Eating plants & flowers

[KellyDienaar]

Hey Adrienne! 

I'm new to the community, I have an 8-month old beagle called Nala. I've started the obedience 101 training and I'm also simultaneously trying to polish up her training, as she was already familiar with a couple of the mentioned tricks. Thankfully it's going relatively well, albeit slowly. I purchased your dog training course because our vet advised us to go to the dog school with her as he believed she was on her way to becoming a uncooperative dog.  Although I found he may have been exagerating a bit, I didn't want to ignore his advice and went looking for dog schools. Unfortunately, dog schools are way too expensive for me so I chose an online course instead.  

She still struggles with nipping, jumping, pulling on the leash, etc. However, we found that her compulsive need to ruin our plants and flowers on our terrace is most prominent (and frustrating). We shout "no" everytime she goes to eat them or simply destroy them, which most of the time she completely ignores up until we get closer to her, when she finally stops. We thought she would've learned by now as we've been very cosistent with correcting her in this area. She just doesn't seem to learn. And it's not that she simply doesn't understand "no", because when we say no when she's nipping she does stop (mostly). Please help!

 

 

[Adrienne]

Hi Kelly, 

Welcome to the forums!

I am glad your vet suggested training your dog, it's the best thing you can do for your dog and beagles benefit from extra guidance, although their powerful noses can get them sometimes in trouble 🙂 

I have a couple of questions:

What plants and flowers are you growing in your terrace?- Not being nosy 😉 just wondering whether there may be some toxic type of plants (some rather innocent looking flowers and plants can be harmful- just think that a sago palm can easily kill a dog)   

How much time does your beagle spend in the terrace?

Is she sent on the terrace to do something specific? Like it it her potty area? Do you send her there to get some fresh air?

Is your terrace very large?

Thanks for the extra details!

[KellyDienaar]

Thank you for the quick reply!

We have garden pink, echinacea, ornamental grass (she especially loves to eat this one) and 2 small cypress trees. We also grow some herbs such as rosemary, basil and thyme. We used to grow chives as well, but since I discovered she's not allowed to eat those, we removed them.

Side note: We also have peace lillies inside the house, which she occasionally also takes a bite out of.

She spends a lot of time on the terrace, as she has constant access to it. We always leave the window to the terrace open as this is her potty area. If we do close the window she's unable to signal to us she has to go outside to do her business and then does so inside the house. (Of course this will form a problem when winter arrives and the window will always be closed). Sometimes she also likes to go on the terrace to just lay in the sun. We also have a yard where we occasionally let her play but it doesn't adjoin to our house while the terrace does, so it was an easy choice to make the terrace her potty area so she can do her business whenever she has to.

Our terrace is rather large, it's 15,5ft by 21ft.

[Adrienne]

It sounds like most of the plants you mention growing in your terrace are not toxic to dogs. I am though not sure what flowers garden pink are exactly and certain types of cypress trees may be troublesome. When I am not sure about certain plants or flowers, I look up what the ASPCA has to say. They have an extensive list of toxic and non toxic plants that you can find here: https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/dogs-plant-list and here: https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/toxic-and-non-toxic-plants  Some varieties, you may need to look up their botanical name. 

However, the peace lilies you have in your home are another story. The ASPCA lists them as toxic https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/toxic-and-non-toxic-plants/peace-lily, so I would keep them out of reach, maybe in a high hanging basked or wall planter that is totally inaccessibile. 

In any case, even though our outdoor terrace plants may be not toxic, we surely don't want our lush gardens destroyed by our companions!

  Your terrace is quite large. This poses a challenge considering that you mention that your dog poses a "deaf ear" when you tell her "no" when she approaches the plants and you are at a distance. I don't think she's really voluntarily deciding to disobey, I think it's more a matter of how her powerful nose works.

You see, in beagles there's this phenomenon known as "one track mind."  In a past time, when beagles were mostly bred for hunting down hare, they were said to be on a "hot trail' when they were really focused on tracking smells. The "one track mind" refers to their predisposition for staying so focused on scent, so much so, that they find it difficult to concentrate on other things rather than the scent. Many times, beagles are therefore accused for being stubborn when in reality they are just too focused on tracking scent, especially on walks and outdoors. 

On top of this, a beagle's past required them to be quite independent thinkers, moving ahead of the hunters and just focusing on doing what they were bred for without much human directions. While the "one track mind" and independent thinking were premium qualities of this breed's past, they can put a dent in our modern lives where we desire our dogs to focus on us and please us. Fact is, to put it bluntly, certain dogs may care less about certain things, unless we can motivate them and prove them that listening to us can be potentially very rewarding. 

From your beagle's perspective, your terrace is therefore interesting and quite irresistible, with all the intriguing aromatic scents and flavors. Dogs don't have a green thumb nor do they understand the aesthetic aspects of gardening for our delight or our habit of growing herbs for our cuisine, so they come to think that any patch of growing things is there for their pleasure. They'll be instinctively drawn to it, especially if they spend a lot of time outdoors unsupervised and maybe get a little bored so they come to enjoy every little bit of mental stimulation they can get with the added bonus of a savory perk if they enjoy the taste. 

So what can we do to prevent access to plants in a terrace? Here are a few things that come to mind:

-Place your flowers and plants higher. Nowadays, there are many options when it comes to gardening. Variety is the spice of life. You can find hanging planters, raised beds, window boxes and wall planters. 

-Another option is to restrict access to only when you can supervise your dog, but since the terrace is her potty area,  I understand this may be difficult to do. 

- I suggest all dogs learn to "leave it." This can come handy in a variety of circumstances.  I feel that this command works better than "no" because it tells your dog to leave whatever she is trying to get and come to you for a  reward. Dogs do better when we tell them what we want them to do rather than just telling them to stop doing whatever we are doing,. You may have to practice this indoors with random items and them progress to where you have a solid response and then practice with distance. Here's how to train "leave it"

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/brain-training/obedience-101/take-leave-it/

Here's a thread on training leave it, with an accompanying video demo:

 

However, I want to point out, that when we train leave it, we will need to be in most cases present because, left to their own devices, dogs may come to make 'bad choices" either out of boredom or the fact that they may learn to leave things only when in our presence when we tell them to. Sure, there may be ways around this (like using a camera we can watch our dog while outdoors in the terrace and remind to "leave it' even if were't not physically there such as when using a Furbo camera) but that is quite a stretch. It also wouldn't be helpful to train a dog to leave it when we are around and let the dog do as she pleases when alone in the terrace as this inconsistency will just have a negative impact on our training. 

The easiest fix may be to therefore simply place chicken wire panels (or other type of barrier) around your plants. Out of reach, out of mind. I feel this may be the best option if you are unable to always supervise her when she's out going potty and enjoying some fresh air.  

-Last but not least, have your dog see the vet if there are chances she may be eating flowers and plants due to digestive issues or if she may have nutritional deficiency. Some dogs who get quite obsessed about eating greens and certain things, may have some underlying medical issue so always best to mention any odd eating habit to the vet to play it safe. 

I hope this helps!

Best,

Adrienne