Chapter 3 - Dealing With Dog Chewing Problems

Three days after adopting Dakota we had to go to work. We confined her to a portion of the garage and off we went for the day. Bear, my husband, got home first. Nothing could have prepared him for what he walked into. Dakota had pooped everywhere. Not only had she pooped, she had managed to smear it all over her, the floor, her dog food bowl, her water feeder, and the dog toys we'd left for her. Welcome Home!

Subsequent days he came home to find that she'd chewed her dog bowls into teeny little pieces and had ripped open a bag of cement, scattering it's contents hither and yon.

And to add insult to destruction, the neighbors were complaining that Dakota barked all day. Even from the garage she was loud and they could hear her several houses away. Dakota did not do well left alone in the garage.

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

If you've read the preceding chapters you'll know that Dakota is a house dog and that we were only putting her in the garage on our work days. Otherwise she was in the house with us, even at night for sleepytime. As long as we could supervise her she stayed in the house.

About a month after adopting Dakota we got her a dog crate and moved her into the house even on work days. This solved a lot of other problems but she still chewed. We attempted to put a blanket in there for her but she chewed a two foot hole in it the first day so we took it out and she didn't get another one. We did not attempt to put dog food or water bowls in the crate. We already knew how they would fare. We fed and watered her before we left and again when we got home. That was just going to have to be good enough.

Several months later we went off on a vacation. We bought a 6x10 chain link dog kennel and put it in the garage. We put a huge watering feeder in it and her dog food bowl, laid a thick carpet of hay down for her and hired the girl next door to feed her twice a day and check on her.

You can see how well that went...

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

A dog who is bored will look for entertainment. Sometimes play gets a little out of hand and things get destroyed. Some dogs don't do well if they spend too many hours apart from you or if you ignore them a lot even when home. Active breeds like herding dogs and sporting dogs need to be kept busy. If you don't provide them with outlets, they will find their own. Young dogs are full of energy and if you don't exercise them, all of that pent up energy will find a way out, usually in a bad way. Dogs don't calm down until they're about three.

Dakota was all of the above. She had abandonment fears so whenever we left her she became distressed. Being an Australian Cattle Dog/Husky mix put her in the high energy working dog category. Both breeds were meant to spend many hours a day on the move. And she was young and full of energy.

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

Dakota was a chewer. She was like a baby bird, her mouth was always open and in motion and if anything came near it, she latched onto the thing with her teeth. If it was in her mouth, she was chewing on it. It wasn't malicious, it just was.

We learned very quickly not to leave Dakota alone in the house out of sight. If she disappeared around a corner I was hot on her tail. Not only did she chew but Dakota was in her curious stage, exploring the world around her having no idea what was okay to play with. Some of the things she grabbed were: an empty plastic milk jug, shoes, a wooden billy club, tin foil with meat drippings she snatched out of the garbage can, berries off of potted plants, and rolls of toilet tissue sitting on the floor. We didn't catch her in time with the toilet tissue and she shredded it.

Those first months we kept her in sight at all times. We never left her unsupervised in the house. I made her follow me everywhere. I'd hook my finger under her collar and guide her around the house with me. I took her into the bathroom with me and closed the door so she couldn't leave. I blocked the stairs so she had to stay on whatever floor I was on. Wherever I went I took her with me.

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

I wanted to catch her the minute she grabbed something in her mouth so that I could tell her if it was legal or not. The goal was to teach her that unless it was something we gave to her, she shouldn't touch it, and we were very careful in what we did give her. This is where many people fail. Give a dog an old shoe to chew on and then not understand when he chews on your new shoes. You must be consistent. If you don't want your dog to chew on shoes then ALL shoes should be off limits. Your dog's allowable toys should not be similar to forbidden items in your house.

If she grabbed something I immediate took it away making it clear that this object was illegal and replaced it with something she was allowed to have. If I took something away, I gave her a dog chew or a dog toy to replace it. She learned which items belonged to her. We went through a lot of dog chew toys during that first year.

