Eating Sticks

[Nushie]

Over the last week or so Jager has been eating a lot of sticks from the garden. I would like to know why he does it.

His diet is EarthBorn small breed (he has been on this for about 12-18months) - no change in amount fed.

He gets 2 chicken necks each evening - no change

I started giving him a stuffed kong (stuffed with Beneful wet food mixed with Earthborn dry - small sized kong). He used to get them over summer and with the weather starting to fine up I decided to give them to him again (I hide them in the garden for him to find). His Earthborn and chicken necks didn't change in amount as usually I wait to see if he gains weight and then adjust the Earthborn to balance.

So a couple of days after starting to give him kongs again he started to bring sticks in from the garden and chewing them up. I thought it was weird but didn't think anything of it. This went on for a few days and so increased his chicken necks, thinking he may need more substance to help digest (I don't know, seemed logical at the time). Since increasing the chicken necks he has stopped eating sticks (I decreased some of the Earthborn as well).

Could it have been the introduction of a kong a day caused him to start eating sticks? Do you think the stick eating is related to his teeth or his belly??

We are going to the vet next week for his annual check up so will bring it up then. But I was just curious. Nothing else in his behaviour changed, no change to his poop (except the addition of some sticks during the days that he was eating them) but before and after are the same). His routine was the same, same exercise routine etc.

He is normally a big chewer and we have deer antlers and nylabones etc around the house which he just chooses what he wants to chew on. Stick chewing is new though.

Other options - I have done a lot of gardening over the past few weeks - the garden was out of control and was way overgrown - so I have cleared out a large section so maybe that has give him access to more sticks that were previously hidden by the garden = new chew toys?

Any ideas?

[persephone]

A lot of dogs chew sticks :) I used to have a shocker! Didn't eat them ..just used to chew them to shreds ...

[Ranga]

He chews them just because he can :)

Also, I've found with one of my dogs, if I've been gardening he likes to help ... So anything I've been handling ie branches, sticks, foliage etc have my scent on them and make them interesting for him to chew :)

[Dory the Doted One]

Willow went through a stick eating period of time. So much she earned the nickname of 'Woodchuck'. We would find poops in the yard that were more splinters than anything. We discouraged her when we could, took them off her when we could and other times she ate them before we knew she had them.

Judging by the lack of 'outdoors' that has come indoors recently, I'd say that phase of her life has past for the moment.

She didn't seem to have any ill effects.

I did wonder whether or not it was just some of her pre-season norties. She gets REALLY obnoxious before she comes into season.

[Dave-o]

Mine's addicted to sticks. For a while I tried weening her off them with a fake stick but never had any luck. I keep an eye on her as I don't want her choking on splinters.

[Nushie]

Thanks guys, just wanted to makes sure it wasn't some diet deficiency. He didn't seem to do it during the day (at least not inside) but at around 8pm he would race outside and grab a stick and bring it in, chew it too pieces all over the carpet and then go back and grab another and another and another etc until I cracked it and told him to go to bed.

Seems fine now, hopefully he is over this little obsession and I can go back to a (relatively) clean house.