Tag: bad dog habits

Heartworm shall not defeat us

And power cords shall not get in the way

The healthy foster dog. Note the perky ears; the loving, confident eyes that say, “Sure, you can put your feet here. But I’m not moving.” See also, the lamp power cord under her tail….

This post was going to be all about how ‘Tavi is progressing during her heartworm treatment. About how she’s calmer, and more confident, and has learned to use the extra-large doggie door, even though she’s only a svelte 45 pounds. And, she seems like she feels…good.

Then this morning, she killed my lamp. Ok, maybe not killed – just mutilated and disabled it. Moved it from the “useful household furnishings” category to the dust-collecting projects heap, in a matter of — I don’t know — 30 seconds? Five minutes? Longer? If I’d known she was mutilating it, I would have stopped her. But I didn’t notice. And she was right there, at my feet, under the small table where I was typing. And she still feels good. But I feel bad.

The evidence.

Should I have trained her not to chew electric cords sooner? Should I have moved the cord out of harm’s way? Was I supposed to crate her even though she loves to be with her pack — I mean right with her pack? Even though her whines, and her deep brown eyes, say ‘Nooooo! It’s not bed time!’ when I try to put her in?

I now think the answer to that last one was yes. Yes, unless I could work and respond to subtle ambient sounds at the same time. Which I can’t.

The victim.

While responding to emails this morning, should I have wondered why, after hours of restlessly poking around the house and tasting things, asking for ice cubes or a ball partner, ‘Tavi had been resting quietly at my feet for a solid half hour? I tried to stick to my policy, Ignore them, or you will never get anything done.

I could tell she was chewing on something. Fine. Chewing keeps her busy. Plenty of wholesome chewables ’round here. She wasn’t making teeth-on-bone sounds, though. Something softer. But not as soft as her (unstuffed) stuffy toy. And not squeaky, like a squeak ball. That’s good. Or…is it?? So I looked. And let the exclamations begin.

I saw a small scattering of off-white vinyl plus shiny copper, strewn on the floor where the dog had been lying, so happily, just moments before. The bent plug was disconnected from the lamp-formerly-known-as-the-Zoom-light on my work table (which is also known as my dining table). The dog scootched out of there as soon as the hollering began.

The perpetrator. The ears are down (‘guilty as charged.’) The eyes say “I’m really sorry…but did you know those things feel FANTASTIC in your mouth?”

Don’t worry — the lamp wasn’t plugged in. It was only used during Zoom calls, which are less frequent, these days, thank goodness. No electric shock to anyone. Just ‘I can’t believe I have a dog who chews electric cords’ shock, for me.

As I was saying, ‘Tavi seems to feel terrific. She’s been with me for almost 12 weeks. In two more weeks, she will get her final dose of heartworm medicine, and begin a period of more stringent movement restrictions. She’ll need to be in her crate more, like it or not.

Limiting her movement will keep her cardiovascular system quiet. Keeping her circulation calm will prevent the dying and dead pieces of heartworm from infiltrating her blood stream too fast, and causing an embolism. An embolism could kill her.

So, today’s lesson was a good one for me. I’d better toughen up.

Pumpkin on my elbow makes me happy

How to Make Puppy Poop Taste Bad

Ruthie (left) and Remo after 16 days in foster, 3 to 4 meals per day.

Wait – doesn’t puppy poop already taste terrible? You’d think so. But here’s an alternate take:

Let’s say that you’re a puppy and your only source of food, for your first twelve weeks, is your mom’s milk. Now, realize that your 5 siblings are in the same situation. And your mom is underweight, and underfed. You’d probably be very interested in eating anything you can find. If all there is, is poop, then poop is what you eat. With gusto.

This is the setting that Remo and Ruthie were born into. Hungry, covered in fleas, living outdoors in somebody’s yard for a minute, til their first humans at least had the decency to surrender them to their local animal shelter in an upstate New York town.

A normal healthy puppy gets milk from their normal healthy mom for the first 6 to 8 weeks of life. Then they get solid food, meant for puppies, with extra protein, fat and calories to help them grow. But that’s not how it went down for Remo and Ruthie.

So having formed the habit of competing for any poop pile they can find, they were not going to give that habit up easily.

“Well, once they’ve eaten a real meal, and they’re full, surely…” I thought.

“Once they realize that they are getting regular meals, three or four times a day, they wouldn’t… would they?”

Waiting for them to see the light, stuffing their guts with great food did nothing to change their behavior. I was picking up their poop as soon as I sensed it had hit the floor. I started to rack my brain about how to get the poop-eating to stop. Had I read something somewhere about adding hot pepper to the poop, and let them eat it? Wait – was that for some other animal? Is hot pepper toxic for puppies? Augh!

I turned to our foster group leader. “I’m having this problem…” I said to her as I was picking up the de-worming medicine from her. I explained that the puppies aggressively compete to own each poop, no matter who deals it.

“That’s because they’re still used to being starving,” she said. “Try putting some pumpkin puree in their food. Just plain, from a can. Either that, or try some pineapple. Just a small spoonful, mix it in. It tastes good going in, but it makes their poop taste terrible when it comes out. That should do the trick.”

That night, I put some pumpkin in their dinner. It was a BIG hit. At one point, Remo was hogging all the food, and growling at Ruthie for trying to get her share. He was eating maniacally. I picked him up to force him to take a break. There he was with bright orange pumpkin smudges all over his chin. He looked up at me, blinking, and let out a big burp. “NOW you feel better,” I told him. He squirmed as I put him back down, and ended up smearing what was left of his pumpkin-chin on my shirt sleeve. A nice long mushy stripe up to my elbow. I sighed. ‘This kid’s going to go far,’ I thought. ‘With that kind of charm…’

Late the following day, I noticed that they weren’t devouring the poop; just tasting it, then leaving it. I still tried to be quick at picking it up off the floor. Because, yuck. By the time we got through 2 full cans of pumpkin (several days of meals), only Ruthie was still trying to eat poop. And less enthusiastically, at that.

When I ran out of pumpkin, we switched to crushed pineapple. I had never known that pineapple was ok for dogs to eat. I would have thought it too acidic, like citrus. They hate citrus. The first trial with pineapple went slowly. It was mixed into their food, and it took them almost twice as long as usual to eat it. ‘Well forget that, ‘ I thought. ‘I need them to eat.’ I thought pineapple was a fail. But then I decided to try again, and just give it to them straight, as dessert. That worked! They gobbled it up. And boy, the next day’s poop was noticeably stinkier. And they didn’t eat it. Not any of it. Ta-daa!