WITH TALES OF NAUGHTY DOGS sure to be told around the country with the opening of the film "Marley and Me," I thought I'd recount a canine story of my own. Ventura County's own version of Marley, a yellow Labrador retriever named Trigger, really takes the cake - and he ingests everything else, too.
Trigger is the semi-beloved pet of the towheaded Tappin clan, a family blessed with a great capacity for forgiveness and a sense of humor. Beth Tappin has even written a short manuscript on her dog's many escapades.
The Oxnard family of four lives in a house set up with a system of baby gates and locks to deter their food-stealing animal. But this canine, who has been dubbed "Garbage Gut" by his veterinarian, knows no rules. He has yet to determine what is actually food.
Now I thought I had it bad the day my own dog ate the notebook containing all my Internet site passwords, but I really do feel sorry for the Tappins.
THE FAMILY FIRST NOTICED something was amiss with one particularly bad habit. Basic biology teaches us that what goes in must come out, but in Trigger's case what goes out goes back in too... "The first time we witnessed this habit," Beth Tappin said, "my only thought was, 'And this dog kissed my kids!' We read about this online and rushed to PetSmart to buy the products they suggested. The gentleman at the pet store said, 'Oh, don't worry, these tablets will make his business taste like ****, no wait, it must make it taste worse than that.' "
Later, the Tappins heard a comedian talking about a neighbor of his who had a dog with this same habit. "He would call his neighbor and ask to borrow his dog for a few hours to clean up his yard," Beth said. "I know it's gross, but I had to wonder if there was money to be made with Trigger."
But Trigger has a very varied palate. He has eaten two couches, acrylic paint on a paper plate (paint, plate and all), the entire contents of many Easter baskets and Halloween bags, cat food cans (whole can, pop top and all, chewed and swallowed), one four-pack of food dye on the area rug (very colorful dog and rug), entire batches of freshly made cookies, whole loaves of bread in their wrappers, cooking utensils, half a can of coffee, seven bottles of Terro ant killer (it apparently only kills ants), one bag of Bertie Botts Every-Flavored Jelly Beans (bag, drawstring and all), four or five soft-sided lunch boxes, two new bags of marshmallows (they came back up in much the same form), and the list goes on and on. He's made numerous runs in the pantry, eating everything from the third shelf down.
THE TAPPINS NEVER KNOW what they will find when they come home or awaken in the morning. "I find myself yelling, "No! No! No! Not the (fill in the blank)," Beth said. "Usually as soon as we get into the hallway you begin to see the problem. It begins with a few scraps of something.
"I am not always the calmest person in the face of disaster," Beth confessed. "I really don't like to admit this, but once I even said, 'I am going to kill you dog!' But that was after five quarts of home-made Albondigas soup was spilled all over the kitchen floor and I had carrots, peas, green beans, corn and meatballs from cabinet to cabinet and in between every mini-blind.
"It took 45 minutes and a shovel to clean that one up."
The rather portly yellow lab is amazingly nimble when leaping from nearby chairs to kitchen counters. "I have even seen him eyeing vegetables in a basket that we hung from the ceiling!" Beth said. One day in desperation the family tried to deter him from the counter by putting masking tape all along the edge with the sticky side out. "That just left us with a dog with eight yards of tape all over his front half," Beth said.
If you put him outside, he digs, roots through the compost bin and snacks on dead gophers and the aforementioned "business." He has gone through four metal trashcans.
SO THE TAPPINS HAVE DECIDED to view life with their soft and gentle-natured eating machine as a character-building experience. What have they learned?
1. A body can process way more than trace elements of aluminum.
2. When life gets you down, raiding junk food is very good.
3. Sometimes there is a very fine line between wanting to hug a pet and kill the pet.
4. Stay away from dead and/or rotting things. They rub off and make you smell bad, too.
5. Your family will still love you when you make a terrible mess of something.
My thanks to Beth for letting me borrow from her very funny manuscript. Happy holidays, everyone!
The powder in the food thing - that doesn't work. We tried it. Nothing is grosser than a dog.
Geez,
I thought I had it bad with my trash-raiding beagle. This just goes to show that the grass isn't always greener on the other side.
My younger sister had a version of Marley and Trigger named Maggie. She was a black lab and would eat anything and everything. She recently died at a ripe old age of 14 and they replaced her with ANOTHER black lab puppy. Initial indications are she will be even worse than her predeccesor.
It's all fun and laughs until you end up at the Emergency Vet. with an intestinal blockage! In the first six months we had our girl, she had two surgeries for blockages. You'd think we'd learn after the first one. . . but she eats common things like socks, washcloths, sponges, whatever she can find. Each time there were 3 items stuck in her intestines. If dogs don't pass them, they have to have surgery or they will die. It's no fun. She lives a more restricted life now and has a lot more supervision. I can't take another surgery!
From time to time we babysit a spaniel that loves socks and will find them no matter how well hidden/put away. She has had at least one surgery and I watch her like a hawk when she visits. I call her the $10K dog because I bet her owners have put at least that much into her.
I own Australian Shepherds - which can also be high maintenance - but nothing like labs or this little spaniel.
My son and family also have a "Trigger" garbage hound. She is part Australian Sheep dog and part whatever. They cannot leave anything in an unlocked cabinet. Our first clue was "Havi" slinking out of the kitchen with cake crumbs in her whiskers. Yes, she took the cake, along with the turkey (all of it) and most of the vegetables for the first Thanksgiving dinner she lived at their house. She almost didn't make it to Christmas. But is't been 5 years and aside from her periodic slinking after raiding something left out by mistake, she is a great loving dog indeed.
Hope this isnt taken the wrong way but a lot of this could be avoided by "Dog" Proofing your house.
I had to do this with my Beagle that I adopted. He used to be a chewing machine, he would get into the cupboard and eat everything he could get to, chew up and eat plastic containers and disembowel all his toys so I took him to basic training.
A lot of Triggers bad habits can be corrected thru training, also a lot of bad habits dogs have are a result of owner behaivor or lifestyle.
This doesnt indicate a bad situation just some things that you do that have a negative impact on your dogs behavior.
Your dog may be bored, need more walks or any other number of things that are resulting in this bad behavior.
The only way to find out is to talk to a dog trainer, they can usually pinpoint the cause of the negative behavior.
I still have to put my dog thru intermediate and advanvced training. The one main problem I have with him is he is a food comsuming unit. He is always wanting food.
Since he is a Beagle I have him on a strict diet as I had some issues of him being overweight, now he is at his target weight. He is a bundle of love, pretty well behaved (for me he is but not for my sister)
I adopted him from www.beaglesandbuddies.com in El monte a no kill animal shelter last Dec he is the best pup!
I would check up with some trainers on Triggers behavior they might be able to help you out or at least curb his trash compactor appetite.
I think they have consulted with a trainer, who said he needed more exercise.
My own dog loves to shred paper and is particularly troublesome on days when he hasn't had a walk because I have been too busy or it is raining outside.
He is not the best dog I have had, principally because he is so unfriendly. He is extremely devoted to me and tolerates everyone else in the family. He hates most strangers and even dislikes other dogs. He's a scary watchdog. I have considered a trainer to work on socializing him more.
I tell the Tappins to count what blessings they have because Trigger is very good with kids. Mine is not.