My 4 month old has a thing for picking up and chewing on rocks. I realize puppies like to chew everything when they are teething. But she has a thousand chew toys, and I've given her carrots and ice cubes, but none is as satisfying to her as a rock. I do NOT want her to chew rocks for fear she will choke or break her incoming adult teeth. "Just keep her away from rocks" is not an answer. There are rocks everywhere in the world. There are rocks where we let her out to potty. There are rocks where we go walking and hiking. Even walking where you think there are no rocks won't stop her. She'll manage to find the smallest pebble on an otherwise clean sidewalk. So avoiding rocks is just not possible in the real world. We are working on "Leave it!" and "Drop it" but, since rocks are everywhere, "Leave it" is hard to enforce. She will usually drop it when told to but 2 feet down the path she manages to find and grab another one. Our walks are an endless game of "Leave it" and "Drop it" and become quite tiresome at times. Any advice short of muzzling her?
Hello! This is pretty normal; I've had it with all three of mine. Swapping each time worked for me and they all eventually grew out of it. Every now and again they'll pick up a rock still, but it's a non-event now to get them to leave it if they do show an interest. Shadow regressed a year or so ago and became a bit obsessed again, but it only lasted a couple of weeks and he gave up on them again.
Scooby had an ingrained rock habit when he came to us - he was about 10 years old He would seek out a large rock to carry. We were lucky that just giving him an alternative worked. When we went out he would always carry a Kong Safestix - he was happy to carry that everywhere and he didn't drop it in favour of a rock.
Rock chewing will pass as a phase but while your pup is in the midst of this annoying behavior you need to do your best to suppress it. Bowel obstruction surgery will run you thousands of dollars and if you don't have insurance to cover you may depending on finances have to make a tough decision between the big bill or the small one to put her down. Use what ever method works to get her to stop.
