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How to Stop a Begging Dog

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Use Your Begging Dog to Your Advantage

Begging Dog

Oh, begging dogs, it’s time to change your begging ways or we’ll use begging to our advantage. 🙂 Here are myths about begging dogs dispelled plus tips on preventing, fixing and using the behavior to your advantage.

Myth: People Food Causes Begging

This is a common myth. Many dog owners refrain from using bits of baked chicken or cheese as training rewards because they’re worried their dogs will start begging. Allow me to ease your mind. People food does not teach your dog to beg. Feeding food from your plate teaches dogs to beg. 🙂 By feeding food from your plate, your dog learns to hover around because he will eventually be rewarded with a few nibbles of your dinner.

How to Stop Your Dog’s Begging Behavior

  • Prevention: Don’t feed a dog from your plate. 🙂
  • Hardcore beggars:
    • As approaches, grab a luscious food stuffed toy for your dog to enjoy in his crate. This keeps him busy and happy while you enjoy your meal.
    • Tether your dog. If your dog is not crate trained, try tethering. Redirect his begging attention by providing a delicious food stuffed toy while he is tethered. Plus, the food stuffed toy teaches him to associate good things when tethered.

Using Begging to Your Advantage

Who can resist those pitiful brown eyes asking for a tiny morsel of your dinner? Use begging to your advantage! Remember the cues you learned during dog training class? Well, it’s time to practice them. 🙂

“Down-stay” is my favorite dog behavior to teach during meal times. As you’re sitting down to eat, ask your dog to “down” and “stay.” While eating, toss a few tidbits between his front legs. This ensures he remains lying down, but is still rewarded. Soon your dog will have a rock solid “down-stay.” Woot woot!

Take it a step further and teach your dog to “down-stay” from across the room. Toss tidbits across the room, so it lands near his front legs, which provides easy access plus you’re practicing your aim. If he begins creeping toward the dining table, tether him and continue to practice.

What cues do you practice during dinner time?

The Right Way To Do Dog Time Outs

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Time Out for Dogs

Puppy Time Out
Koufax73/Adobe Stock

Your dog is jumping on you. Immediately, you grab her collar and say “time out” and make a beeline for her crate. If she resists, you stuff her in the crate and close the door. After ignoring her for several minutes, you open the door and praise her. Does this sound familiar? While you might think you’re punishing your dog by putting her in her crate, this can actually confuse your dog.

Don’t Use Crates for Puppy Time Outs

Dog crates should not be used for punishment if a dog misbehaves. It’s different when you tell your child to go to his room because you can explain why and what you expected from him. With dogs, they’re left confused when you force them into their crates. You’re inadvertently teaching your dog to dislike his crate too.

If you’ve been using crates as a place for puppy time out, it’s not too late to change your dog’s perspective. Check out crate training tips for details on creating a crate oasis for your dog.

A More Effective Dog Time Out

Let’s think of time outs from a human perspective. What if your boss said “time out” and walked out of the room immediately after reading your latest report? What does it mean? Did he not like the report or was it something you did? What could you do differently?

“Time out,” and its equivalent “no,” are easy to say, but don’t really tell you what to do instead. When teaching your dog consequences, ignoring your dog for a few seconds is considered a “time out.” Ignoring a jumping dog until she chooses to do the right behavior (e.g. “sit”) is pretty darn effective. Rewarding your dog for good behavior is lost if you leave the room or put her in a crate. You’re missing out on a learning opportunity.

Use a Crate to Teach Self-Control

Dog crates are fabulous for teaching dogs self-control, which is important to teach puppies and adolescent dogs.

When a dog is out of control, doing zoomies behind the sofa or getting excited when guests arrive, grab a food stuffed toy and give your go-to-your-crate cue. This is different than a dog time out. Your dog is voluntarily going into her crate and being rewarded with a food stuffed toy for her good choice.

Now, your dog will settle down and chew on her toy, lowering her arousal rate. Teaching a dog to bring her arousal rate down is equivalent to taking a calming yoga breath to relax.

Once your dog is calm, simply open the crate. Most relaxed dogs stretch and then find a nice place to continue their snooze. Mission accomplished!

When do you use puppy time outs?

How to Give a Dog a Pill

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Easiest Way to Give Your Dog a Pill

How to Give a Dog a Pill
It’s not that simple. Learn the easiest ways to give your dog a pill. tonodiaz/Deposit Photos

Oi, having a sick dog is the pits and then having to give pills several times a day — I feel your pain. Recently, Sobek (my Rottweiler) has been sick and his tummy issue has lingered for days. I’ve had plenty of time to test the easiest ways to give dogs pills and I want to share my success!

Hide the Pill

Make it fun with lots of rewards or pill-giving will be you and your dog’s worse nightmare. It’s best to hide pills in strong smelling soft food, which hides the smell and taste of pills. My fav pill-hiding foods are:

  • Peanut butter
  • Cream cheese

Both foods have a low liquid consistency so they easily mold around pills while still tasting really good! During the day, reward your dog with random fingerfulls of peanut butter without hidden medication. By giving pill-free rewards, you’re lessening the chance she will not smell or taste the pill. Teaching positive associations to peanut butter ensures eager swallowing of pills.

Keep Pills Out of Dog’s Meals

Keep pill giving separate from meals. You don’t want your dog to associate meals with pills. This can cause her not to eat meals. I usually give meds right before meals, as they’re hungry and will gobble down their hidden meds.

Oh Oh, She Tasted the Meds

Don’t freak out. Pick up the pill and take a 10-minute break. If you immediately try to hide the broken pill in something else, your dog will refuse it. He knows what you’re up to. 🙂 Bring her outside to potty and try again using another flavored pill hider, such as cream cheese or canned pumpkin. This time, take a large glop and bury the pill from view. As your dog eats the pill glop, reward with lots of praise. Badabing! You did it!

