Rolling. Aaaaaargh.

[CalamityKate]

She's obsessed with rolling in fox crap. It stinks.

Short of keeping her by me/onlead all the time, what can I do??

She'll walk by me if I ask her to. Her recall is OK. She'll play with me and her tuggie. But at times I do want her to be able to run about independently and sniff and explore and just be a dog and do doggy things. She's so bloody QUICK - sniffsniffsniff "Oooh POO!!!" rollrollroll.

Her "Leave It" is OK EXCEPT for poo. NOTHING matches the allure of grinding poo into her neck and shoulders and back.

Any advice?

Can't help with the rolling, but can with the washing! Use tomato ketchup as it neutralises the smell - not perfectly, but best thing I know!

I have white dogs, and a field and garden used heavily by foxes, so it looks like I've massacred the dogs on a refular basis

Well Kate [rolls eyes] you are just going to have to make yourself more exciting and rewarding than fox poo aren't you!!! Doesn't sound hard

I wish I bloody knew. I reckon I have a 0.7 second window of recall opportunity while the sniff is still going on but before a full dropped shoulder/roll commitment decision has been reached. Once the legs are pointing heavenward I do not believe even a circus of liver juggling squirrels could distract my dog from shit utopia.

Foul beasts.

Does your dog swim Kate? I can rein in my disgust usually as I can give the revolting creature a good swim before we come home.

Other than that the new cotton fresh febreeze candle is your friend.

A dog coat?

I wish I knew the answer to this one. [eyes stinky hound]

My younger dog is shameless in his rolling, and I can normally catch him when he does the sniffing, shoulder drop move. Even if I drag him off the offending poo, he'll carry on wriggling around in glee on his back, just for the feel of it. The older dog, though, despite her ladylike demeanour, is a complete tart for fox poo and will lag behind until I'm just too far away to stop her. Then I'll glance back and see four stumpy legs kicking blissfully in the air as she squirms about in the filth.

I have an outdoor hose. I am saving up for a full-scale motorised dogwash with rotating brushes and tomato sauce spray.

Yep Slubber - that's it! The 0.7 window between sniffing and the shoulder drop... that's it exactly! Even if I'm lucky enough to be in time to bellow "LEEEE..." it's too late.

Yes, she swims and yes, I generally make darn sure she has a swim after, but then what normally happens is she finds another stinking sloppy pile of poo on the way back and rolls in that, and being already damp it works its way even deeper into her fur

Foul foul dog.

In the summer it's not too bad - we've got a hose outside and she gets banished until the sun's dried her but much as it annoys me, I can't bring myself to hose her when it's cold.

I might look around at dog coats... maybe a lightweight waterproof one... hmm...

.... except, thinking about it, she generally gets it ground into her ears and neck too, so I'd need a full body coat, including a balaclava.

Like Wildfig says, she seems to enjoy rolling in general. Sometimes of an evening, she'll throw herself on her back and wriggle and roll on the rug like some demented breakdancer. The addition of something stenchful is just, it seems, an added bonus

It must really tick a primitive instinct pleasure box, alongside eating herbivore poo.

What I want to know is what on earth are the foxes all eating to produce such vicious smelling turds?
AND
Why does my dog want to disguise herself with the smell of another carnivore's poo? How does that work then, predator speaking. Surely she should disguise herself olfactoraly as a meadow or a cow?

Really good points Slubber!

I wouldn't think foxes eat much differently to dogs, really - especially dogs on raw.

It's sort of fishy-ish, isn't it, fox poo?

Oh, let the dog roll. It is just a special doggy Dior perfume. Deer poo is very alluring too.

When my dog has just been bathed, she loves to find lovely smells to roll in The joy and happiness in her eyes is worth the stink. And anyway, I have done the military smell immersion course with dh around anyway

fishy yes, and something else sort of bitter too like dandelions but MUCH worse. I dunno, it's like being punched in the face with an evil rancid triffid dandelion who has been working on a trawler.

And I have found somehow the smell seeps into soft furnishings, even if the soft furnishing have not come into contact with the despicable shitty hound. I swear my duvet smelt of fox poo the other day and this is in a bedroom on an upper floor where dogs are very much verboten.

Why is fox poo so attractive to them ? Is it the equivalent to cats and catnip ?

I make sure my lab goes for a swim if she rolls in it even if I have to make a special journey to the river in order to do so.

She once rolled in the stuff when we went to my MIL - after a long car journey we arrived and I said I would take dog for quick walk, on way back , yards from house she did it , not a bloody river in sight !

I have unfortunately great experience in removing smells from dogs, in our case it's skunks.

Recommended de-smellifying solution:
dogs.about.com/od/caringfordogsandpuppies/ht/deskunking.htm
(No guarantee that it will work on fox poo, but since fox poo and skunk spray are both organic, might be worth a try?)

And the joys of badger poo! No advice but remember to wash the collar too if it is a nylon/textile one. I keep diluted disinfectant in the boot of the car.