PREVENTING AND FIXING FOOD GUARDING IN DOGS

Food is REALLY important to dogs. Left to their own devices most of their waking hours would be spent looking for and eating food, and they would spend the rest of their time sleeping and digesting food. Guarding food from other dogs, other animals, and even people is a natural dog behaviour, a survival tactic even. Unfortunately a very common problem for dog owners is that their dog growls if people approach him while he is eating, and this can escalate to snapping or biting. We need to teach our dogs that they don’t have to guard their food from us.

FOOD GUARDING FROM A DOG’S POINT OF VIEW

Snoopy loves mealtimes, he can’t wait for his dinner to come and he’s not planning on sharing! Up until now Snoopy’s people have put his food bowl down and left him to eat in peace but Snoopy’s people have just read that you should be able to take food away from your dog and as their baby is now a free ranging toddler they decide to see how ‘good’ Snoopy’s food manners are. Snoopy’s male owner strides over to the bowl while Snoopy is eating, Snoopy is a bit worried as this is unusual. The male owner reaches down and tries to take Snoopy’s bowl which makes Snoopy gobble his food down really fast, but he’d nearly finished anyway. The next day the male owner puts Snoopy’s food down, leaves the room, then walks back in. Snoopy is worried the male owner will take his food again so he stands over the bowl and gives a little growl. The male owner has read that he should hit Snoopy if he growls so he knows who is in charge so he smacks Snoopy on the nose and takes the food away. This happens most evenings for a few days, even the female owner has started taking his food away. Every time he is fed Snoopy gets more and more worried as his people not only steal his food, they hit him as well. Finally Snoopy is so worried that he growls and growls and when the female owner moves her hand to hit him he snaps at her. She doesn’t move quickly enough and his teeth sink into her hand. Snoopy didn’t mean to bite, just to scare her away from his food…but she’s straight on the phone to the vet, “Enough is enough,” she says, “next time it could be our toddler’s face!”

FIXING FOOD GUARDING IN DOGS

Luckily when Snoopy’s owner called the vet she was given the number of a COAPE behaviourist who agreed to come out and see Snoopy. They discussed how to keep the toddler safe while Snoopy learnt new food manners and how Snoopy’s owners would change their behaviour at feeding time. Various options were discussed and tried including hand feeding, scatter feeding, and adding tasty treats to the bowl. It took several weeks of patient practice but before long Snoopy began to trust his owners again. He stopped growling and would sit it they approached his bowl in the hope of getting an extra treat. Because food guarding can have serious consequences we aren’t going to tell you exactly how to fix it here. It is safer for a behaviourist using modern, dog fair techniques to visit and assess your dog. Our vet Vicky is a COAPE behaviourist and is happy to help with this as well as other behavioural issues.

(Snoopy isn’t a real case, he’s just an all too typical example!)

PREVENTING FOOD GUARDING IN DOGS

Prevention is always better than cure. What if Snoopy’s owners had done things differently when they brought him home?

Snoopy’s owners did lots of research before bringing him home, and they spoke to COAPE behaviourist about how to teach him manners around his food. The behaviourist told them they should use his food ration to help train him instead of using lots of treats. Snoopy’s owners held the bowl and when Snoopy did clever things like sitting, or peeing outside, or coming when they called they would feed him from their hands. Being a puppy Snoopy would occasionally get a bit excited and nip his owners when taking the food. When this happened he wasn’t offered any more until he calmed down; Snoopy soon learned to be gentle with his mouth. After a while Snoopy’s owners needed to use less food for training and Snoopy was allowed to eat by himself from the bowl more often. Sometimes they came over to his bowl and added tasty things like bits of chicken. Now when Snoopy sees people coming towards his bowl he steps back to give them lots of room to add treats.