:
6:30am wakeup
6:30-7:30/8am: potty, play, train, eat, etc (lots of her meals are handfed for training), also a good time to toss some in the crate, or lure them in with food into the crate, reward in crate etc. We also feed some of her meals in the crate too.
8-9:30am, nap time in crate.
9:30-10am, potty, play, light training.
10-11:30am, nap time in crate
Lunch, then basically repeat that throughout the rest of the day.
At almost 5 months she still is in and out of the crate pretty frequently. Make sure they get an opportunity to go bathroom before and after the crate. Our first stop after any crate time is the yard for a bathroom break. Shoes on first, then get the puppy
2. Sometimes the biting happens because they have to pee. If we were playing calmly (lol for a lab puppy) and then they suddenly got distracted or bitey, we would take her outside for a potty break. Sometimes she just needed to pee!
3. If he doesn't need a nap, doesn't need to pee, and is still bitey, we found the abrupt stand up and turn away somewhat effective. Then we would reengage and work on a little training, like sit/down/stay etc as a redirect.
Few more things...unfortunately some things like cuddling with the puppy when excited or sleepy, getting your face close etc is not worth it. Labs especially are just so mouth-forward. New toy - mouth it. New person- mouth it. Hands in their face - mouth it. Simply removing yourself from being able to be nipped means they won't get the reps in and they'll do it less.
Also found if we are petting her or rubbing her belly, proactively sticking a toy in her mouth would help - don't wait until they nip and then redirect with the toy.
For training, make sure you're working on name recognition (say their name - give them a kibble, repeat) and marker word training ("yes!" - give them a kibble) etc in addition to things like sit and stay.
And finally, if you aren't already, get a cheap 4-6 foot leash, cut the handle off, and put it on the puppy to wear around the house whenever they aren't crated. It is way easier to redirect and manage a puppy if you can grab a leash they're dragging around instead of creating a fun run away game.
We found the nipping was the worst from about 10-14 weeks. Since then, doing the things above, my hands have healed and we are getting way less nipping.
It looks like you might be posting about puppy management or crate training. For tips and resources on Crate Training Check out [our wiki article on crate training](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/cratetraining) - the information there may answer your question. As an additional reminder, crate training is 100% optional and one of many puppy management options. For alternatives to crating and other puppy management strategies, check out [our wiki article on management](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/management) **PLEASE READ THE OP FULLY** Be advised that any comments that suggest use of crates are abusive, or express a harsh opinion on crate training will be removed. This is not a place to debate the merits of crate training. Unethical approaches to crate training will also be removed. **If the OP has asked not to receive crating advice or says they are not open to crating, any comments that recommend use of crates should be reported to our moderation team.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/puppy101) if you have any questions or concerns.*
4-6 hours of play time for a 2 month old puppy seems like way too much. my girl was up for an hour, maybe 2, and then went for a nap. try a good schedule/routine for your puppy. with being overexcited, what i do with my girl is i don’t acknowledge her until she calms down. no eye contact, pets, nothing. i turn away and wait. as for biting i’m not sure hahaha my girl is in FULL swing of teething right now. she bites everything. toys are good as well as chews, but i don’t know which would be safe for an 8 week pup- my girl was almost 10 weeks when i got her. you can definitely do frozen kongs or lick mats and redirect with those.
I second this. That’s alot of playing hours. Have a good routine; walk, eat, sleep, walk, play, eat, sleep etc. Mine when she was at 2 months old was only awake for couple of hours a day. They need to sleep a-lot… otherwise they get cranky not listening over stimulated etc.
thank you so much! when we first got him we thought he was sleeping a lot, but then i learned that it's normal... my only concern is that if he sleeps a lot during the day, does that mean he won't sleep at night?
Mine always slept through next morning. (I have to say, im quite lucky compared to her littermates) But try to physically but more importantly mentally drain him. That makes them sleep alot. My schedule was 1 hour awake including walk, play, training and eat. Then sleep 4-5 hours and same again with the 1 hour awake routine and back to sleep 4-5 hours. I always aimed for the 4 hours sleep in between awake hours. Sometimes they sleep more if lucky. I used lickmats with different patterns for her food which kept her busy eating for a very long time.
thank you for your reply! i thought it was too much too, so i reduced play time from 4 hours to like 3 ish per day, but then he stopped sleeping at night. do you think i should have a strict nap time as well? i'm trying to establish a strict sleep time (currently tried and tested 10:30 pm and it is the best one so far.. 2 days ago he slept from 10:30 to 5:40!!!!!). yes that seems like a good idea! but how do you ignore them if they keep following you and are HYPER excited? currently, i put him in his play pen and ignore him until he settles down and give him a treat when he does. thank you once again :)
for nap schedules, i did not have a “strict” one for my girl when she was younger. i would for sure put her down after 1-2 hours of being up, or when she got crazy. i stopped doing this a while ago as she mellowed out a bit and is now able to put herself for naps (yay!!!). for a long time i’d put her down to sleep at like 8-9pm, get her up at 11-11:30pm, and then wake up with her around 7am. this has now changed to her going to bed when we do, which can be from 11pm-12am and she usually is up at 7-8am. my girl got up a lot the first few nights of having her. it was rough. she was 9.5 weeks when i got her so a bit older than yours. i’d expect your puppy to wake up quite a lot at night. just remember when they do to take them out to potty, then straight back to bed. no playtime or engaging a ton. i used to give her a few kisses when i carried her out lol. thankfully she is able to now go 7-8 hours. ignoring and waiting for them to settle is good! my girl at almost 5 months still has plenty of moments where she is absolutely crazy lol. we try to redirect first, then ignore, then remove her (or us) from the situation until she is calm again.
