Eats everything on the Ground while walking

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Permalink Reply by John Wolff on November 13, 2009 at 12:13pm

What was it that she ate?

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Permalink Reply by Patricia A Columbo on November 13, 2009 at 12:25pm

I THINK it was a black chestnut. They are on the ground in Princeton and the nuts if moldy are poisonous (it hasn't stopped raining here so everything is moldy...). She is with me at work so I am very aware of everything that goes into her mouth....within 2 hours of her lunchtime walk she started vomiting and collapsed.

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Permalink Reply by Sky and Lyla on November 13, 2009 at 12:59pm

I have not tried a muzzle, but I do have two dogs who will eat anything and everything. The command "leave it" is your best friend. It is harder to get them to obey "leave it" where they are excited, like outside, but with practice they actually learn it quite well. My Lyla is 9 months, and she is very good at "leave it." Just this morning she was about to eat a hair tie that the cat knocked on the floor, I said "leave it" and she immediately turned and came to me.

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Permalink Reply by Bev Levy on November 13, 2009 at 2:38pm

Oh that is too bad! Try teaching the leave- it command. If you do it several times a day for a few days you will be surprised at how good she will get. Just sit with treats and put one on the floor and say leave it and before she gets it take it back and give a treat (not the same one). She should be in a sit and stay for this. If you repeat this regularly you should see results pretty soon. I always watch Sparty like a hawk when we are out because he loves to get stuff. When he goes for something I say leave it and pull him away with the leash. Izzy will drop anything when you say leave it. It is important to practice this in order for it to work. Good luck.

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Permalink Reply by Patricia A Columbo on November 13, 2009 at 2:42pm

I will start tomorrow on the leave it command. My fear is if I don't say leave it will she still vacuum the ground? Will she grow out of this behavior?

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Permalink Reply by Sky and Lyla on November 13, 2009 at 4:11pm

In addition to Leave It, I also teach "Drop It" to get them to spit out things the already have. I taught this by playing fetch or tug of war. For example. when playing fetch, they bring the ball back, I take the ball out, say "drop it" and then immediately throw it again. In their minds this mean when I spit things out, really fun things happen immediately. I always try to make sure to do something fun after drop it, or give a treat, when we are practicing so it becomes one of those commands the do happily. In my opinion, leave it and drop it are just as important as recall. They can be just as life saving as a come in some situations.

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Permalink Reply by Beth on November 14, 2009 at 8:25am

I use "leave it" as a general purpose command that sort of means "that has nothing to do with you." So it means to not pick something up, or if he's picked something up to let it go. It also means "don't pee on that!" LOL You'd think it might be confusing, but to the dog it seems to make perfect sense.

However, Jack is just about 100% with stuff in the house and with non-food items outside, but with edibles he thinks "leave it" means "chew faster and swallow before she gets it out of my mouth." *sigh* I really think that I would need to use punishment with him as he's smart enough to have figured out that the treats I have are never as tasty as whatever he found that I'm asking him to leave. And I'm just not willing to take the punishment route with him, so hopefully nothing will happen to make me second-guess my decision.

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Permalink Reply by Beth on November 13, 2009 at 3:01pm

Will she grow out of the behavior? Probably not. Mine are 5 and two-and-a-half, and they both still hoover stuff up. Many of them will, however, get more selective in what they'll actually swallow. A crab apple, for example, will get picked up but spit out. Every fall Jack manages to eat some unripe acorns and gets a bit ill.

I'm sorry to hear about poor Tootsie's episode! You must have been so worried, and of course it's never fun to have to dish out $1,000, even though we will do it in a heartbeat to help our furry friends.

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Permalink Reply by Patricia A Columbo on November 13, 2009 at 3:40pm

Yes, we will do anything to save our babies.... I guess I will just have to be super vigilant during the fall when all the nuts are falling....

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Permalink Reply by Cat&Matilda on November 13, 2009 at 6:15pm

You should teach her "leave it" and work hard on that at home and then outside, and teach her to "drop it" also in case she does get it in her mouth. I tought her these tricks the same way as sky and lyla did.

Besides these commands here is what i did to stop Tilda from being a vacuum cleaner outside:
I walk her on heel position, then when we get to grassy areas i give her a release command so she can go sniff around. The minute she would try to lunge for anything in the ground i would give her the "leave it" command and the free sniffing would end.
She quickly learned that if she picked anything from the ground she would go back into a heel position and not be able to sniff around.

You still have to be vigilant when they are sniffing the ground. I always keep an eye out for her so i can say the "leave it" command when needed.

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Permalink Reply by Patricia A Columbo on November 14, 2009 at 6:58am

Now that makes sense to me!!! Really didn't want to go with a muzzle...

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Permalink Reply by Sunni A. on November 14, 2009 at 12:56am

I just went through this with Eddy, we ran tests on him, all negative, so the vet said he most likely ate something, like a moldy fig. My vet said, You gotta hate when the seasons change because so many bugs come out, and even eating a leaf or twig can mean a week of antibiotics. He told me that the corgi vacuum is normal but that it often leads to stomach bugs during spring and fall.

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