So our lil guy who isn't so lil anymore. 17months, 80lbs and full of energy, has been eating his nails to the quick whenever my fiancee goes to military training for a few days in a row. He doesn't like not having a routine at all. So we went to the vet on Friday and he is on an antibioitc and anti inflammatory for the pain. He chewed one of his back nails down so far it kept bleeding for days. He will not allow us to clip his nails and wouldn't let the groomer at his last visit. So his nails are longer but.... he is chewing them so bad! The vet thinks he has seperation anxiety. He is closest to my fiancee and with my him deploying in July we are worried about a year of stressing me the heck out even more now. The vet recommended Clomicalm. Anyone ever use this? We need to do something...I can't bear to watch him bleed and limp around cuz he chews his nails.
Also....if we leave him out of our sight for a minute he's stealing things...jackets, shoes, remotes, hairbrushes you name it and is destroying things at record speed. I can't even pee without having him getting in trouble. What gives? Twice now he has somehow managed to pull a jacket into his crate and shred it while I showered. (yes I know the kids are responsible just as much since they put them near his crate) But I'm seriously stressed out with his behavior.
Thanks guys!
hoping to educate the world one person at a time about the Alapaha Blue Blood Bulldog!
Our Dread went through a bit of a mischievious period, taking slippers and other clothing into the yard, and getting over excited whenever i returned home from work, that has sort of died down now since he has done a breeding.
He is a lot more dominant and protective since the breeding and now treats the garden as his domain and obviously he is now a lot bigger so we let him outside during most of the day and early evening which gives him plenty of time to burn off steam between walks. This wasn't so easy when he was small as he used to try and escape with our staffy and there was always the worry of him being stolen so i think he wasn's satisfied with his walks... good luck to anyone who tries to steel him now though lol
"a dog is for life not just for christmas"
I am not sure how much exercise your alapaha is getting but I do know give him a lot of exercise will cut down on a lot of this. Our dog boss would do the same thing but not to that extreme. So we then introduced a treadmill to him. And started him off slow at a med. walk for about 15-20 mins and gradually progressed it. , by the time I left for IRAQ he was doing about 45-1hr at a time and it would ware him out along with his daily walks. Now that I am gone he gets on average. 2hrs a day on the treadmill and loves it and not to mention the walk 2-3 times a day and playing with the kids. And it does not have to be anything expensive either; we went on craigslist and bought a used treadmill for like 75 dollars. We do have a small leash that we attached to the treadmill for him that keeps him from going too far back and we put a few bricks on the sides of the treadmill to keep him in the middle. My wife breaks up the time on the treadmill between walking and a slow run.... this will help keep them lean and build up muscle as well. They will start eating more. Boss went from 5-6 cups a day to about 6-7 cups of food a day and plenty of chew toys helps out a lot. kongs with a frozen treat in it.... works well. I really hope this works out for you.