The food bandit has struck again!!!

[Corie & Floyd]

Ok so Floyd is now 4m old. and his fav past time is table and counter surfing.He does it more then my Great dane EVER did. This morning i made breakfast of a egg scramble, hash browns and bacon. I put my husbands (2 slices of bacon) plate and mine down on the table and turned around to get my 3 year olds plate.....i saw Floyd licking his chops a few feet from the table. We were sitting at the table and my husband asked if there was any more bacon...i told him i already gave him 2. "well i did not eat them" he said.....it was all to clear what had happened. Floyd had snatched his bacon from his plate & ate them. I have been very clear when we eat at the table he must remain out of the room..and he does good, as soon as u get up hes right there jumping up to see what is left. Last week i had a new stick of butter on the counter that he got half way through. I make sure the table is clean and the chairs r pushed in, and the counters remain clear as well. when he gets up i tell him "off" but he still does it. Any suggestions . i have tried but i can be right by his side all the time.

thanks for the help

[Ginny Nightingale]

Well...you probably won't like this--but what about crating him during meals--or use a gate. We have a very well-behaved 2 year old mini who can't reach the counters, but if there is food on a lower table she will find it in a second. I think they are just so smart--they don't do it to be bad--they are just clever enough to get by you! Since we can't watch them all the time, we have to fight fire with fire and keep them securely out of the room when food is available--
You can also train the dog to respond to a "leave it" command, but they will have to be older to be releiable and, again--you have to be there to tell them to leave it. You can put the food out in front of them and keep them restrained and tell them to "leave it". Reward them when they stay back without you holding them back. This takes a lot of repetition, but the dog may get it as they get older.

[Lynne Fowler-Oodles of Doodles]

One trick I read here in another discussion that worked for me is to put a couple of metal pots &/or pans on the counter and just one time my Jack knocked them down and heard all the racket they made...he has not done it again. I laughed but he ran for the hills.

[Ginny Nightingale]

I have also heard this--and you can put rocks in them too--small ones!

[Tegan]

We have the same problem, Kali is big and very food motivated. If anything gets left on the counter she just helps herself to it. We crate her during meal times and try not to leave anything out, but she still manages to find the odd thing worth going for. I hope people have some good suggestions, we'd like help with that too.

[Debbie and Thomas]

Hi, my doodle is now about 5 1/2 months old. I started this same discussion when he was maybe 4 months old. He was relentless about the kichen counters. At that time he could just reach the edge of the counter, now he is so big he can grab anything from the middle and back of these counters!!! I left a grocery bag of just a few pieces of garbage in the sink as I cleaned out the fridge yesterday. He could actually reach into the sink with his mouth and took off with a piece of wax paper that some feta cheese had been wrapped in. I chased him and that was probably wrong because he swallowed the piece of wax paperbefore I could get to him. Our old dog NEVER did this or maybe he couldn't reach, but in any event we are not used to this. Meals are a challenge in our house!! He is getting better though-I tried the booby trap with the cookie sheet loaded with safe cutlery. I hung it over the edge of the counter with a tasty piece of meat to temp him just behind it. He sniffed at it a bit but never touched it!! What to do??? I just leave the counters cleared and he leaves them alone. When I am in there cooking-he just lies about 2 feet from me but has stopped jumping up while I am cooking. But I know if I left food on there unsupervised, it would be gone in seconds. I have ordered a device which wil guard the counters or whatever else I need to protect. Many doodle owners on this site recommended this to me. With obedience training, he is in the intermediate level-but when it comes to food, he is NOT LISTENING to his commands. He is such a good boy, but when it comes to food, he just can't help himself. I don't want years of worrying about food being stolen-so we will try this device and see how it goes.

[Louise and Toby]

Yep, and if you don't like crating you could tether him out of reach. We had the same issue and I am the one who got trained to keep things off the counter. Toby even went after our zucchini, broiled with a little butter and Parmesan cheese, and a stick of butter once too. He still takes a peek to see if anything is left out. But it has really gotten better with time. He's 2 1/2 now.

[Deena Womack]

I used to think that Cali was not involved in counter surfing. However, last Saturday I had cleaned the house and had cleaned the counters with the cleaner which leaves them nice and shiny. I left for a couple of hours, came back home and I noticed the telltale "drool spots" on the counters, the same ones I see all over the kitchen floor. And there is only one someone that drools. So I am thinking my happy doodle girl wanted to check out whatever was on the counter. We are always real diligent not to leave anything out to tempt her when we leave so I don't know what would have encouraged her. It seems like as she becomes more comfortable, she is getting a bit more "ornery".

[Shelia]

We have 2 doodles - one is a counter surfer. She will steal anything left out- even "baggies" that never had food in them. I also tried the utensils on the cookie sheet, I tried Frank's Red Hot on a piece of bread-she seemed to like it. Nothing works. I gave up and got trained to not leave stuff out-I guess she can win this battle. Oh yeah- in response to other posts- she is also the one who eats poop! Gotta love em. : )

[Alice Bedard]

Thanks so much...it drives me crazy that Oliver, 7 months old, is counter surfing (love the term) as soon as I walk near our island. Happy that he is so smart that he knows his chances are good of nabbing something when I am doing meal prep but I can't stand that I am forever bumping him with my hip to get OFF. The kids also do their homework there so he is also grabbing pencils, homework books and the like... I have had a few envelopes chewed up. True, I guess, that sometimes the dog did eat your homework!! I will try tether him when doing meal prep but I also read about trying quick rewards if he stays off the counter and just follows me around the island. I will try that as well, constantly praising him and giving snacks for a few days when I am home with him in the kitchen!!
Thanks,
Alice in Alberta