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Post by DivineOblivion19 on May 30, 2006 10:51:16 GMT -5
My parents have an uncovered garbage can in their room. We've never had a problem with dogs getting into it (which is rather surprising). But last year Cori decided she needed to get into it all the time. So I put a mouse trap in the can and once she sprung it she never went into that can again.
Is it wrong to use mouse traps??
I'm asking because now she's taken to stealing things off of the kitchen table. I just caught her in the act and yelled at her after I sneaked up on her. I never would have guessed that she was long enough to stretch all the way up to the table!!! But, she came close to death last week when she chewed up my $225 Oakley sunglasses. (And by close to death I mean I really wanted to kill her, but I just ignored her and cleaned up the mess. She knew I was pissed!).
So, since she seems to do this when we are not home I would like to correct the problem. I can always go back to crating her when we're gone but I'd rather not. Is it ok to plant a mouse trap on the table in order to correct her? Or is there a different way?
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Post by Laura on May 31, 2006 0:26:51 GMT -5
I personally don't have a problem using traps as an adversive, but I wouldn't use real mousetraps unless you loosen the spring on it first (a new, tightly wound one could very well take a toe off a paw, or break a bone in it if caught right). They sell Snappy Traps just for this purpose, just like a mousetrap, but larger and not such a snap to them . And going back to the crate may not be the worst thing either, I know how nervous Cori was, and her chewing objects may be a way for her to relieve stress when you aren't home, so crating may alleviate the anxiety as well as keep her alive in the future ;D.
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Post by Aussienot on May 31, 2006 21:19:32 GMT -5
I too have used mousetraps to keep a doberman out of the trash. She got caught once, then learned to drop toys into the can first to avoid the snap. So I used two traps, she used two toys, three traps, and things escalated as they always did when I got into a battle of wills with a dog that was smarter than me, and eventually I got a garbage can with a locking lid.
Now that I am older and more experienced, I tend to manage behavior that I can't train. If you do booby trap the table, and she stops that, what will she turn to next? Maybe ripping up the sofa? It's possible that she will have negative experience from table, and that will be the end of that. But my guess is that even if you do manage to fluke her out of that behavior, another one will take its place when she's unsupervised.
My choice would be to leave her in a crate or an X pen with a big bone to chew and something soft to sleep on.
And how well I remember the night I shut myself in the bathroom to keep from murdering Finn when he ripped my $800 leather coat. I shudda hung it up rather than leaving it on a table.
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Post by DivineOblivion19 on Jun 4, 2006 20:12:03 GMT -5
Thanks for the replies!
Aussie, I would generally agree with you, but I should explain little Cori just a bit further. ;D
She's not normally destuctive, she's actually a very good girl. But, I was a bad mom and left a newly baked bag of treats sitting on the edge of the table a couple months back. I would never have thought that she could reach it (since she'd never tried before). And the treats smelled so good and the smell was bursting through the bag and she decided she needed those treats. So now, she thinks she can get goodies off the table. Not only that, but I've realized that the bag that my glasses were in was similar to the treat bag I use in agility. Smooth move there...
I think that the negative reaction of the mousetrap would greatly discourage her (since she's pretty sensitive). Of course the trap isn't going to be full force, but it's enough to scare her away from stealing from the table.
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