Warning To Those That Have Dogs That Chew & Eat Strange Things (aka: Hoovers)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm new here last night and so lucky to have found this website. We were at a loss to find out what was wrong with Joe. My husband found him playing in the highway with another dog and coaxed him to safety. The other dog ran away. Joe is a black lab less than a year old that was someone elses wonderful pet, but we haven't been able to find that someone after eight weeks of newspaper ads and posts at the vets offices and community sites. He's well-trained and extremely obedient except for his eating habits. Besides eating string, cloth, foam rubber, rope, plastic, paper towels, twist-ties, totally consuming bones (that required surgery), sticks, raspberry bushes, roses, any flower with a hard stem, he also ate large holes in my sheer panel to my living room window. Joe's bed blanket looked like swiss cheese. I told my husband we would have to throw it away and strip our house bare if we want to protect his dog. He had already taken him to the vet four times for things he has eaten. Now he has to sleep on the hard plastic tray in the botton of his crate. It's his own fault.
I was told a lab will be the best pet you can have after they are about two years old. I sure hope he makes it to two years old so I can find out. I'll have to keep the garden hose out and keep checking the yard to see what else he has eaten for a long time.
Funny this should pop up. We lost our grandpuppy over the weekend from her eating something. I'm sure it was a chicken bone. She got into the garbage - they all did - one night when my son in law took it out of the can and didn't take it right outside. I found it and cleaned it all up and took it out, didn't think much of it. I should know better.
The next day Tink was kind of ........... blah. She was always an overly active 18 month old pittie, always wanting to play. She had a loose stool but my dogs get that occasionally and I didn't think much of it. Again, I should have paid attention.
The next day I was in class in Nashville and hubby texted that her stool was now liquid and bloody. I thought 'Aha, she has worms' and moved on. One of our fosters had a very bloody liquid stool last year and we ran him to the vet to find out he's very sensitive to intestinal parasites. When he gets them he bleeds pretty bad. Again, shouldn't have assumed, especially since she was still not her normal self.
I got home that night and she was laying on the couch next to her daddy. I didn't think anything of it as I hopped on line. Then I heard my SIL calling her over and over. I looked up to see her head hanging off the couch. That was the first time I thought of the garbage and I lost it. I called hubby to grab his stethoscope (part of his career background is in EMS) and told him to check her.
Not good. I called the vet and left a voicemail but before he could even call back she was gone. Died in her daddy's arms.
Dogs tend to hide any sickness very well. It serves them well in the wild as signs of illness will attract predators. Sadly, it also keeps us from getting the red flag we need sometimes if we're not vigilant about keeping a very close eye on them. My failure to pay attention to the signs cost Tinkerbell her life. When I had hubby check her he moved her enough that I could see her tummy and see the tell tale blue mark, very common with internal bleeding. Almost like a bruise.
Keep an eye on your fur babies. It truly can cost them their life if you don't.
Funny this should pop up. We lost our grandpuppy over the weekend from her eating something. I'm sure it was a chicken bone. She got into the garbage - they all did - one night when my son in law took it out of the can and didn't take it right outside. I found it and cleaned it all up and took it out, didn't think much of it. I should know better.
The next day Tink was kind of ........... blah. She was always an overly active 18 month old pittie, always wanting to play. She had a loose stool but my dogs get that occasionally and I didn't think much of it. Again, I should have paid attention.
The next day I was in class in Nashville and hubby texted that her stool was now liquid and bloody. I thought 'Aha, she has worms' and moved on. One of our fosters had a very bloody liquid stool last year and we ran him to the vet to find out he's very sensitive to intestinal parasites. When he gets them he bleeds pretty bad. Again, shouldn't have assumed, especially since she was still not her normal self.
I got home that night and she was laying on the couch next to her daddy. I didn't think anything of it as I hopped on line. Then I heard my SIL calling her over and over. I looked up to see her head hanging off the couch. That was the first time I thought of the garbage and I lost it. I called hubby to grab his stethoscope (part of his career background is in EMS) and told him to check her.
Not good. I called the vet and left a voicemail but before he could even call back she was gone. Died in her daddy's arms.
Dogs tend to hide any sickness very well. It serves them well in the wild as signs of illness will attract predators. Sadly, it also keeps us from getting the red flag we need sometimes if we're not vigilant about keeping a very close eye on them. My failure to pay attention to the signs cost Tinkerbell her life. When I had hubby check her he moved her enough that I could see her tummy and see the tell tale blue mark, very common with internal bleeding. Almost like a bruise.
Keep an eye on your fur babies. It truly can cost them their life if you don't.
I am so sorry.....I know losing a pet is awful.....
I'm new here last night and so lucky to have found this website. We were at a loss to find out what was wrong with Joe. My husband found him playing in the highway with another dog and coaxed him to safety. The other dog ran away. Joe is a black lab less than a year old that was someone elses wonderful pet, but we haven't been able to find that someone after eight weeks of newspaper ads and posts at the vets offices and community sites. He's well-trained and extremely obedient except for his eating habits. Besides eating string, cloth, foam rubber, rope, plastic, paper towels, twist-ties, totally consuming bones (that required surgery), sticks, raspberry bushes, roses, any flower with a hard stem, he also ate large holes in my sheer panel to my living room window. Joe's bed blanket looked like swiss cheese. I told my husband we would have to throw it away and strip our house bare if we want to protect his dog. He had already taken him to the vet four times for things he has eaten. Now he has to sleep on the hard plastic tray in the botton of his crate. It's his own fault.
