Need some help or advice. I have a 5 year old yellow lab, neutered male. He’s always a bit of a handful off the leash despite training. However, over the last couple of years, on walks and for sure off leash walks, he eats EVERYTHING!! Not just food, but sometimes random sh*t, and mostly whatever is in season, berries, long grass, random flowers and it keeps getting worse! Sometimes he’ll take off and zone right out, I can walk about 4-500 meters away from him and have to call multiple times for him to come back. It’s bevoming an incredible nuisance and I don’t know what to do. Help?
Hi @James81, welcome to the Forum from myself and Cassie who is 2. She's a bit of a poo eater, and in particular fallen apples, so I know a bit about how frustrating this can be. What sort of training do you do with him? I do loads of stuff with Cassie when out and about, I started off with lots of find it games, where you hide a tasty treat for them to seek out, in the undergrowth or on tree stumps etc. You can practice agility style techniques by getting them to jump or walk along a log. There are some log stacks up in my local woods, it's got now that Cass will wait by them to see if we are going to play. Also you can teach hand touch, so that it's good to be near you for a tasty reward. Also too you can do some training and then release them to something they like, in your case berries which are unlikely to harm him. Not the random s**t though! I find now that I enjoy doing all this with her and it often the object of our exercise rather than going from a to b. And also you could teach a scatter cue where you through a handful of kibble on the ground near you. And there is ping pong recall with sausages. Quite a lot really! @snowbunny @Beanwood might be along just now.
This may sound incredibly drastic, but when my new puppy (not a lab but a beagle) used to eat everything while on walks we put a muzzle on him to stop him. This meant he physically couldnt eat anything. The only downside is people thought he was aggressive. We only did it for a month or so and then slowly started taking it off on walks, but carried it with us, so if he tried to eat anything it went back on, he quickly got the message. Sometimes he still eats on walks, but it was nowhere near as bad as it used to be. Before the muzzle he ate some food on a walk once and he had to be rushed into the vets as he got sick from it, he also ate a stone and had to have surgery to remove it. Glad we did this though as it did work. Might not work for your dog but its worth a try.
Both great insights. I’ve done a lot of training with cash, and when there are treats involved he listens pretty well for the most part. Whenever we are on trails or by our local pond, even though treats are present, he runs off after the berries, sweet grass, plants and the occasional goose poop. He can be incredibly cunning...
Hi and welcome. I wouldn’t keep recalling him if he ignores you as it isn’t working and all you are doing is reinforcing that when you say something, he can ignore you. I would go back to basics with recall. I sed my daughter for this and we walked in opposite directions then called her back and forth with sausages as a reward. When I was alone, I would wait for her to come towards me and throw some treats around me and made a big fuss of her. I am lucky that she rarely eats anything on the ground - might be because she knows I have something better? Good luck and let us know how you get on.
Lucius is pretty good with eating off the floor, he usually leaves it when I tell him, but as a puppy I taught the leave it command early. I taught him to leave food off the floor, rewarding him with a tastier treat. it worked well with him. I don't let him off lead except at his doggy daycare which I volunteer at, he gets a good run on their 1/2 acre field and plays with his buddies.
