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Stone or pebble eating driving me to distraction

Neil.W

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Hi guys,
Logan is now 8 months old and still a handful, loving and sweet and full of character but a handful.

Has anyone here had issues with their pooch eating small stones or pebbles? Logan is constantly raiding our raised flowerbed area for the small granite or limestone pebbles, crunching away at them and running off thinking its a game if I try and stop him. ITS DRIVING ME MAD.

Im afraid they wont pass through naturally resulting in a costly vets bill. Is this a phase puppies/dogs go through or is it something that needs to be dealt with now. He is at that stage in his life where he has serious selective hearing issues!!!!
Any help or advice is extremely welcome
 
Im afraid they wont pass through naturally resulting in a costly vets bill.
You are right to be concerned, this is a legitimate worry. Also the crunching could cause dental damage.

Two things come to mind. First, can you block access to the area? Or have him on a lead?

Second, train a good 'leave it' and 'drop it'. There are several videos on YouTube by Kikopup on this subject - she is very good.

Is your dog a spaniel? They have a bit of a reputation for resource guarding. So the harder you try to take away his prized possession, the harder he will feel forced to guard it (imagine being in a restaurant eating a favourite meal and someone trying to take it from you - you would resist too). So make sure you have something better to swap, so you don't get locked into that situation.
 
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this is potentially life-threatening behavior, & it's also a heritable compulsion - it can be either a learned behavior, in which a puppy's natural oral exploration gets snagged on pebbles or stones as 'pacifiers' or objects of amusement, just as some pups fixate on socks stolen from the hamper, or it can be literally a hard-wired inherited behavior that the pup cannot control.

I'd want to contact the breeder, let them know he has a possible OCD, & ask if his dam, sire, siblings, cousins, or grandparents also exhibit this. // At the very least, they shouldn't mate those 2 dogs again for a repeat litter.
I don't know if the KC breeder-scheme addresses "heritable behaviors" as well as heritable physical abnormalities, but since this is a life-threatening behavior, i'd report it - & in 20 or 30 years, maybe, just maybe, they'll refuse to register repeat breedings of dogs who produce rock-eaters. :rolleyes: Hope springs eternal.

Denying him access is only stage 1 - I'd fence the raised-beds temporarily to keep him safe, & simultaneously give me the time i'd need to remove every stone, & replace them with something less-likely to kill him if swallowed.
A lightweight bird-mesh stapled onto the lumber frame of the raised bed, or a sturdier deer-mesh similarly stapled, will keep his teeth out of the stones **IF** he's accompanied & supervised at all times, while in the garden, & preferably on leash - if he's free-roaming, he'll search out & snatch up larger stones anywhere they can be found, & possibly unseen, leading to tragic consequences.

I would also urge U to have him x-rayed immediately, to see if any rocks remain internally that need to be surgically removed.

If he were mine, i'd assume that it's a compulsion & train him to happily wear a box-muzzle when out of doors; i'd also stringently search the home garden for any stone smaller than his furry head, so that space becomes a safe zone - that means digging below the surface to find pebbles, & remove them all B4 he does.
To maintain the garden's good drainage, Perlite is a safe fine-textured soil amendment that will replace pebbles nicely, & it's inexpensive to buy.
A layer of weed-screen or weed-preventing fabric laid over the soil surface, topped with grass-clippings as mulch, is simple & very good for the garden - working the "old" mulch into the garden soil after lifting the weed-fabric will greatly enhance the soil tilth & humus content, benefiting the plants & the soil microbes & invertebrates, so that the soil health improves each year. Then i'd just replace the weed-fabric & lay down the new grass-clippings, in their turn.

Meanwhile, it would be leash or long-line only in the garden, & anywhere that might have so much as one pebble for him to find. While on the long-line, if i saw him reach down with his mouth open, i'd just assume it's a rock & briskly pull him to one side - a body-harness with the long-line clipped TO * HIS * CHEST makes this easy, even from 20 to 30-ft away.
Note that being no dummy, he may learn to "line-out" - keep himself butt-on to U, so that the bulk of his body conceals his activity from sight, & also to prevent U from easily moving him side to side. // Horses on longue-lines will also do this, cutting across the circle to get the running line alongside their bodies, & even snatching it from the trainer's hands in that fashion.
Just keep him side-on at all times as much as possible, & if he's ahead of U such as on a narrow path, COIL the long-line & get close, so U can see his head easily & watch what he's doing. If he reaches toward the ground, keep yer hands low & wrists straight, & pull toward whichever side the leash is, on him - e-g, if the leash runs to his right, pull right with BOTH hands in steady firm traction. This won't hurt him; it will convert his own forward momentum into a U-turn toward U, with minimal force exerted on the dog, & the least amount of strength demanded from U. :)

To let him sniff & run freely, i'd habituate that box-muzzle as quickly as possible, so that he'd willingly stick his own face into it & stand politely to have the muzzle buckled. I'd be sure to get one with the over-the-skull strap, such as the Baskerville ULTRA model. // I'd also make sure there's a stand-off inside the muzzle, with 1.25 to 1.5-inches between the end of his nose===> & <===the inside of the 'box' - that extra depth in the basket should ensure he cannot ram a small stone thru the front, & pick it up with his incisors or tongue, to swallow it.
U could even fit a square of mesh fabric or fiberglass window-screen onto the end, on the outside where he can't get to it, & sew it there - i'd use unwaxed dental floss, it's extremely strong & durable, & the knots can be softened above a match-flame out of doors or under a vented hood, to weld them permanently so they won't unravel.
Then he can roam about without the long-line. :)

I hope the x-rays come up blank - that would be very reassuring! - Let us know how he gets on, please?

- terry

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