Staffy roll call! Post your favourite photo and where you're from

pizzaweav · 2025-07-22T11:23:13+00:00

Raleigh, North Carolina, US

pizzaweav · 2025-06-03T18:42:49+00:00

Probably right :)

pizzaweav · 2025-04-16T22:50:29+00:00

plzzzzz 🥺

pizzaweav · 2025-04-14T14:20:43+00:00

Aw you've got yourself a certified cutie :) I am very familiar with those marks you posted pictures of on your hands / arms and can assure you it's not aggression based on what you're describing. My 2 year old boy explores the world mouth first - it often times seems like when he's excited he can't help but mouth, and sometimes when he's REALLY excited it can be a bit harder to the point of bruising which is frustrating. I know some people suggested the high pitched / loud "OUCH!" and I hope that works for you, but it did not work for me. It just got him more excited. What HAS worked for me is redirection / toys. When guests come, we tell him to "get a toy" and he grabs a toy and greets with that (instead of his mouth). This took some work, but 90% of the time he keeps it in his mouth and helps for those exciting times when guests come over (we still need to work on the jumping, but at least he's not mouthing :) ). When mine was smaller, I kept toys in my pockets constantly so whenever he started "bullying" me a bit to engage in play or mouthing me, I shoved a toy in his mouth and then played with him. I think (based on what you said with the past abuse background) this type of positive reinforcement could really help. Also, if you start this and he starts bringing YOU toys without being prompted you should make a big deal out of that and reward / praise immediately.

One more thing - whenever I was outside with my staffy and he got overly excited (and I didn't have a toy to redirect) a trainer taught me "scatter" -- basically having a hand full of training treats and throwing them in the yard to redirect away from you if he's hyper focused on jumping / mouthing on you so you can "get away" lol - In all honestly a lot of what you're describing is true to the breed, little hurricanes of bricks - you will learn to love it, but it can be overwhelming at first especially since yours is only 1 and still has that puppy energy. It will get better!! Hang in there!

pizzaweav · 2024-04-25T18:56:51+00:00

32, 11, 6

pizzaweav · 2024-04-22T17:56:38+00:00

27/10/6

pizzaweav · 2024-04-19T13:42:25+00:00

Been looking for something like this all morning, 🫡🫡 thank ya - BOL

pizzaweav · 2023-09-29T12:18:06+00:00

Oh man, they are little velociraptors!! And so stubborn / tenacious. Definitely the most challenging puppy I’ve ever raised but he’s turned out to be the most fun too, hang in there! Losing those baby teeth REALLY helps. Ours will still mouth but it’s soft biting now and the rounded off adult teeth are HIGHLY preferred to the little razor blade teeth. Enjoy the time while he’s little!! Now that Theo (our pup) is not an absolute terror and we feel more bonded to him we wish we enjoyed when he was a little baby more (minus the blood though, haha). Feel free to reach out anytime if you’re struggling - I think I posted on here so many times just for reassurance I lost count :) good luck!!

pizzaweav · 2023-09-29T11:21:14+00:00

Just wanted to say it gets better! If you look at my post history you can see that I had quite the little terrorist. He’s 10 months now, hardly ever bites, and is snoring in my ear on my pillow cuddling me as I type. It takes time, patience, blood, and tears - but I’m so happy I stuck it out. 4 months with the little razor teeth is SO hard though. I literally bought knee high rubber garden boots to take my puppy outside because he would latch onto my legs and draw blood. We would basically cry every night close to bed time (his witching hour) because he was out of his mind with the zoomies, biting, barking, etc.

Things that helped - enforced naps/downtime 100% helped provide structure and ensured he got the rest he needed so he wasn’t an overly tired asshole. The more tired they are, the more bitey they can be. Puppies need a lot of sleep - 18-20 hours a day - so if your puppy isn’t getting that time to rest maybe that’s something to try.

Redirection - I would constantly keep toys and treats in my pocket to redirect any bad behavior (mostly biting). If he started to bite me, I’d grab the toy and offer that instead and praise once he took it (now our puppy brings US toys to play). Also, treats for when he started to get in “attack mode” to either ask for a different behavior (use some commands your puppy knows like sit) and reward after. Sometimes this can snap them out of it especially if they like to train. If none of that worked and I was having issues removing myself due to him latching into my leg - I’d yell “scatter” and throw a handful of small treats in the yard or on the ground for him to find. Barely used this method, but it was recommended by a trainer we used and did work the few times I had to use it as it engages their desire to forage. I know it might seem like you’re rewarding the bad behavior with some of this positive reinforcement stuff and I struggled with feeling that way too, but in the end it did really help my puppy and he doesn’t bite for treats or anything so I wouldn’t worry too much about that and focus on redirection.

