Noise

[Nettle]

Had he been walked before you ate?

[Shalista]

yup, did both and had a good sniff around the whole barn

[Nettle]

Then he is a little bagel-scrounging pickle!! Don't we just love 'em.

[Shalista]

Good news! Bax went to the vets this morning and he got soem meds. I really stressed that I didn't want to hit the hardcore phamacuticles just yet so he's now just on Adaptil diffuser and the Composure chews. They wanted to use the Adaptil collar but didn't have on in bax's size and he mostly stays in my room anyway. they say the diffuser can take up to two weeks to work and composure chews need about an hour. I'll check back in in an hour

[Shalista]

Anyone worked with either the adaptile or composure before?
The adaptile is supposed to be the same pheromone of a lactating *****. I'm supposed to give it up to two weeks for it to work. 3 days in and def not noticing any change.
The composure is supposed to work within an hour. Its supposed to be taken once a day but up to three can be taken per day on an as needed basis. This one I'm on the fence as to whether it works or not? If it does it certainly doesn't last all day.

Moral of the story - still a very loud household. Bax is up to fourteen kongs per day and that's with me being out of the house eight hours at a time. (he still gets all his walks and play time and training when i get home) He's eating so many kongs i dont feed him dinner anymore. He still barks his head off constantly, running from one end of the house to the other barking and growling before coming to whine at me until another round of barking sets off.

[Shalista]

So the raw + adaptil seemed to be working at first but the past 2 days its been just as bad as before all this. The slightest thump sets him off for ages and nothing will distract him from it. even if i interrupt to give him a treat he starts barking as soon he's swallowed the treat. his whole body quivers. he's so tense. I just want him to relax but he just goes and goes. I don't care about the barking, i mean i feel like the root of it isnt that he barks but this TENSION and energy that just won't stop.

to put it in context, my mom is making sauce. every time it bubbles... he barks.... and barks... and barks.

[Shalista]

Contacted my trainer about finding a good behaviorist. Bax had me in tears. Every time i fed him a kong i'd get a few min of silence and then he'd finish and start barking again. He's easily as bad as he ever was before i started feeding raw. idk why the raw helped a little at first and now it's not but i just dont know what to do. I don't want to do a big diet change by taking him off of it again. We'll see what the behaviorist has to say.

[JudyN]

That's a shame I wonder if when you started feeding raw, you relaxed a little as you felt you were doing something and he responded to that? But suggesting that you need to be completely relaxed around him is easier said than done.

Also, I think you mentioned you had introduced liver and some other odds & ends? It could be worth going back to chicken, more chicken and nothing but chicken to see if that makes a difference.

[Shalista]

yeah i switched from plain chicken thigh meat to chicken drumstick meat + chicken drumstick bone + liver. i've been scaling back on the bone since i read some articles about a whole drumstick is a bit to much bone to eat every day. ill cut it and the liver and hope for the best.

[Horace's Mum]

Bone is a funny thing, has he got worse again since you cut down the bone content?
I know the recommended amounts of bone - and Horus eats 2-3 times that amount regularly. He needs it, it keeps his stomach busy so he doesn't get excess acid which causes him discomfort and in turn dramatically increases his stress. He changed dramatically when I switched him to raw, and I am sure it is because his stomach acid (long term stress created too much) had something to work on, dry or wet food just didn't give him anything to digest.
Even now, reading this, I have realised that because I need to put in an order and am consequently emptying the freezer I have run out of bony stuff that I use to top up as needed so he is on mince and even the mince with added bone is not enough - and he is whinging all the time as a result. Thanks for that, wonder how long it would have taken me to twig if I hadn't been writing to you!!

[Shalista]

I'm having to start up on the bone + liver again. No change in behavior with it gone and now he's started pooping basically water. Hopefully some bone will solid him up again.

[JudyN]

You might want to try adding the bone but not the liver - bone firms dogs up, liver does the opposite.

[Nettle]

You might want to try adding the bone but not the liver - bone firms dogs up, liver does the opposite.

Yes - this can make all the difference.

And be patient! Give it all a chance to adjust. It doesn't happen overnight.

[Shalista]

finally got a battle plan from the behaviorist. I'm supposed to kick him out of the room for 1 min every time he barks. I've been warned he might get worse before he gets better. If he doesn't improve within a couple of days i'm supposed to talk to my vet about getting meds for him.

....here we go!

[Nettle]

Crap advice.

You will be putting him from what he thinks is a safe area into an unsafe area. One minute is too long. And while I don't think s/he literally meant kick, the concept seems to be being rough with him.

Instead, YOU go out of the room, count to 10, go back in, if he barks again, out you go again. One correct bit of this advice (which I am sure you were given ages ago from on here too) is that it will get worse initially (look up 'extinction burst') and you have to factor your father into this too.