Our first lab, now a very senior dog, chewed a bit of wood here and there, and usually spit it out. Only once had an issue with her barfing out a pile of wood chips. Our new pup, now just under 6 months is a different kettle of fish. Since we got her at 8 weeks, she's been relentless at grabbing anything possible into her mouth while on a walk - sticks, rocks, garbage, filthy dirty snow, dead hanging plants, etc. Literally everything that she can reach. It seems almost obsessive behaviour. That's not so bad when she's on leash because she'll drop it when I tell her to. However, when she's at the off-leash park, it's another story. Where I live, all the dog parks are filled with wood chips, not gravel. Unless she's 100% engaged in full on wrestling with her dog pals, she obsessively picks up chips and sticks and chews them. 80% of the time, she swallows it before I can get it away from her. It's become a very frustrating experience to take her to the park, because she is literally consumed with the act of consuming wood. It's getting to the point where she is now refusing to listen to commands, and won't drop a stick at the park and will try to chew it up and swallow it before she can be apprehended. She never seems to learn from the after-effects either. 2 months ago she developed a severe intestinal infection that required antibiotics to cure. Every night that she managed to eat wood during the day, we end up waking up to her retching up a pile of wood chips between 1-7am. It's endless, tiresome and totally frustrating. It looks like all of her puppy teeth are gone and the adults have come in (maybe not fully grown). She's a bad chewer in the house - 1000X worse than our old girl was at the same age. The pup has a dozen different chew toys from rubber rings, to Kongs, to antlers to nylabones, and they are all untouched. Instead she steals and/or chews legos, face masks, ping pong paddles, used tissues, bicycle chains (!), and all sorts of other stuff. She's a smart and very high energy dog, but she gets a ton of exercise and play with us and our kids. It can't be boredom chewing. She's also being fed well above age/size recommended levels because she has a lot of activity and is slim, so it's not because she's hungry. Short of putting a muzzle on her at the dog park, or more severe intervention, I'm at a loss as to what do to with this pup. It's not an option to walk her only - she really needs the high energy, hardcore wrestling and play with her dog friends to take the edge off and wear her out.
Hi TWK, What a frustrating situation. I don't think I can provide you with a complete solution here - it sounds like she might benefit from meeting with a force free trainer or behaviorist who can help you devise a strategy for overcoming this behavior. You might find these resources on our main site interesting though: Why Do Dogs Eat Dirt, Stones, And Trash - this is a general article about dogs eating things they shouldn't, why they do it, and how to stop it. 4 Fun Games To Play With Your Lab - this has some great ideas for providing your girl with mental stimulation. Overcoming boredom means more than just physical exercise for Labs - they're never properly tired until they've worked their brains hard as well! Training games are a brilliant way of achieving this. Finally, this article over on our Dogsnet site is all about choosing to use a muzzle, and how to muzzle train a dog. Using a muzzle as a short term solution to prevent her doing more physical harm to herself might be a wise idea. Again though, it might help you to talk things over with an behaviorist or trainer, so that this is just part of a bigger plan, not the complete solution. Good luck, and do let us know how you get on!