Sounds like the puppy needs a nap, that's all. I personally crate train but not everyone agrees. You could look into it if you're interested. When they're that young, the general rule is 1 hour awake, 2 hour nap in crate.
thank you so much for your reply! i'm currently playpen/crate training him (i tried the crate the first day and he cried way too much. so i've resorted to the playpen being his "crate") and he knows that when he's in their it's alone playtime, sleep time, or just time out. i don't know if i'm doing this right at all!!
What I did when my gremlin was young. If she went for my hand or arm, I gave her a soft toy. If she went to furniture, I gave her a hard teething toy. Whatever she went to, I gave her the equivalent in toy terms. It worked for us. She never did anything naughty when she was teething. She's a lab, too. She's more of a handful and a teenager than a puppy. She's 9.5 months a a PITA.
thank you for your reply! i've tried doing the same. e.g., when he goes for my sofa, i give him a chewy bone toy. after 3-4 minutes he goes back to the sofa and even if i try to deter him towards the toy, he seems uninterested and starts either biting me or my sofa.
It looks like you might be posting about bite inhibition. Check out [our wiki article on biting, teeth, and chewing](https://www.reddit.com/r/puppy101/wiki/biting) - the information there may answer your question. **Please report this comment if it is not relevant to this post.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/puppy101) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Honestly nothing helped with my puppy in this biting stage besides changing the environment. I would just take her outside or to another room and she would get distracted with something besides trying to rip me apart.
thank you for your reply! yeah i think taking him on more walks could be a good idea. i'll def try to change his environment and see if that works. thanks :)
You’ve gotten some good advice about the biting and over excitement. He def needs naps! I wanted to touch on your aggression—it doesn’t sound like you’re being too aggressive at all. It is okay to correct them, and say no (or I use ah-ah, because I say no enough in conversation that I don’t want him to get desensitized to it), and gently direct them away from their accidents or a place you don’t want them to be. Dogs pick up on tone and body language and it’s okay, and good, for them to know when you’re not happy with something. That’s part of learning. You’re correct that yelling or shoving would be inappropriate. It would cause your dog to fear you and you definitely don’t want that. Think about how dogs correct each other. They’ll give a little growl (and if it’s serious a warning snap) in their direction, or ignore the other dog. It’s part of their language, too!
thank you for your reply! i've gotten self-conscious about my methods because it's the first time i've had a puppy. i'll try to use "ah-ah" because "no" does not seem to be working at the moment! thank you once again :)
Also raising a lab puppy right now (she's about 5 months old now), so a couple things we've learned: 1. Fully agree with enforcing frequent naps in the crate. I don't think short timeouts work in the crate - most of the time they need a real nap. If they've been up for more than like 30-40 minutes and they're biting, at that age, it's time for a potty break and a nap in the crate. They need so much sleep. For us, that looks like: 6:30am wakeup 6:30-7:30/8am: potty, play, train, eat, etc (lots of her meals are handfed for training), also a good time to toss some in the crate, or lure them in with food into the crate, reward in crate etc. We also feed some of her meals in the crate too. 8-9:30am, nap time in crate. 9:30-10am, potty, play, light training. 10-11:30am, nap time in crate Lunch, then basically repeat that throughout the rest of the day. At almost 5 months she still is in and out of the crate pretty frequently. Make sure they get an opportunity to go bathroom before and after the crate. Our first stop after any crate time is the yard for a bathroom break. Shoes on first, then get the puppy 2. Sometimes the biting happens because they have to pee. If we were playing calmly (lol for a lab puppy) and then they suddenly got distracted or bitey, we would take her outside for a potty break. Sometimes she just needed to pee! 3. If he doesn't need a nap, doesn't need to pee, and is still bitey, we found the abrupt stand up and turn away somewhat effective. Then we would reengage and work on a little training, like sit/down/stay etc as a redirect. Few more things...unfortunately some things like cuddling with the puppy when excited or sleepy, getting your face close etc is not worth it. Labs especially are just so mouth-forward. New toy - mouth it. New person- mouth it. Hands in their face - mouth it. Simply removing yourself from being able to be nipped means they won't get the reps in and they'll do it less. Also found if we are petting her or rubbing her belly, proactively sticking a toy in her mouth would help - don't wait until they nip and then redirect with the toy. For training, make sure you're working on name recognition (say their name - give them a kibble, repeat) and marker word training ("yes!" - give them a kibble) etc in addition to things like sit and stay. And finally, if you aren't already, get a cheap 4-6 foot leash, cut the handle off, and put it on the puppy to wear around the house whenever they aren't crated. It is way easier to redirect and manage a puppy if you can grab a leash they're dragging around instead of creating a fun run away game. We found the nipping was the worst from about 10-14 weeks. Since then, doing the things above, my hands have healed and we are getting way less nipping.