The knock comes at the door and all of a sudden there is a stampede of fur, fluff and doggy breath. Hurtling towards the door readying itself to pounce upon your guest. We hate it, our guests hate it and all that happens is the dog gets more attention.
Think about it. Dogs jumping to greet people at the door is natural. They see us talking at eye level, and they want to be at eye level, too. So they jump to try to get up to eye level and greet the person at the door. But what results is a nightmare as people then push the dog away (an action that dogs consider to be playtime) and yelling.
There’s really one main way to try and cure the problem of having a dog jump at you when you enter the house. Simply ignore the dog. When you enter your house, cross your arms over your chest and look straight ahead or up at the sky. Pretend that the dog isn’t there at all, until it calms down. You might want to set some of its favorite toys next to the door so you can throw it at the ground when you enter the house in order to divert its attention.
Another tactic is to get a friend to help you. Ask the other person to ring the doorbell 10 times every 30 seconds. You should sit in your living room as if nothing is going on. Completely ignore the doorbell. Your dog at first might jump toward the door. But as the doorbell ringing persists, it will stop.
Also, you might want to try tying up your dog at a certain spot every time the doorbell rings. It can be your dog’s spot to go when the doorbell rings. Eventually you can then take your dog off its leash and start teaching it to sit in that spot when the doorbell rings and tell it to “stay,” in order to make a positive door greeting.
