[Coolette]

Mine is 7th Months old now and i am noticing changes in her, in the park she steals other dogs tennis balls and wont give them back, no treat will entice her, but at home she will drop anything for a treat. I'll be known over our park for being the ball thief. is 7months too young for teenage phase? she was golden at 6months and before. Too damn cute to get cross at though... It does happen that they play up right? like all my training wont have gone out the window?
Shes like Stanley by the sounds of it, she will go and play with any dog, she has no fear! I'm always apologising too.

 

[Coolette]

7 months old is definitely not too young for teenage. They start to push the boundaries and now is the time to step up training and management - if they get away with it they will continue to behave like this so you might need to go back to using a long line if recall goes out of the window and carry toys to swap stolen toys with to give back to their original owners

Thanks, that's good to know it might be the teenage phase. cheers for the advice, unfortunately toys / treats (ones she does anything for at home) don't tempt her to give up the stolen ball, she just wants to play. Stepped up training again, so hopefully we wont lose all the good traits she had.

 

[Coolette]

She has learned that she gets a better game with stolen stuff than her normal toys so you need to reverse that - I would put her on lead anywhere near other dogs playing with toys for now while you work on it as that is going to become ingrained behaviour otherwise. You can then work on "her toys = good game and great fun" - "stolen toy = ignored and no fun at all" - set her up with a friend and a toy she can steal

Thanks so much, gonna get her back on the training lead around dogs playing the park, upgraded treats to sprats (they are rank), thanks for responding, hopefully with better training i can get her good behaviours back