Veterinary Question and Answer
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My dog, Spencer has recently taken up the habit of raiding the garbages in the house. He is 4 1/2 years old and hasn't ever had this habit prior to the last few months. There have not been any major changes in our home that would have caused this shift in behavior.
Please help! What can I do to stop this habit?
Hi,
I'm not sure what started this behaviour . . . maybe Spencer one day discovered that the garbage bin was an excellent source of goodies and was pleasantly surprised when there were endless refills. Thankfully you do not need to know what started this behaviour in order to stop it.
First of all, you want to put the garbage bins out of reach when you can't supervise Spencer. When you do have the time to supervise him, you want to catch him in the act when he starts sniffing the garbage. A stern "no" is usually sufficient to let a dog know that he is doing something bad. Keep up with this training until Spencer catches on. You need to be consistent with this training . . . this method won't work if you sometimes catch him in the act, sometimes not. He will be smart and raid the garbage when you're not looking. An alternative to this is to "booby trap" the garbage. Put a stack of (pop) cans containing some small pebbles near the garbage. Make it so that the cans will fall over if Spencer goes near them. The sound of these cans falling should teach Spencer that the garbage bin isn't a safe place to be.
Hopefully this helps,
good luck
drphilvegasvet
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Replying to:
My dog, Spencer has recently taken up the habit of raiding the garbages in the house. He is 4 1/2 years old and hasn't ever had this habit prior to the last few months. There have not been any major changes in our home that would have caused this shift in behavior.
Please help! What can I do to stop this habit?
this might be a drastict measure but sprinkle a little amnoa or bleach on top of the trash can or bag believe it or not but it does work
Thanks for the tips!! I will try the suggestions and hopefully will have the problem resolved soon!