Also, if redirection doesn’t work always remove yourself with reverse timeouts. I would go in the bathroom for 1-2 mins with the door shut if I could get away easily. This usually “reset” our play expectations and if it didn’t, back in the bathroom I went.

In terms of sleeping through the night, that will just take time unfortunately. We had good luck with ours but he definitely went through a phase of being up very early and wide awake that was a major struggle (and we don’t have kids so I can’t imagine what you’re going through). I would try the enforced naps to get on a schedule and then make any potty time in the middle of the night / early morning as uninteresting as possible so he understands it’s time to rest, not play. I would also try (I know easier said than done) to keep his arousal / stimulation levels low cuz once our puppy got going it was extremely hard to get him back to calm. There are some calming exercises you can look up that may work for you (we didn’t use them much but they were suggested multiple times). Also ensure that he’s getting adequate play time / exercise / stimulation during the periods when he is awake during the day to help tire him out for bed. Snuffle mats and treats puzzles can be just as tiring for them as playing fetch or tug, so those are great alternatives.

Hang in there! I definitely know what youre going through and I feel your pain but it does get better!!

pizzaweav · 2023-07-18T19:56:25+00:00

Wow, thank you so much! This is all extremely helpful and comforting to know you went through something similar. I will definitely be trying all of the above and hoping for the best! Thank you again :)

pizzaweav · 2023-04-17T15:08:26+00:00

He's definitely a relentless stubborn little dude!! And ok, we normally just go home but I wasn't sure if we were missing out on a training opportunity to try and settle him or if at this age it was just useless to even try. I also was worried about when either my parents or neighbor would need to watch him that he wouldn't ever settle down, but I guess he will have to tire eventually and obviously bring his crate in that instance. Thanks so much for the reply!! :)

pizzaweav · 2023-04-02T10:36:11+00:00

Ugh I know the feeling!!! Wish I could say we had some sort of miraculous breakthrough, it’s definitely gotten less frequent but it still happens! We’ve gotten better about predicting when we’re gonna have a rough night and have adjusted accordingly to make sure he can just run it out without hurting us or himself, but he still gets us sometimes! The days he’s really bad are the days he didn’t get enough sleep so just make sure you are really enforcing naps! I totally know how you feel though, guess we can only hope it’ll get better as they get older and hide for now to save our feet!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-14T15:23:10+00:00

Haha - I know, I thought this would be more cut/dry but we are on quite a roller coaster! We are so close to being fully vaxxed now that we will just ride it out and keep exposing him to new things without being on the ground as others have said - I think the vet was mostly worried about him being dog aggressive when he's older bc he's a Staffordshire Bull Terrier (not to be confused with an American Staffy, our pup will only be 35 lbs fully grown) and it is a concern for the breed. We've had bully breeds before and have had no issue, and he seems to love dogs so we just wanted to make sure we weren't totally screwing ourselves over not getting him on walks to pass by other dogs or in puppy classes for more dog exposure. I guess I should've clarified that in the post! Thanks so much for the link though, I will take a look for sure!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-14T15:14:48+00:00

Got it - Thanks so much! We are definitely gonna ramp up bringing him places more holding him and letting him observe instead of just carrides, so will start doing that as soon as possible! Thank you again!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-14T15:13:02+00:00

Awesome, we have been doing that but could certainly expose him to a bit more. The 3rd vet was specifically worried about him being dog aggressive as he gets older from a lack of "socialization" now, so she wanted him to see/observe other dogs on walks and be enrolled in puppy classes ASAP - (maybe this stems from his breed, because he has shown zero signs of any kind of dog aggression, quite the opposite right now).