I was told a lab will be the best pet you can have after they are about two years old. I sure hope he makes it to two years old so I can find out. I'll have to keep the garden hose out and keep checking the yard to see what else he has eaten for a long time.
I have a lab mix and the chewing has slowed down a lot recently...she's 9 months old and she will still chew when she's bored, but she hasn't eaten the corner off the wall, a rock, or a chunk of concrete (from my neighbor's doorstep ) in a while. She will still gnaw a shoe if my daughter leaves one on the floor.
One of the best things to do is give your puppy other things to chew on. Ginger's favorite is a really large rawhide bone, which seems to last better than other things (she ate through the kong and the nylabones really fast).
I have a soft wheaten terrier who is like child to me. I have also spent thousands of dollars on vet bills due to him eating the carpet while I'm out of the house. He has never chewed anything while I am at home. I have had a behaviorist monitor who confirmed it is some type of anxiety about being alone but not seperation anxiety. We have tried Kongs, Dap Collars, music, thunder shirt, mild fluoxetine pills, extra exercise from a dog walker and nothing has helped. He will go months being fine left alone and then last week he ate the carpet again and I had to do emergency surgery. We can't find any consistent trigger. My husband is ready to get him re-homed, which it heartbreaking. I'm reaching out for any and all recommendations!
I have been considering a basket muzzle or crate, but I am worried that will put him under a lot of stress. Please let me know if you have any suggestions.
I have a soft wheaten terrier who is like child to me. I have also spent thousands of dollars on vet bills due to him eating the carpet while I'm out of the house. He has never chewed anything while I am at home. I have had a behaviorist monitor who confirmed it is some type of anxiety about being alone but not seperation anxiety. We have tried Kongs, Dap Collars, music, thunder shirt, mild fluoxetine pills, extra exercise from a dog walker and nothing has helped. He will go months being fine left alone and then last week he ate the carpet again and I had to do emergency surgery. We can't find any consistent trigger. My husband is ready to get him re-homed, which it heartbreaking. I'm reaching out for any and all recommendations!
I have been considering a basket muzzle or crate, but I am worried that will put him under a lot of stress. Please let me know if you have any suggestions.
Thank you in advance for any help!
Replace Soft Coated Wheaten with Airedale. It started at about 9 months of age after spaying. Pepper ate dog toys (we just quit with those early on) batteries from the haz-mat bin, pinecones, rocks, drywall, dog doors, fence, her beds, clothing from the hamper, industrial linoleum flooring (we almost lost her on that one) poisonous mushrooms, garbage when walking and the list goes on and on. In addition if she had nothing to chew she would chew her feet till she got granulomas. Bitter apple, cayenne even habanero were condiments and didn't slow her down. She did most of the damage when we were gone but she would hoover stuff on walks so that we trended to keep her in the middle of the street to avoid a lightning fast grabs. Everything in our house went on lock down. We were hyper vigilant.
Like several others on this forum we spent countless thousands of dollars on vet care. We had a book where we kept her vet records. On a whim I decided to add the costs up and at 10K I threw the book out. I was a little over halfway through. We called the new addition to Pet Emergency "Pepper's Wng" but in those terrible years we found that 1) she was claustrophobic so confining her made her more anxious 2) she needed hardcore exercise and diversions, a bored or anxious Pepper was a chewing/eating Peper 3) on the recommendation of our vet we consulted a behaviorist DVM and we instituted a regimen of clomipramine, calming hormone plug ins, and deference protocols (behavioral modification) to reduce the anxiety at about age 2.5. That got her to age 5 and she pretty much mellowed out after that so that we could discontinue the meds. We still had a few isolated incidents but nothing like the first five years. Pepper lived to 14.5 years before advanced age took her. We miss her still.
There is hope but I do feel your pain. To the OP I'm very sorry for your loss.
This was with our 11 year old King Charles Ozzie. He's a dog with a double heart murmur. We just had berber carpet laid on our stairs and hallway. Came home one day and there was a 4 foot piece of berber cord mixed in with vomit. Ran him to Blue Pearl...they said "He was ok and often times they vomit up what they ingest. If anything happens bring him back within 24 hours and we will not charge you the initial visit fee." So with that we go home. By the time i got him out of the car he started to choke and up came a bunch of cord clogging his entire throat..i know your not supposed to pull, so lucky enough I was able to put my finger in his mouth and by some miracle he gagged and vomited it up...about 12 feet of cord. Back in the car...back to Blue Pearl. They did an xray and found he had carpet cord clogging his stomach and intestines. They had to cut open his stomach and intestines to remove all the cord still in him. He recovered well and quickly. $6,000 later he was absolutely fine! He's now 14 years old and a happy and healthy little guy. Of course he takes one pill for his heart every day. We have no carpet, no throw rugs, no fuzzy toys in our house. Some dogs are just crazy. They are like 2 year olds that never grow up.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
) in a while. She will still gnaw a shoe if my daughter leaves one on the floor.
