We had a perfectly trained 18 month old great dane... until we brought home the boston terrier puppy. Heffy, the dane, is a digger, so we gave her a specific place in the yard to go at it. We even have a way to close it off and she wouldn't dig at all if her "sandbox" wasn't available. Now Heffy and Gimlet are both digging in some other spots in the yard. They almost always do this when we are not home, so it is hard to correct them and redirect to the appropriate digging spot. We've tried putting poop in the holes and they just dig it up. Any suggestions?
MrTroyHouse
Digging isn't a behavioral issue generally, it's a stimulation issue, they are BORED, exercise them more regularly if you aren't, if you are work them harder. Tired stimulated dogs generally don't dig, Tobi did for a little bit, and we started upping his work, the same with my Husky that i had, he'd get a good 3-4 hours of exercise per day to stave the digging when he's been outside.
Other than what Tobi said, there is no way to stop the digging unless you are with the dogs. I suggest keeping the dogs inside when you aren't out with them. All those folk remedies like poop in the holes, mouse traps in the holes, etc just don't work.
Thanks for the advice! We will definitely try to up their activity level. We finally finished the puppy shots, so we are going to the dog park tonight.
If you deal with it now you can probably stop it from becoming too much of a habit. For now I'd never let them out unsupervised and if you need to keep them on a long line. As soon as they start to dig you can redirect them to the sandbox and I'd bet they'll quickly figure it out. Bury toys in the sand box too, it'll make it more fun. Once they've gone a good week without trying to dig anywhere else you are probably safe enough to let them out unsupervised again but I'd still keep an eye on them the first few times to make sure they're still behaving.
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