a spoiled dalmatian who thinks shes homeless

She eats out of the garbage.

What to do? My wife and I have started enforcing a no dogs allowed policy in the kitchen for both the Dal and the Whippet... but i think this makes the Dalmatian want to sneak in there even more as soon as we leave!

She stays out of the kitchen fine while we are with her, but on some days we can just be outside and she'll get into it. on others she won't... but it almost never fails that if we try to actually leave the house, with her in it, and garbage in the can under the sink... the garbage will be all over the kitchen when we get home. she actually has to open a door just to get to it!

A little background... She given to an older lady at age 2 (already fixed) when her owners left the country. the older lady died at age 4. She lived in the older ladies yard for 2 weeks (up until this point she NEVER went outside. I don't think she even pooped outside) until someone took her for free out of the newspaper. 2 weeks after that they put her in the paper again because she was too rough with their cat... so my wife and I picked her up and took her to our house, then we moved 2 weeks later to a farm. the poor dog. She was 77lbs, but now is very healthy at about 55lbs. She LOVES the outdoors and seems to have adjusted well over the last 8 months. now we just need to finish house breaking her!!! Her goal for age five? No more accidents, and laying off the garbage!

any advice on keeping her out of my garbage? TIA

Dustin07

one more quick note... we considered the idea of putting child locks on the doors to help keep her from getting under the sink, but i don't want her clawing at the wood cabinets...

I've had to put small mousetraps in mine to discourage Shiva. They really don't like those snappy, noisy little things that try to bite. (lol)

if there's no better way then we'll go ahead and try the moust traps. we had considered it before but the ones we have just seem so strong. I snapped one on my finger once and it really killed! (and i consider myself fairly 'tough' growing up on a farm, finding bloody wounds and not quite sure where i cut myself...lol)

on the other hand, it's nice to hear someone else considered the same idea for the problem-

thanks!
Dustin07

I hunted around until I found some small ones, but in all fairness, not only is Shiva very large - she'll probably mature to about a 160 pound female - but the Filas are pretty impervious to things that you'd think would normally be pretty painful. When she tore a 6" X 4" gash in her side it didn't seem to give her any pain at all; she was still cavorting and trying to play with us while we were trying to hold her hide together long enough to get her to the vet! I think it bothered me more than it did her! The first time Kharma got into the very, very hot electric fence (she was only 10 weeks old), she turned around and bit it twice before she ran and sat on my feet and whined about it.

There are some sprays that are supposed to put dogs off of things, but I don't know how well they'd work if there's some really lovely, fragrant old tuna cans or steak wrapping in the trash can!

Good luck! Let me know if you find something that works; Shiva will figure out the mousetraps before long . . .

well, so far so good. i haven't trusted her alone for an extended amount of time yet though.

I gently snapped the mouse trap on her paw so she would know what it does. then i clipped it to her lip hoping that she would feel a little bit of pain and understand more of what was happening. then i let it snap a handfull of times in front of her to give her an idea of the noise, speed, etc. I put it in the sink area under the cabinet where our garbage is while she watched... when she came into the kitchen i pulled it out and triggered it a handful of times to scare her out of the kitchen.

then she watched as i reloaded it next to the garbage again, and so far so good!

Could you move the trash up high for a couple of months? Or, empty it before you leave?

well we have an enclosed front porch that is just a few feet from the kitchen, so i've been keeping it out there. so far so good, every night i stop breathing when i get home till i do a quick sweep of the house and deam it clean! it's been amazing!

just can't figure out why they quit pooping though, unless they really did poop after the garbage was dug into-

Glad to hear things are working. It's comical when you stop and realize that the high point of your day is coming home and finding out the garbage is still where you left it . . .

lol, yes it is. but really the garbage is easy to clean (usually) we are more concerned when they leave us "hugs" and "presents" on the carpet ;-) and when they decide not to gift us with such love, as well as leaving the garbage alone, wow, what a day!