Gibby again.......

I don't have an experience with the rice but we hope Gibby is feeling better soon and it's nothing serious.

willowchow

I don't have an experience with the rice but we hope Gibby is feeling better soon and it's nothing serious.

  Same for me; I hope Gibby's okay.Gibby, you have a great mom; stop worrying her like that!!!! Keep us posted; {{{{{{{{{{{hugs}}}}}}}}}}}}}}

 If it were me I would maybe let his system settle and not put anything more in it--but I'm not a vet.

I feel your pain and hope everything is OK.  Do you have an e-vet you can call for off hour stuff?

How's Gibby doing? 

JackieG

How's Gibby doing? 

Thanks for asking...and thanks to all of your replies.   The little bugger is fine. THANK GOODNESS!

Silly Sally you were right....although its not what I did.   I called the vet that I work for... but they were all busy so the girls said she would call back.... and it was too late when she did. You see...I was afraid he would try to eat something else so I wanted to get something in his stomach. I did give him the rice I had cooked and he didn't eat it. I knew for sure he wasn't feeling well then.   A little later I put his home cooked stuff- which was chicken, ground beef, rice and some veggies...but only about one cup...in his bowl and he ate it.  I added a little water to it just to get more liquid in him.   He layed down and went to sleep then.  Got back up and ate the cup of rice I put in after he ate the other stuff.  Then about 8:30 I fed him a cup of kibble and some more of the home cooked food...    Now I am back to feeding him normal.  I am so happy that he is fine...but what the heck am I going to do with him???  I am beginning to feel like a bad dog owner.  First he ate his kong...which was probably to get the stuff inside...  then he ate a bit of another hard rubber konk that I put food into...then last week it was the Chex Mix which I forgot was in a bag... which I left on the chair in the living room........now this.    We were gone for maybe 10 minutes tops.....and we wanted to go and "test"  him a bit to see what he would do if we just let him in the house for a while.......but I bet he crawled on that bed and saw those foam things and just ripped them up and ate them.  I can almost understand ripping them up.....but eating them??????

Oh...so after I fed him....the vet called back and said not to. OOps.!

Sorry -- I know it isn't necessarily a popular notion but I do NOT leave my dogs "out" when we're not here.  They all chew things -- particularly Luna and the pup.

Destruction doesn't phase me -- having them INGEST something does.  Dogs are dogs -- they're gonna chew, they're gonna PLAY< and they're gonna be blockheads.  So I prevent it. 

They stay in crates (sometimes LONG days) -- but when I get home they are healthy and haven't gotten hurt on something and they haven't ingested something that might obstruct them.

ONE surgery for obstruction ... just one ... is harder on a dog's system than crating them.  The resulting illness and stress to their system is BY FAR a greater problem for their bodies to handle than being crated. 

They are *DOGS* -- they are den animals.  If you train them to a crate it is no kind of 'punishment' -- it just plain keeps them safe.  If I get home and someone is sick *I KNOW* -- instantly.  Their crates are all gigundo -- and we have a tiny house.  But I'd far rather err on the side of caution -- I don't want to come home and find someone has eaten a six foot hole in a vellux blanket (Muffin did -- that was the LAST day I ever left a dog un-crated **ever**) and I had to worry about not only obstruction but internal bleeding for weeks.(because something may have shifted). 

Dyan -- stuff like foam rubber may not pass thru fast -- and it won't probably show up on an x-ray.  So you'll have to watch for signs of obstruction or partial obstruction for a long time.  Depending on the size of the pieces (or how much they did or didn't break down in the stomach/digestive tract).  And sponge foam can HOLD moisture and bacteria. 

Sorry -- no way would I leave any *pup* uncrated - not ever.  Not even for 5 minutes.  They can get into *enough* trouble while you're there watching them (hence Tink getting into chocolate on Christmas eve).  I can just feature her running around knocking off the TV or whatever she got herself caught in THIS time if I wasn't there).  Even an older, more settled dog can still get into trouble -- but  pup doesn't have a "brain" nor any sort of judgment at all for a long, long time. 

Tearing/shredding stuff like that is completely self-rewarding -- it's such a satisfying thing to tear and toss or swallow what's in your mouth.  And it's pretty impossible to re-assemble to see if it's 'all there'.

People somehow feel it's "mean" to crate them -- and for me?  I'm more apt to think it's less mean to limit their activity than to let them get into trouble they can't handle.  Does that make sense?

