Pet Help

Puppies love to get up to mischief. Destroying furniture and shoes seems to come naturally to them. In this article I will teach you 5 simple things you can do to stop your puppy chewing for good.

The first thing you need to do is to get your dog checked out by a vet. Sometimes puppies and dogs chew due to underlying medical reason’s, we need to make sure that everything is ok with our dogs before proceeding with this training.

Chewing is one of the most important phases dogs go through, it shouldn’t be banned totally, all you should be trying to achieve is to teach your dog what can and what can’t be chewed. You also need to teach your dog about items that are dangerous to chew - such as power-cords etc.

The easiest way to teach your dog the items that can and can’t be chewed is by using the “No” command. Use it anytime your dog starts to chew on something that it shouldn’t. After telling your dog “No”, remove the item it was chewing. Should your dog resist giving you the item, squirt a little water in its face and then take the item.

Don’t rush up to get the object from your dog as it will think you are playing. Slowly walk to the dog and remove the object it’s chewing. For objects that can’t be moved, consider using a spray deterrent such as bitter apple spray.

The idea is not to destroy your dogs chewing aspirations. You should encourage it to chew on chew toys, bones and crunchy biscuits instead of your shoes.

A word of caution, some puppies and dogs may react aggressively when you try to remove their latest “chew toy’ - so act with caution to avoid a violent reaction.

The 5 suggestions I’ve mentioned above work extremely well when combined with a little patience and consistency. Give your dog a chance to learn these and your chewing problems will be over for good.