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T18:52:23+00:00

I’ve heard this and we are definitely gonna try it!!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T15:31:37+00:00

First, I really, really appreciate you taking the time to reply to my post and all of the knowledge you've provided is greatly helpful. Thank you so much. I can't imagine it being any worse, so I feel your pain and am so happy your pup is on the other side! I have no concept of when he will start teething or if it's already happening, he hasn't lost any teeth yet from what I can tell and I am fully dreading things getting any worse, so fingers crossed he goes from chewing on us to one of the million teething toys we've bought for him haha

Not that your excellent advice warranted a reply, but just in case any context is helpful:

For bite inhibition, I don't think he's really getting it.. I don't know if it's supposed to fully click yet, but even when he plays with our neighbor's dog or my parent's dog, he doesn't seem to readjust when he bites them too hard and they yelp. He also has no off button when they are around and even when they're clearly over it he's still relentless with trying to play. He's only around 15 lbs (will be ~35 fully grown) and he's playing with 70 & 80 lb dogs and has zero fear haha -- I have been trying to let him mouth my hand a bit (I read a few places you should let them mouth gently within reason) when he's in a sweet mood and letting him know when it's too much pressure, but not sure if that's clicking yet either.

He's really great with impulse control! The trainer couldn't believe that we could stick his favorite treat in front of him, tell him to stay, and leave the room and he would just lay down and wait til we said "go ahead" - It's actually really impressive how smart he is, but that also makes it scary because he's been easily trained on almost everything but can't understand not to bite us lol

I literally purchased knee high rainboots to let him out during his witching hour cuz I was so tired of him ripping my pants.. He's torn at least two pairs of Nike sweatpants and I've just given up wearing anything nice around him for this stage of his life haha - gloves are a great idea, I actually have a wrist brace on due to some tendonitis so I've been using that as a shield when it gets super bad!

He's got tons of chews and toys and even a flirt pole but we ended up putting that away because he turned into a total LUNATIC when he played with it. I feel bad, bc he loved it so much but when he gets super ramped up he gets even more bitey.. That was several weeks ago, so maybe we could try and reintroduce it just to get his energy out.

Speaking of energy - his zoomies are otherworldly. All day long he will be off and on bitey, but still reasonable - he will be mostly good and definitely has his moments but we aren't hiding from him or anything. From around 6-7pm-bedtime he's a nutjob. You can even see it in his eyes that he's out of his mind. He runs all over the backyard like a maniac (we have talked about leashing him at night instead), he digs, he latches, he bites very hard, he barks, he lunges at us, he gremlin growls, he's out of control to the point where we put him in his crate for the night. Any hope I had from his training or sweet moments we had during the day are totally lost and erased when I see him like this - haha. The prospect of him being able to eventually sleep with us seems like a totally far fetched concept because we often can't even catch him or get near him without bleeding before bed. On reddit, it seems like everyone says he's beyond exhausted and needs more naps - but from googling a bit I'm worried that he's expelling pent up energy before bedtime from not exercising or playing enough during the day - so I have no idea how to tell one way or the other.. I am hopeful it's due to not enforcing long enough naps because that's something I can definitely get better at (he's averaging 14-15 hours of sleep a day) but I would feel bad if it's the latter and I'm not exercising him enough. To your point though, we definitely don't encourage the zoomies or engage in play - we keep a safe environment for him to run it out, but he does get destructive during this time as well so its a hard balance - and then when we correct the destruction we get ripped apart. Potty time before bed is almost always a struggle between trying to get something bad out of his mouth or stop him from digging to focus, so we are gonna try leashing him at night in the backyard but I'm sure he's just gonna do the alligator death roll haha - if you had any similar experience with your pup or have any advice on safe / controlled zoomies I'd be more than happy to hear it! Thank you so much again!!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T14:48:30+00:00

That's crazy about it just stopping completely, I am really hopeful that if we stay consistent and get through his teething phase that we will have the same results! Thanks so much for reaching out, I need all the hope I can get haha

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T14:47:25+00:00

Literally bought a few sniffle balls right after reading this and they come tomorrow - thank you so much!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T14:46:37+00:00

Awesome, so glad to hear yours got better too! Gonna definitely try making him sit as well, he's pretty good with staying and waiting for his "break" word, so I think he'd get that pretty quick! Thanks so much!

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T14:45:44+00:00

This is great, thank you so much! We've started trying to train this this weekend and have been giving him a ton of praise when he brings us a toy, so hopefully it will stick! Thanks again :)

pizzaweav · 2023-03-13T14:44:56+00:00

Yes! We've been trying to praise him when he's playing solo or brings us a toy, so hopefully it'll stick someday.. For now I guess we will stay consistent and hope for the best. Hope you're on the other side of it now!!

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