How do I get my Brittany to stop chewing!?

She is about 16 months old and will chew on anything and everything she can get her paws on. We kennel her when we can't watch her like when we are gone, so she doesn't get into trouble then but if I leave her in the kitchen for even 1 minute alone, she will find something and instantly rip it to shreds. Tonight I was in the basement with her and while I was distracted by the computer and FM she sneaked into the laundry room and chewed up my sons glove. She was only out of my sight for a couple of minutes.

She won't do it when I or anyone else is in the room with her or watching her but as soon as she can sneak out of sight she will find something and destroy it.

Is there anyway to rid her of this undesirable behavior? If I catch her in the act I scold her and take the object away but the problem is I rarely ever catch her in the act because if she sneaks away I usually call for her and she comes to me right away and I don't catch what she was doing until I enter the room that she was in later.

Overall she is a good dog and learned obedience very well and fast. I'm sure if there is a good way of teaching her not to chew that she will learn it in a short time but I am not sure how to do it.

I am far from an expert, but here is what we did with our block-headed bulldog. We used a check cord even in the house. That way the dog knew we had control. Eventually we did not even have the cc in our hand, but the dog thought we did. We then got to the point of using a short length of rope, and then to no rope at all. It was interesting to see a dog that started out knowing he was far enough away to not get caught change into a dog that knew we were always in control. I am not even sure if this is the right way to do it. I had some spare change, so there is my $.02

Erik

How much excercise does she get? A tired dog is a well behaved dog!!

I like the check cord idea, also a dog that gets enough exercise is better behaved in the house and a Britt needs at least an hour a day, maybe more.

My suggestion is when you take away something that she is not supposed to have, replace it with something she can chew on. I use the beef knuckles for my springers to chew on and they love them. I got 6 springers and none of them chew on something that they are not supposed to have. And they do get at least a hour of play time outside the kennel everyday.

My Britt just kind of quit chewing on everything at a little over 14 months old. One thing that worked for me, putting a little hot sauce on a couple of the things he liked to chew on the most. That stopped it pretty soon after that.

Our Shorthairs went through a bit of that.
What we did was always replace whatever they were chewing on by one of their chew toys and reinforced to them that their toy was theirs and the other thing was "u-uh" or whatever you use for "no".

It took awhile but they got the idea.
And don't fofrget the positive reinforcement when they grab one of their toys on their own.

Good luck.

I've got a four-month-old Brittany, so I feel your pain ... although alot of my issues right now are because he's teething.

I echo the exercise sentiment. It's like night and day with my litte guy. I get him a 30-45 walk when I get home and he's happy as heck, and when 8 rolls around, he'll typically curl up for a little nap. Without the walk, he's chewing, running, and creating general havoc until nine.

A bone he really likes will work, and I've used bitter apple on a couple things. More than anything though, when you tell him no, giving him something acceptable to chew on right after seems to work.

Dave,

I am glad to hear your pup is doing well. I would suggest more exercise. Pigs ears work well. You could also try soaking a rope knot in chicken broth, this will usually keep their attention a long time. If you want more training ideas just drop me an e-mail or give me call.

Take Care, Ben

Thanks Ben and others.

I know that she needs more exercise. Now that winter is here it's just a little harder to get outside and do the things that we used to do every night.

I'll try some of the other ideas posted here also, and hopefully one day she will no longer take an interest in chewing.

Ben, I might take you up on some training ideas as far as hunting training goes. She is really good about the obedience training and she gets better every day. She is really smart but I just haven't put her in a position to point a bird yet this year. She seems a little clueless in the field yet but I think she just needs to get some birds under her belt. It is my fault, I haven't had time this year to take her somewhere where there is a better chance of picking up a couple of birds, and the few birds we have seen were found by another dog that we were hunting with. The economy has me in a tight spot as far as doing much traveling and gamefarms are definitely out unless you know of something cheap. Christmas is coming soon you know!

I can all but forget about training at home, nothing but chew play, chew up some more stuff play some more, but away from home a whole different animal. My wife said once, why dont we just tie him here to this tree and come visit with him every now and then, He even listen;s to her while out in the field/woods LOL.

I did the NO followed by giving him something acceptable to chew on. I also had a small basket in the living room where I stored lots of different chew toys. I would put them in the basket and he soon caught on that he could go over and grab one when he wanted to chew on something. This seemed to work really well for me.

something I would suggest, coming from someone who has been in that situation is to A) make sure that the pup has plenty of chew toys of her own, B) make sure she gets plenty of excersise (if it's too cold to do it outside, play with her in the basement or around the house), C)if, and only if, you catch your pup in the act, scold her for it. If you scold her for it after the fact, she won't have any idea why she's getting scolded. At that age, they only have a short term memory span of 7-10 minutes.