Hi all, Can anyone help. When I take my 4 month old puppy Riley out for her walk each day she loves to pick up cigarette ends and chew them. I'm forever on the alert for her picking up other things as well and have to stop every so often to take something out of her mouth.
Funny that as mine likes butt ends too. She also likes chewing gum but I guess its cos shes trying to kick the habit of smoking. Its just a age thing being young so just keep on his case and he will stop.
To stop Juno picking anything up I use our "leave'. A good strong Leave' is so useful in a multitude of situations both indoors and out Sowell worth the time to train.
I agree, train a strong 'leave' cue as when they are on or off lead you need to be able to get them to leave something that could be dangerous for them.
Leave It is a must, but not really enough because you have to see it first. I would strongly recommend training up a Drop It also.
A good "drop it" is also a brilliant training tool. I don't use it very much with Juno, if she is looking very interested in something or a clump of grass I use a "leave" as I prefer to pre-empt a pick up when ever possible.
Some puppies seem attracted to cigarette ends, but they usually grow out of it. Definitely don't allow her to swallow them - get them out of her mouth. If she eats enough of them she might have a toxic reaction.
I was trying to find an article on teaching 'leave it' for things on the ground but the closest I could get was this article on not getting on the sofa or not touching furniture. The same principles apply though....just imagine the article is talking about an object on the ground and not a piece of furniture http://www.thelabradorsite.com/training-your-labrador-not-to-touch-or-climb-on-things/
Ziggy does this - bin day in particular is horrendous and we have a problem with plastic forks from discarded takeaways. However he has very quickly picked up(!) both Leave It and Drop It. It's certainly far from perfect but I've found both quite easy to train because he's always stealing things (trainers/post/pens) at home and scavenging the pavements so there are plenty of varied opportunities to train and proof both.
