I might have almost gotten myself bitten by Joey tonight. It's my fault, but now I know something we need to work on.
I got the dogs new bones today and gave them the bones this evening after dinner.
First off Joey kept trying to steal Cricket and Bamm's bones so I moved him over to the other side of the room and kept a close eye on him to keep him from stealing theirs.
He bit off a chunk of bone that concerned me. He had his head facing up with the bone at the back of his mouth trying to chew it and I got worried since a friend of mine just had to have major surgery on her dog that had swallowed a big piece of bone recently.
So... I went over to Joey to try to confiscate that piece and he tried to swallow it instead. I made the mistake of trying to get the bone from him before he could swallow it and he growled at me and kept the bone piece in the back of his mouth. I grabbed a different bone and tried to trade and he growled again and dropped the piece that was in his mouth when he air snapped at me.
Sooo... I did end up taking the bones away for now because I'm not ok with that. Cricket and Bamm will let me take a bone right out of their mouth. I was just trying to prevent him from swallowing that piece and hopefully prevent a possible obstruction.
So. I know I shouldn't have tried to reach for the bone like that and I really need to teach him a drop it badly after this.
Any other recommendations? There is probably going to be a new rule that he only gets chews and stuff in his crate from now on. He doesn't seem to be able to break chunks like that with antlers so only antlers for now while I work on teaching him a solid drop it cue.
We are both a little shook up right now. He went into his crate and was trembling for a bit I feel bad that he was trembling because of something I did, but for his safety I need to be able to take valuable things from him in situations like tonight so we have some work ahead of us.
I got the dogs new bones today and gave them the bones this evening after dinner.
First off Joey kept trying to steal Cricket and Bamm's bones so I moved him over to the other side of the room and kept a close eye on him to keep him from stealing theirs.
He bit off a chunk of bone that concerned me. He had his head facing up with the bone at the back of his mouth trying to chew it and I got worried since a friend of mine just had to have major surgery on her dog that had swallowed a big piece of bone recently.
So... I went over to Joey to try to confiscate that piece and he tried to swallow it instead. I made the mistake of trying to get the bone from him before he could swallow it and he growled at me and kept the bone piece in the back of his mouth. I grabbed a different bone and tried to trade and he growled again and dropped the piece that was in his mouth when he air snapped at me.
Sooo... I did end up taking the bones away for now because I'm not ok with that. Cricket and Bamm will let me take a bone right out of their mouth. I was just trying to prevent him from swallowing that piece and hopefully prevent a possible obstruction.
So. I know I shouldn't have tried to reach for the bone like that and I really need to teach him a drop it badly after this.
Any other recommendations? There is probably going to be a new rule that he only gets chews and stuff in his crate from now on. He doesn't seem to be able to break chunks like that with antlers so only antlers for now while I work on teaching him a solid drop it cue.
We are both a little shook up right now. He went into his crate and was trembling for a bit I feel bad that he was trembling because of something I did, but for his safety I need to be able to take valuable things from him in situations like tonight so we have some work ahead of us.