I hope everything passes through with no problem. Gibby, you are not to be trusted when it comes to choosing good things to eat!  I am not trusting of young dogs when we aren't watching, but I've still had dogs eat things they shouldn't right under my nose. LOL  Sending good vibes to Gibby and you.

calliecritturs

People somehow feel it's "mean" to crate them -- and for me?  I'm more apt to think it's less mean to limit their activity than to let them get into trouble they can't handle.  Does that make sense?

I dont' think its necessarily mean to crate a dog..... but if you remember from the time I got Gibby...he would not stay in a crate without crying and making himself sick........   we put him in it at 8 weeks.....and 5 or 6 weeks later he was still crying all night in it...and when we would put him in when we went away and come home the whole entire floor would be wet around the cage where he barked, cried and slobbered.   And I did everything everyone told me to as far as trying to crate train him except take the cage in different rooms. Its a giant cage for a giant dog. Its still up in the laundry room which is the same room that he eats in.   He still goes in it waiting for me to drop food in...as I tried that forever, along with other "tricks" to get him to like his crate.  He likes it when the door is open and it has food in it.  

I don't want to have a crated dog...I want him to guard my house...I want him to go to the door and bark when someone comes, I want him to be able to look outside the way all my other dogs did.  However that said...I wish that I had been able to crate him...to have him love his crate as some dogs do.  I tried!   In fact the last couple of times I crated him when we left for a while..he chewed up his blanket that was in the crate, the one that had been there from the day we got him.

But when we think of what Gibby ate that I worried about....one was a kong that had peanut butter in it....something I would have left in the crate had he been crated.  That was my first time I worried about him.  Of course the Chex Mix he ate with bag and twistie, was after we came home from being gone when he was a good boy and didnt' do anything wrong.  

This was the very first time we walked out of the house and didn't barricade him from the house....we usually gate him between the laundry room and my bedroom...where he gets on the bed and sleeps..sometimes with the bones and kongs that we leave him with.   This time..the bed was stripped...and we didn't put the big mattress pad on it to cover the pillows and spread......and he found the foam.   We has wanted to try to leave him without the hoopla that we usually go thru....to see if he would be alright and now we know the answer is NO! 

Not to underestimate the serious of dogs eating things because I am not but..  River has eaten so many things, our big dogs can get into so many things we can't imagine in advance and I crate River.  Just recently he ate his bed, the foam just like Gibby and threw it up.  I don't panic anymore when he eats his bed or foam providing he throws it up.  He doesn't eat his bed often he usually leaves it be but sometimes something during the day must make him anxious and he does.  erh..

luvmyswissy

Not to underestimate the serious of dogs eating things because I am not but..  River has eaten so many things, our big dogs can get into so many things we can't imagine in advance and I crate River.  Just recently he ate his bed, the foam just like Gibby and threw it up.  I don't panic anymore when he eats his bed or foam providing he throws it up.  He doesn't eat his bed often he usually leaves it be but sometimes something during the day must make him anxious and he does.  erh..

I feel the same way. If I did panic everytime, I'd have had a heart attack by now. Sassy recently went thru a period where she started ripping up her doggie bed. It wasn't obvious that she'd eaten any of it, but it was just in a mess each morning. I finally tossed it and gave her some thin blankets instead. Well, a few days later, she threw up some bile and brown fabric (the blanket) but she was/is fine. You'd think the experience would be awful enough that they wouldn't do it again, but we all know that's not true.

cakana

You'd think the experience would be awful enough that they wouldn't do it again, but we all know that's not true.

How true!  After Gibson threw up all that foam rubber stuff.....he was obviously feeling pretty awful for a couple of hours...and I kept telling him " do you see what you did to yourself by eating something that you were not supposed to eat?" Gee if only he knew what I was saying!

When I got Bubblegum, her breeder brought her to my house...and pointed to almost every thing in my house and said "she will tear that up...tear that up.... " at all the stuffies that were here ( Ollies ), throw pillows... everything. Then she told me not to put even a blanket in her crate because she will chew that up too.  Now I don't remember if she said EAT or just CHEW...but either way...Bubby was in the crate for only a few weeks.....and I let her out little at a time...and she never chewed up one thing in my house...not anything of mine or hers, not even a stuffie. 

Once Gibby chewed up his blanket when he was locked up in his crate... I knew that the only thing I could do was leave him in the crate with nothing in it...no toys or blankets...and I can't see it, even though I know that is the way he would have been the safest.  They say that most of the time a dog chews up things when you first walk out of the door...because they are mad. So I fill all kinds of real bones with peanut butter,,, dog snacks, hot dogs, cheese...and put them in the laundry room when we walk out the door. He drools while I do that because he has been watching me get those bones ready..and I make him SIT while I put them down...and then when I get ready to walk out I give him OK and he runs to them.   That day he ate that foam rubber...DH walked out and didn't prepare him anything because I was going to be home.  And I bet thats what got him mad....he had nothing to eat or fish food out of.

