Expert: Have4Paws - 5/11/2009

Question
Can you help?  3 years ago, our family adopted a 6-month old Beagle from
the Humane Society.  She, for the most part, has been a nice dog with my 2
young children and behaves well in our household.  There is however one
problem that has been getting steadily worse...

She is a food stealer.  Since bringing her home, she would always steal my
kids food from their hands, from the table or even the kitchen counter.  That
was something we went to obedience training for but I was told that it
couldn't be trained.  It was just something we'd have to live with and work
around.  So, we have changed how we live... keeping her out of the kitchen or
crated whenever food was out.  (I should mention that we feed her 2 cups of
Nutro food a day, and her veterinarian still stays that she's too heavy and I
should feed less.  I cannot however, because that just increases the stealing).

Our dog will eat visitors over night bags to get to their medicines or toiletry
items... she has eaten through plastic bottles to get vitamins, medicines,
shavers and soap.  No matter how much I emphasize that they put these
things out of reach, she has climbed chairs and jumped to pull the bags off of  
hanging hooks when we leave the room.  This has been dangerous to her and
also frustrating for us.

Most lately, she has eaten a rotted carcus of a dead animal outside and then
proceeded to come into the house and throw it up, (bones, maggots and all)
on our carpeting in 5 places!  Yesterday, she found and ate an entire nest of
Duck eggs (to the horror of my kids and I)... it was enough to ruin my
Mothers day!  

We have had a complete blood work-up done recently that checked
everything including her thyroid and everything came back normal.  So it is
not some sort of metabolic problem.

Is this normal?  If so, is there anything that can be done to stop her?  She is
extremely devious in how she does these things... she will follow me out of  a
room to make sure that I'm busy and then run back into the kitchen to get
what she's after.  We crate her when we're eating but if I crate her every time
food is out, she would never be out of the cage.  Also, if she doesn't get the
food in the house, she is eating animals outside... Help!

Answer
Just wanted to add that it is never too late to teach an old dog new tricks. She CAN be rehabilitated with the proper training so don't give up!  :)

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Hi Carla, wow you definately have your hands full with your beagle girl. Since she has been checked by the vet this is a pure behavior issue.  Believe me it is not because she is hungry. Also I agree with the vet, 2 cups a day is a lot, it should be more like 1/3 to 1/2 cup twice a day. Beagles tend to be overweight and it greatly shortens their life, additionally they will eat till they explode if you let them. I can imagine your horror with the dead animals and duck eggs. I hope she has all her shots because she could pick something up from either.Remember that beagles are hunting dogs so they have a high prey instinct and love to seach things out.

This behavior is now so instilled in her that I do not feel it is something I can fix with an email. I think you need to have a trainer come in for a few sessions and work directly with you on curbing this continuous behavior, It will be well worth the price and I would suggest telling the trainer up front that you want to get this taken care of in a few sessions. This will of course also mean that you will have to work hard at whatever they tell you to do and everyone will need to be on board but it can be fixed. I am reluctant to give you suggestions not being there to observe because it could inadvertently make things worse so beware of others giving you a quick fix via the internet as well. I wish there was an easy way to handle this for you but in the best interests of everyone get a trainer to come to the house.

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