Okay basic story is ...

DS is a biter BUT only at childcare. (If he does bite at home it's only when he's tired).

They have tried to keep him away from the other kids that he seems to have issues with. He has just moved up from the baby room to the toddler room and it seems to be more serious now than it was. He used to bite a reasonable amount in the baby room but not as hard. We were hoping he'd grow out of it fairly quickly.

He has managed to bite and leave a mark on another child's bottom THROUGH the nappy . He's also had to be dragged off another child by the back of his shirt and had to have a carer unhinge his jaw so they could take him off another child on Friday (in front of another parent). It's gotten so bad that they're suggesting that if he was at another centre he may have been asked to leave. Thankfully my CC isn't likely to do that (they were set up to help children with special needs as the owners had a special needs child that they couldn't get satisfactory care for). But it hasn't been an easy conversation to have at CC on Friday after a week from hell with his sleeping (and high schoolers being painful). The carer that spoke to me was at pains to tell me I wasn't a bad parent. I know I'm not, but it's not easy to hear that your child won't stop biting. (We did have a good last week but that was because DS was still getting over a family holiday interstate so he was sleeping 2+ hours in the day)

They've tried separating him from the other kids (time out sort of thing) in the group activities. He's been known to go back to the same child as soon as he'd been taken off them for a second or third attempt. I'm not sure that it's not related to teething, I think we're trying to get our 2yr molars but I'm not sure about this. We're going to send him to CC with teething gel and get that applied every 4hrs from Monday.

Does anyone have any suggestions about deterring the behaviour?

I'm looking at trying to cut down the night feed time (apparently I'm a human dummy at the moment at night 1 or more hours of feeding at a time ) I'm hoping this might encourage more sleep from him at home so he's less tired at CC and that way it should reduce the biting. (This is a whole nother thread that I've posted in the BFing forum)

CC also suggested there might be something like the stop-biting-your-nails paint that I could get to put on his mouth after he bites - not sure what it's called or where I'd find this. Basically working as a deterrant on the taste after biting (but knowing my DS he'll actually like the stuff). So I think I'd like to try this.

I'd prefer to have natural remedies or gentle methods if possible but I'm ready to try anything really.

I think some of the biting is normal 2 yr old behaviour, some is frustration, some is tiredness and I've no idea if some is teething related.

I'd like to be reducing the biting from 4 or more to maybe one fairly rapidly.

It's hard to get DS to sleep more if he doesn't want to even if he clearly needs more sleep - he's been down to one day sleep for ages and it's typically only for a hour or so at a time. Bedtime is anywhere between 7 & 8:30pm, we generally start bedtime around 7 and some nights he's out quickly, other nights it takes longer. Typically he's asleep by 8. (If we try to go to sleep earlier and we managed to do so, he wakes earlier - like 4/5am instead of 6/7am - and this kind of defeats the purpose of going to bed early).