When Willow was a young pup, she would pick up rocks now and again, mainly from river beds. I always used a swap or a game, distraction, leave it yada yada and she eventually grew out of it. The only time she would pick up rocks was when we were out with their friend, Alfie, who is a massive rock fiend. Still, if I told her to leave it, she would, and happily trot on without it. In the last couple of weeks, however, they have both gone absolutely rock crazy. Every walk, they'll find at least one between them that they become obsessed with. "Leave it" works, but now only for a while. Shadow especially will run back 100m to go and pick up a rock that I've told him to leave. He won't give it up. I've used the lead to walk on a couple of times, but the paths we walk on are often rather awkward for lead walking, so I've taken to picking the rock up, putting it in my bag and disposing of it when they're not looking. I'm going to do some training around this with dummies, I think - drop a dummy, use the "leave it" and walk on, then have J surreptitiously pick the dummy up so, if they do run back, it's not there anymore. We could do this with rocks they pick up, too, I guess, when he's around, and in the meantime just take them away and do what I've been doing. I don't know if they're rocks that Alfie has picked up previously (it's generally on the paths where he is walked on his quick walks), but they will dig them up from under deep snow, so there's obviously something they can smell on them. I just have no idea where this behaviour has suddenly sprung from!
How annoying - you will end up with strong shoulders if you keep putting them in your bag! Do you have something they could each carry for that part of the walk? .
Oh heavens , what a problem When we first had Millie , she used to pick up large ( for her ) stones from the river bed , all her canine teeth are worn down so it was obviously a long term habit of hers . I just swapped the stone for tennis balls , and , touch wood , she hasn't picked up a stone for ages now .
What do they do if you ignore them with the rock? Just thinking that their love of stones is a bit like Juno's love of sticks which are strewn across all of our walks. I do a fair amount of leave and drop but at times I also ignore the stick in her mouth which she then drops around 20 feet later and just walks on.
Sorry I don't have any useful advice but I just have this mental picture of you walking around with a bag of rocks!!
They run around like lunatics, and I worry for their teeth. I can't let them do it, it pains me to watch! They'll happily drop and leave the rocks, but unless I pick them up, they'll go back and get them when we're done playing. This is a new trick, too. They have realised that "backwards" is a direction. Until very recently, they've never seemed to realise that they can go back once we've passed something! Luckily, it's only one every now and again they get obsessed with, and I generally manage to dispose of it off the edge of a cliff quite quickly ... although the other day, I accidentally sent a filled poo bag flying with it. Oops. One to go and find in the spring....
Sounds very like Juno with her sticks. She will drop them and get a treat and then go back to pick it up again after we've moved on. I hate her having the stick but the game seems to be, as far as Juno is concerned, pick up stick/drop stick when asked/get treat or leave stick when asked/get treat and then in both instances go back for stick or find a new one. Recently I've changed tactics and now ask her what she's got at which point she prances around with the stick or ignore her having the stick. In either situation she drops the stick and loses interest in picking any more of them up which I'm putting down to my lack of interest in the stick.
Charlie is like this with sticks. OH swears that Charlie remembered where OH had hidden a stick a full year after OH stuck it deep in a bush.....I just ignore Charlie and the stick these days, to give any attention to the stick just makes it worse. I can see that's a problem with rocks. Huh. Dunno....
I had a trial this evening with DH picking the rock up as I walked on with the dogs. Shadow is too smart and immediately knew he had taken it, so I don't think that works as a tactic!
What a pain in the behind. Sounds kinda drastic but would muzzles be an option during a period of 'leave the rocks' training....?
I don't think we've got that far yet. I can easily get the rocks off them, I'm more concerned about the fact that Shadow in particular will run back for a rock he's previously left on cue. So I guess I need to work on "leave it" meaning "leave it forever". I can always manage it by putting him on lead for longer. That's good practice for him, anyway, if a little inconvenient due to terrain at times. Maybe I need to shape a "walk behind me" behaviour for narrow paths.
I have a 'behind' cue - it was dead easy to train. Strangely, Charlie learned it way before he was able to even walk on a loose lead and sometimes during his mad pulling phase I'll tell him to walk behind me for a bit to have a break! I have a narrow path in a garden, down a steep flight of steps too, and I was super consistent with Charlie down this way when he was a pup. Of course, it helped massively that there were walls either side down part of it, so he didn't have much choice but to stay behind me....
Juno has always naturally walked behind where there isn't much room, I think it's down to the narrow paths we walked on sometimes around town. She just tucks in behind my leg
Yes, Shadow does this a lot, too, when off lead if it's narrow. It would be handy to put it on cue, and he wouldn't do it on lead, either, unless trained. Lead means walk by my side or, if allowed to sniff, in front. Does the list of things to train ever get shorter?
Well, it's true that we shouldn't presume to know what our dogs find most rewarding. This morning, we took a nice long walk and Willow dug up a whole deer leg. Shoulder blade to foot, all intact, still hairy, bending in all directions and, to my mind, the most amazing find in the world, ever! She pranced around with it for a little bit, brought it to show me, dug a hole to put it in, dug it back up again. I let her have it for a while, then told her to drop it. She did, I threw her a cone and she walked off without a second glance at the leg. Shadow gave it a sniff and trotted away in apparent disgust. Rocks, yes. Deer legs, no. There you have it.
Wow, what a find!!! I'm not sure if the most amazing part is that Willow gave it up without a fuss or that Shadow didn't care about it!!
