Puppy eating soil etc

Graceland

I have a lab/collie pup over 4 months old. Everytime he is outside, he is always eating things in the garden - soil, plants, twigs etc. I just can't seem to get him out of the habit of this. Everytime I see him doing it, I shout at him and tell him it is bold. He runs away from what he is doing, but in no time, he is somewhere else in the garden doing it again.
Is this normal behaviour for a pup and will he grow out of it eventually. Has anyone had the same problem.
He is getting enough to eat, plenty of nutrients in his food so that isn't the problem.
Any help would be appreciated.

rhonin

Our Bichon pup does the same. Although it has got less frequent since we started feeding her James Wellbeloved food.

dolly13

Graceland wrote: »

I have a lab/collie pup over 4 months old. Everytime he is outside, he is always eating things in the garden - soil, plants, twigs etc. I just can't seem to get him out of the habit of this. Everytime I see him doing it, I shout at him and tell him it is bold. He runs away from what he is doing, but in no time, he is somewhere else in the garden doing it again.
Is this normal behaviour for a pup and will he grow out of it eventually. Has anyone had the same problem.
He is getting enough to eat, plenty of nutrients in his food so that isn't the problem.
Any help would be appreciated.

I think this is pretty normal for pups but if you are shouting at him for doing it it's not going to help matters. The dog sees you shouting at him as a reward - the dog cant understand English so it makes no difference to him if you are standing there shouting your bold or shouting your wonderful either way its attention and the dog will see it as positive attention. We have a collie x and it is amazing how quickly they get bored he is a year and a half now and if he is outside and doesnt have something to do he will try and dig his way to Australia. When you are putting him outside, if you haven't tried it before try giving him a kong (most pet shops sell them) buy a fairly big one mush his food up to a paste with boiling water and put it in the freezer overnight _ I normally put some bits of ham or bacon in it to make it even more exciting for him. It will take him a couple of hours to get the food out of it which will keep him occupied and deter him from pulling up the garden and if you catch him at it just ignore him hard and all as it is shouting at him will only encourage him to do it again because when he does it he gets attention.

Graceland

rhonin wrote: »

Our Bichon pup does the same. Although it has got less frequent since we started feeding her James Wellbeloved food.

At least I know it's just not my pup, lol

Graceland

dolly13 wrote: »

I think this is pretty normal for pups but if you are shouting at him for doing it it's not going to help matters. The dog sees you shouting at him as a reward - the dog cant understand English so it makes no difference to him if you are standing there shouting your bold or shouting your wonderful either way its attention and the dog will see it as positive attention. We have a collie x and it is amazing how quickly they get bored he is a year and a half now and if he is outside and doesnt have something to do he will try and dig his way to Australia. When you are putting him outside, if you haven't tried it before try giving him a kong (most pet shops sell them) buy a fairly big one mush his food up to a paste with boiling water and put it in the freezer overnight _ I normally put some bits of ham or bacon in it to make it even more exciting for him. It will take him a couple of hours to get the food out of it which will keep him occupied and deter him from pulling up the garden and if you catch him at it just ignore him hard and all as it is shouting at him will only encourage him to do it again because when he does it he gets attention.

You were saying that it is best not to shout at him as he wouldn't understand english and it wouldn't matter what you said to him. The thing is - he does understand what I'm saying. Maybe it is more the tone of my voice, but I have trained him to do different things by saying certain words to him, and he does know what I mean.
Do you think if I just ignored him, he would eventually grow out of eating the soil etc, the older he gets.
Thanks for the advice about the Kong, I might try that.

ahaaha

my fella has developed a taste for grass - and not the good kind :P
he's fed Hills Science Plan which he seems to love, so i don't think he's lacking anything - but he got v sick last night from eating too much of it cos he was outside playing most of the day with his cousins. im just hoping he'll link it to feeling sick with time!