VIDEO: Easiest Way to Give Your Dog a Pill

READ NEXT: Understanding Dog Nutrition

Dog Recipes for Food Stuffed Toys

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Food Stuffed Toy Recipes for Dogs

Dog Recipes

Food stuffed toys are awesome for all dogs! As a dog trainer, I’m constantly recommending food stuffed toys and decided to share my favorite and easy recipes. Choose from grain-free, raw food, sensitive tummy, waist-watchers style and prescription food ideas!

Grain-Free

  • Baked chicken (cut into small chunks)
  • Peas (cooked)
  • Blueberries (raw)

Place chicken chunks at the bottom of the food stuffed toy and layer with peas and blueberries. By adding the chicken at the bottom, you ensure your pooch eats his veggies first. 🙂

For food stuffed toy pros, seal the opening with honey or cream cheese and freeze overnight. For newbies, a few pieces of food spilling out is very encouraging and fun.

Raw Food

  • Ground beef
  • Raw honey
  • Cottage cheese (full fat)

Stuff ground beef (or preferred meat) first (bottom of toy). Then, alternate layers of cottage cheese and raw honey. If honey is too thin and oozes out of openings, substitute organic blackstrap molasses, as it’s a bit thicker.

Tip: Pack your dog’s regular meal into a puzzle. Voila!

Sensitive Tummy

Fiber and low-fat ingredients are best for sensitive tummies. I don’t recommend freezing before serving, as cold food can cause or aggravate digestive issues.

  • Canned pumpkin (or cooked fresh pumpkin)
  • Oatmeal (soaked overnight or cooked not instant)
  • Low or non-fat yogurt

Alternate between layers with pumpkin, oatmeal and yogurt. Seal openings with oatmeal (acts like glue).

Prescription Dog Food
Prescription food ideas.

Prescription Food

  • Purchase a few cans of your dog’s prescription diet. Using a butter knife, spread ½ can of food along the sides of food stuffed toy (Kongs work best for this recipe). The amount depends on size and weight of dog.

Check out Kong Wobbler for additional details, using puzzles for prescription food ideas.

Waist Watchers

  • Ground turkey (cooked and drained)
  • Cooked carrots (canned works well too, just rinse well to remove excess sodium)
  • Green beans (cooked or canned, rinsed and drained)

Alternate layers by hiding turkey within veggies so they’re not ignored. 🙂 If veggies are ignored, layer with a bit of non-fat yogurt.

Share your favorite food stuffed toys or puzzle recipes!

READ ALSO: Homemade Diets for Dogs

Dog Handling: Teaching Your Dog to Say “Ah”

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Body Handling Exercises

Teaching Your Dog to Open His Mouth
Mouth exercises are important for good health and behavior. membio/Deposit Photos

Check your dog’s mouth and teeth a couple of times a week. You’re looking for plaque buildup or lodged foreign bodies. It’s important to teach dog body handling exercises early on so follow these quick tips on teaching your dog to say “ah”!

Using a clicker and yummy treats, remember to click and treat as you’re touching, lifting or opening. Practice for 1-2 minutes with breaks in between. Usually, steps 1-9 take 2 or 3 short sessions to teach. If at anytime, your dog refuses to open his mouth, go back to steps 1-5 for several training sessions.

  1. Using your index finger, touch the side of your dog’s muzzle. Keep clicker away from your dog’s ear. If that’s not possible, use a verbal marker “yes” instead.
  2. Lift the corner of your dog’s lip.
  3. Lift the other corner of his lip.
  4. Place your index finger in his mouth.
  5. Pull back his lips for a second.
  6. Place one hand across his muzzle (keeping your fingers away from his eyes and not applying any pressure).
  7. Place hand under his muzzle.
  8. Using both hands, open front of dog’s mouth. Click or say “yes” as you’re opening his mouth. Keep it short. Open, click, let go of mouth and treat.
  9. Open mouth for half a second.
  10. Extend duration (time) of mouth. Open slowly in small steps until your dog is comfortable for 2-3 seconds.
  11. Add a cue: Before moving your hands to open his mouth, say “Mouth.” Then, proceed to open and take a peek inside!

Mouth Work Means Less “Mouthing” for Puppies Too

Mouth work (touching and massaging gums and muscles of the mouth) works wonders for mouthing or nipping puppies too! Plus, give it a go for easily excited adolescent dogs (ranging between 6-18 months old). You’ll be shocked at the calming results.

How does it work? Using T Touch (Tellington Touch Training), you’re teaching body awareness using calming touch work, which promotes relaxation. Puppies and adolescent dogs have a tough time calming themselves so any opportunity to teach self soothing is highly beneficial.  

Points to remember:

  • Move slowly. Each tiny circle should take half a second to complete.
  • Use light pressure just enough to lightly move skin around. T Touch is different than massage. You’re not kneading muscles. You’re promoting relaxation and body awareness.
  • Teething puppies’ mouths are sore between 4-6 months. Instead try using T Touch around his neck and shoulders. Once all teeth have erupted, begin mouth work again.

Tellington TTouch Mouthwork for Dogs

Here’s a great video demonstrating T Touch for mouth work. Notice how slow and soft her hands move around the dog’s mouth?

Have you taught mouth work yet? If so, how did it go?

Dog Training Nation is a dog training blog for pet owners and dog lovers. We cover a range of topics from puppy socialization tips to dog aggression to dog health. It is our hope you share our content to make the world a better place for dogs.

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