Originally Posted by
annkie
So my method may not be the most "positive" but it was extremely effective. My chocolate lab was super duper stubborn. Super alpha. I don't remember when I did this, perhaps also around 5ish months maybe. So, dogs jaws are actually designed to bite down and not open up. Their strength is when they bite down. They have little strength to actually open their mouth. I put my fingers around his mouth LIGHTLY and said "no biting" until he stopped fighting. Then let go. I did this every time he tried to mouth my hands. It took a couple times until he got the "no biting" command. It doesn't hurt them. They're just not fans of not being able to open their mouth. You don't press their mouth closed. You just operate as a muzzle with your hand/fingers and say "no biting". That's it. That's how he stopped. And if he got overly exciting as he got older and was mouthy with a new person all I had to do was say "no biting" and he stopped immediately.