We gave her big, hard bones and humungous rawhide bones, and hooves to chew on. The dog experts are against all of these chewies but for Dakota it was necessary. We had to divert her from chewing our house to pieces.

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

Why are the dog experts against these types of chewies? These items can actually harm your dog, particularly hard bones and hooves. Small pieces can break off and if your dog swallows it and it has a sharp point, that point can pierce the stomach or intestinal lining. If your dog swallows a piece that is too big, it can block the intestines and require surgery to remove (if it doesn't kill your dog first).

If you don't believe me, do a Google search. Type in "dangerous dog treats" or "dog treats kill". You'll find page upon page of scary stuff, some of it from trustworthy sources such as CNN, NBC and ABC.

Dakota gave me a quite a scare one night, possibly related to swallowing the remnants of a hoof. She acted a bit queer and every time she drank water it immediately came back out like a projectile. It was as if it never got fully down into her innards. I stayed up with her all night taking her out to the bathroom several times. She was very distressed.

The next day I found a big piece of what looked like a hoof in her poop and after that she was fine. Dogs have died from swallowing objects that blocked their intestines. But we took the chance making sure to watch over this carefully. After the Big Scare if we gave her a hoof and we saw small shards as she chewed, we took them away and disposed of them. If the hoof got to that size we were afraid she'd swallow whole, we tossed it and gave her a new one.

Rawhides weren't quite as bad but they didn't last long. She could devour an average size rawhide in an hour. This was bad not only for her innards but it didn't keep her teeth busy long enough. We needed to keep her in chewy pacifiers for much longer than an hour without her ingesting too much at one time so we bought the biggest rawhides we could find at $10 each. These kept her busy for a long time. We only had to watch to make sure she didn't actually eat too much at one time as she was notorious for swallowing big chunks.

Bad Dog to Best Friend:
The Transformation of Dakota
Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

Dakota just celebrated 15 months with us which puts her at 22 months old. We are able to leave her for 9 hours loose in the bedroom without incident (and without chewy toys of any kind) while we are at work. This is amazing progress for a dog who initially wanted to grab everything that came into her sphere and chew on it. Chapter 4 - Training Your Dog To Be Home Alone details how we weaned her from the crate. We're up to about 3 hours in the main part of the house and the only incident we had was when we left a blanket on the floor. She chewed some pieces off of it.

For some reason blankets on the floor defy our efforts to stop her chewing. I don't know if this was a carryover from her old life or what. So far the only solution we've found is not leave blankets on the floor even if we are at home. We are also careful not to leave small, plastic items on the floor. I had taken a box fan apart to clean it and forgot to put the feet back in. An hour later I found them chewed to pieces.

Your dog will not go from bad to perfect overnight. The fan feet incident happened the other day but such incidents are rare and they don't happen at all if we are careful about what we leave on the floor.

She learned pretty quickly not to grab things off of tables so most of our efforts are spent on things laying on the floor. We trust her enough to leave her for many hours in a room that we've dog-proofed for the items that tempt her. Remember, dog training is about creating new habits to replace the old ones. Today, we still have to be aware of temptations and remove them. Eventually this will become her new habit and we won't have to worry about dog proofing.

When we first started putting her in the bedroom instead of the crate, we removed several items from the bedroom including a guitar. Last week I put it back. I trust her not to chew it. I am very proud of her progress and look forward to the day that she is worry free.

Chapter 1 - Training Our Problem Dog
Chapter 2 - Potty Training An Adult Dog
Chapter 3 - Dealing With Dog Chewing Problems
Chapter 4 - Training Your Dog To Be Home Alone
Chapter 5 - Proof That Any Dog Can Be Trained
Chapter 6 - Interviewed for Victoria Stilwell
Chapter 7 - Motivating Your Dog To Honor And Obey You
Follow Dakota on Twitter
Bad Dog to Best Friend: Paperback Book (26 Chapters)

Article copyright 2007 gypsyware.com

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