I can't work out whether something is missing from his diet or whether he's just being a pain, but Whisky has started pulling pieces of wallpaper off the wall. As you can imagine, I'm suffering a bit of a sense of humour failure - it's one step forward, three steps back as far as decorating the house is concerned.
So I thought I would ask the experts (yes, you lot). Whisky's now about (he's a a rescue dog so no-one was completely sure) 18 months old so not really a puppy any more and should be beyond the chewing stage. He has chew toys and loves crunching bones and walnuts. So what is it about the wallpaper? He's made about 3 patches in various parts of the house so it can't be something irresistible about one wall. Unfortunately I rarely catch him at it so can't growl at him and tell him 'no'.
Does anyone have any ideas why, or know of a stinky deterrent of some sort? What should I do?
White vinegar! John, you're a genius - I have some in the kitchen (I use it as an all purpose green cleaner and germ basher). He's a bit of a walking bucket so I hope he doesn't develop a taste for it and expect the cod and chips to follow.
Oh Annie that's so worrying for you. One of my moggies contracted hepatitis just after we arrived here but the vet managed to treat it in time. I hope there is good news from the test results and treatment can be fast and effective. xx
So sorry to hear about your pup. Hepatitis is very difficult to deal with, it makes them feel very queezy. Praying for your pup. Have you tried white rice? Green beans are another suggestion.
Ok add to the bra episode that I was waiting to put it on when they snitched it, and set off down the garden..........yes I did give chase and yes I did grab a dressing gown before entertaining all the village, and yes I did end up in a giggling heap on the grass!
One day a neighbour asked me if one of them would be able to give blood to help her lab who had lukemia, so Meg went off to the vet and stood with her head on my shoulder for an hour with needles in both sides of her neck to give half a pint of blood which saved the other labs life. When we got home Nell, her twin, had been in the bin and found a tuna tin which may, or may not, have had a crumb left in it, and it was stuck on her tongue......there you have the character difference!!!so very different, but both so very delicious. At present I have a belgian shepherd who has hepatitis and is very sick, she has become annorexic and it is heart rending to see how thin she has become, I am hand feeding her chicken. She had a piece of her liver taken yesterday to be analysed as the hepatitis may be caused by cancer of the liver, she is only 3. It is so rough waiting for the analyses!
Number of reasons, boredom, playing, likes the taste of the paste i believe it tastes sweet but if it contains a fungicide that is highly toxic, try wiping the walls with white vinegar i dont think it smells like normal vinegar so your house wont smell like the village chippy it should put him off or he he may just ask for a large cod and chips, our Old English when two of them were pups between them they eat half the door of a oak kitchen unit i found my mobile in bits one day with the battery missing and had to rush both pups to the vets to be xrayed none had eaten it but as i told the vet if they had eaten the whole phone at least i could have rung and found out which one it was and saved the cost of the scan
I so wish you had all that on video somewhere Annie. I know it wouldn't have been funny for you at the time but I'm sitting here laughing out loud with some bizarre images in my head.
Oh goodness the list......... tuperware boxes by the dozen, butter.....I could never work out why the dish was always empty and, apparently, washed, till I caught Nell at it, my mobile, my glasses, a dozen geraniums, not eaten but de potted and the soil used as a skid pan, the matress of a sunlounger...the bits of mousse used as above, such fun and Oh lord the thought of it makes ma cringe the NEW boots of my girlfriend, and of course there was the day they took off down the garden with my new bra being ripped to pieces in the battle for ownership..........however they grew up, and dont do wicked things any more, well not often!!!
Ha ha ha, that made me laugh. Especially the 13 bagels and box of donuts - she'd look like Steve McQueen after all those boiled eggs! Maybe he doesn't like the colour choice left by the previous owners. I'm hoping it's a phase that he'll grow out of. Just seems a strange new 'trick' to have started - his diet's the same, playtime's the same. I'm trying to think if anything's changed recently.
He wants to update the house perhaps! I feel your pain!
My lab was a goat. She ate paper, socks,underwear, handiwipes,she would strip tennis balls rubber bands. She once ate antibiotics that were in the middle of my kitchen table. She could down a bag of cookies like a vacuum cleaner. She ate 13 bagels and a box of donuts. The list is endless but paper was her favorite and she was a sneak. There are many reasons for this behavior. They explore with their noses and mouths, they become bored, they want attention. However it could be a gastrc problem. If your dog was older and just started engaging in this behavior I would be suspicious and have a vet to evaluate him. At 18 months he is still a puppy and I doubt they will find anything. I have heard people use tobasco sauce to deter the behavior, but I wouldn’t recommend putting it on wallpaper!
Both dogs roam around the garden munching at the grass (as do the cats) so hopefully get enough roughage that way. They both also try to raid the cat litter tray if I'm not fast enough to remove anything offensive! I wonder if it's boredom (he loves to play ALL the time which I can't do) or he's sulking about something.
I have 2 labs who started to eat eachother poo when little........the said it was a lack of vit K, I said it was disgusting and had become a habit! I started putting two drops of tabasco on each poo they did, yep I had bottles in all my pockets, it worked. Dont see how you can paint you walls with tabasco though! Good luck do let us know how you get on, have to say my sister had a retriever who clean stripped the wallpaper in her hall and stairs one afternoon as he was fedup they had gone out without him, he pulled one corner and just kept reversing...........5 m lengths greeted them when they came in!
Hi Valerie, know nothing about dogs and even though I am tempted to make some quip about Distemper, I may have read somewhere that animals who are lacking roughage, may engage in this sort of behaviour.