I bet there is not many people that crate their dog with nothing in the crate but the dog.

luvmyswissy

Not to underestimate the serious of dogs eating things because I am not but..  River has eaten so many things, our big dogs can get into so many things we can't imagine in advance and I crate River.  Just recently he ate his bed, the foam just like Gibby and threw it up.  I don't panic anymore when he eats his bed or foam providing he throws it up.  He doesn't eat his bed often he usually leaves it be but sometimes something during the day must make him anxious and he does.  erh..

I agree and disagree.  On the one hand, yes, Jack has eaten things that you would not believe and he is crated.  

However, the thought of him having eaten something does get me into a mild panic--it's probably because he has actually had obstruction surgery, and that was one of the single most frightening incidents of my life.  Even though it has almost been a year since the surgery, it *has* changed his GI tract.  He is much more sensitive than he used to be.  He used to have a GI tract of iron, and now stuff that Sally handles easily makes him ill.

sillysally

I agree and disagree.  On the one hand, yes, Jack has eaten things that you would not believe and he is crated.  

I know..... to keep them perfectly safe you must crate without anything in their crates at all.

But can you?  I dont' think I can. Years ago when Ollie ( my sons Dane,,,remember him?? ;)  was young he was crated and every once in a while Mike would get mad at him for chewing something and take everything out of his crate....here he was down their basement for the whole day in a cage with no blanket, no nothing.  I used to get so mad at Mike and threaten not to go over there to help him by letting Ollie out at lunchtime to pee.   It broke my heart.  I don't think Ollie was eating what he chewed..thats not why Mike did it. He was just saying "if he is going to chew up his stuff then he isn't going to have stuff to chew up!"  That must be the exact thoughts that Pam...Bubbys breeder had when she told me that Bubby would chew up anything stuffed, or blankets or things in her crated.  But she had more than one dog locked up in crates in her basement for the day as she was a breeder and had a daytime job. I guess she could not afford to care.

Its a ligitimate worry, a Great Dane on one of my GD forums died last year...it continually ate things in his crate..his bedding.  A piece of the bedding got lodged someplace where  they could not either get it out...or it damaged something...and it died.  Its a scary horrible thing.

I wish we knew what makes one dog chew things and not another.   What makes some eat what they are chewing and not another?  The one kong he ate half of,,we believe we lodged some food in there too tight and he was unable to get it out...so ate it until he got it.   He loves to just chew on stuffies.....until he can find a hole to get the stuffing out....so I would never let him have one of his many stuffies when we leave.  We watch him carefully when we are home and he plays with them.  But gee.....he has several dog beds in my house that he lays on....if he gets a hole in one of them ( which eventually they do ) he starts pulling the stuffing out of it! 

We leave Gibby ( barricaded between the laundry room where his crate and bowls are and the bedroom ) with real bones that have peanut butter, dog bisquits, hot dogs and cheese and kibble in them.  And we are watching an Extreme Kong that that we also put stuff in...making sure if he starts wearing down the rubber to not give it to him.  When we walk out,,I put all the toys in his crate..along with some kibble sprinkled around. He sits and WAITS for us to leave,,,drooling. As I am closing the door walking out and give him the "okay" he runs in the crate to eat.  When I come home most of the time the emptly things are still in the crate...occasionally he has one on my bed that me must have taken out...but he is usually sound asleep when we get home.

At this point,,,I would honestly be scared to death to lock him in that crate that he has always hated.  Besides him making himself sick backing and slobbering in it as he always has........I think with his strength now..he would try to get out and could damage himself.   The girl Dane that I almost got after Bubblegum died last April damaged herself in her crate, had to have surgery and therefore she was not kept in a crate.  I just pray that Gibson doesn't do anything to hurt himself. 

My mom got Jack a super durable dog bed for his crate--and so far *knock on wood* he has left it alone.  Honestly, it is the only thing in his crate that we have found that he will not tear up *knock on wood again.*

As far as him not liking his crate--could you try borrowing a Dane sized plastic sided airline style crate?  Or at least buy on from a store with a good return policey?  Feeling like he is covered might make a difference for him.  Sally dislikes being crated in an "open" crate, but covering it up makes her relax and feel much more secure.