How To Wean Pets From Bad Habits
How To Wean Pets From Bad Habits

Video: How To Wean Pets From Bad Habits

Video: How To Wean Pets From Bad Habits
Video: A simple way to break a bad habit | Judson Brewer 2024, March
Anonim

I am often asked the question: how to wean a dog from gnawing master's things; hamsters, rats or ferrets - to grab onto such obviously inedible objects as rubber toys, electric wires, shoe soles and many other things that are not for gastronomic purposes. I usually answer: no way. It is impossible to "wean" an animal to do what its internal needs urge it to do. In this case, I mean a lack of certain substances, that is, hypovitaminosis or mineral imbalance.

dog in the trash
dog in the trash

Now for the owners of animals in terms of their feeding, if not a golden age, then something close to that (I say this with full responsibility, as a person who for years has been making up a vitamin-mineral mixture of more than 30 preparations for his dogs). Now everything is much simpler: you go to a pet store and buy ready-made pills for dogs (cats, rodents …). There is also a selection of premixes for farm animals.

But living organisms are complex and unpredictable systems, and failures still occur from time to time. They provoke the emergence of imbalances: diseases, including colds, the breeding season, the change of season, even more so - molting, stress, and to a very large extent - parasites. Mild forms of a lack of a particular substance are often reflected in the behavior of the animal.

I will try to consider the most typical cases.

Your pet licks concrete walls, drags in its mouth, licks or gnaws stones, and at the sight of a piece of chalk will not rest until it eats it. So do: dogs, horses, sometimes cats and ferrets. Well, everything is clear: lack of calcium. Swap out your regular vitamin and mineral supplements for those that are high in calcium and phosphorus. (Without phosphorus, calcium is not assimilated, even if it enters the body in abundance). As an emergency measure, you can feed, for example, calcium lactate for a week or two. Hypocalcemia increases: during pregnancy, lactation (feeding), growth, recovery from injuries (fractures). Remember! In rodents and rabbits, this disease develops rapidly and leads to the most deplorable consequences, especially during the breeding season, and it is more difficult to trace it than in other animals,therefore, their diet should always contain sufficient calcium and phosphorus.

Lethargy, drowsiness is sometimes accompanied by a deterioration in the quality of the coat or peeling of the skin. Typical: dogs, cats, ferrets, horses, goats, less often - rodents. Attention! These may be the first symptoms of iodine deficiency disease. Prescribe seaweed, and be sure to consult with your veterinarian: iodine deficiency is extremely dangerous!

Attempts to eat moldy food. Horses, goats, sheep, cows, rabbits, less often predators and rodents suffer from this. Diagnosis: acute protein deficiency. Increases in pregnant and lactating animals. Exit: the appointment of protein premixes. For farm animals living outside the city, in the summer it would be great to get mushrooms for food at least occasionally, provided that the owner understands them WELL and does not treat the goat with toadstool. It's a good idea to add protein foods - eggs, reverse.

dog with owner
dog with owner

Eating earth, clay, peat. It is characteristic, in my opinion, of all animals and speaks of a complex lack of micro - and macronutrients. Increase your daily supplement intake to the maximum allowed. If this does not give a noticeable effect after 1-2 weeks, change the manufacturer (but before that, do not forget to check if your supplements have expired). Such a significant imbalance is also said to be: an indomitable interest in garbage dumps, strong-smelling substances, including medicines, the desire to gnaw unsuitable objects, for example, cardboard boxes, eating charcoal, sawdust, ash, soap, and also: deterioration of the appearance and quality of wool, bad breath, frequent intestinal dysfunction, both constipation and diarrhea. Please note that most often such severe failures occur against the background of infection with worms, so do not forget to do tests and carry out adequate treatment. In general, for any animal that does not even go outside, I strongly recommend twice a year - in spring and autumn - to conduct a prophylactic course of anthelmintic drugs in accordance with the instructions.

In addition, in dogs, especially hunting breeds, interest in rotten food is quite normal. It may also be due to a lack of enzymes or intestinal microflora - the stomach or intestines are junk, ordinary food is poorly digested, and rotten meat is already half-digested by microorganisms. The only question is that these are not always friendly organisms …

Rats, for example, love soap, especially household soap.

Eating grass by dogs, cats, ferrets. Serves for mechanical cleaning of the stomach. An extremely healthy procedure, so put up with the greenish-foamy puddles that appear on the floor after this with a heap of grass in the center - nothing can empty the stomach of your cat or dog so well. In addition to green grass in summer, my cat used hay for the same purpose in winter. True, he did not begin to milk … In general, the interest of predators in the vegetarian menu is much higher than it is commonly believed. Experienced owners of dogs, cats and others will confirm and give a lot of examples of how their pets ate vegetables and fruits both raw and boiled with appetite. And nothing surprising. Their wild cousins do the same. When I was doing an internship in the Darwin Reserve, our group, observing the bird family, contemplated the "grazing"a fox in a raspberry tree. The predator was so carried away by sweet berries that she almost bumped into a man's nose …

Indomitable thirst. Unfortunately, it is often the first sign of illness, including diabetes. Even more often, this indicates a purulent inflammation of the uterus with a closed cervix - pyometra - immediately for ultrasound and for surgery!

People! You cannot feed the animals with sweets! Their pancreas is not designed for "unplanned" sugar and breaks down deplorably quickly. The amount of polysaccharides that they get from everyday food, including the same fruits, is more than enough for them.

overeating cat
overeating cat

Eating feces. Normal for rabbits and rodents. In other animals, it speaks of a strong mineral and vitamin imbalance or a deficiency in digestive enzymes.

Eating offspring. Rabbits and rodents "sin" the most. Possible reasons: vitamin and mineral imbalance, thirst (an elementary lack of water in the drinking bowl can cause the death of the offspring!), Too early motherhood. It is less common in cats and ferrets and indicates poor feeding.

In addition - the inability to preserve offspring. Nature provides for the preservation of the female in the name of the future, possibly more numerous offspring, and not this offspring, which, in case of danger, will almost certainly not only die itself, but also destroy the mother. That is why one should not frighten the giving birth and lactating female, take offspring once again, and so on.

"They are constantly gnawing on something, no matter what." Such complaints are sometimes heard from owners of dogs, cats, ferrets, rabbits. As for predators - their jaws simply "need" a load - evolution made them so, and it is necessary, in addition to the "nutritious" part of the diet, to provide them with firm and elastic food that needs to be gnawed. Many of these "nibbles" are now sold in pet stores. NEVER let your dog gnaw bones! Scratching and a dead liver - at least, or even a blockage in the intestines! Only huge, which cannot be gnawed, raw beef net! Rabbits, on the other hand, need solid objects to grind their teeth and if you don't provide your rabbit with branches, it will "decorate" the legs of your furniture.

Poor appetite, frequent refusals to eat. If disease is ruled out, this is the classic picture of an overfed animal. Believe me, there is nothing good about it. Urgent measures are needed: the introduction of fasting days, an increase in physical activity, a decrease in feeding rates, or even a switch to low-calorie feed.

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