Fox poo!

[zippyandbungle]

Every walk my lab finds a patch, it's becoming a daily thing no matter where I walk. Lab 1 is a mud roller and wears a light coat which really helps with the post walk clean up but lab2 the poo roller has no protection as it's always on his neck or behind his ears.

Is there anyway to stop it? I'm thinking of sewing a dog version of the horse neck protector up as a last resort.

if you find a way, let me know. I have tried:

Screaming very very loudly at my lab when i see the shoulder dip.

Flinging him in any mass of water to try and get the stench off before getting in the car.

Supporting the tomato ketchup industry by applying liberally and often.

Crying.

Nothing has worked (Well the ketchup one does, but that is not the point).

Mine also like to roll in dead things. Seagulls, putrefying rabbits, the deader the better. And he eats horse manure. And he licks the water off cow pats.

Why do we put ourselves through this? They really are disgusting creatures

Oh - and I will buy a doggie neck protector from you when you set up your multi million pound industry!

Do it!! I'll buy one too!!

And me.

Is this just a countryside thing, by the way? Do urban foxes leave stealth poo bombs for townie dogs to roll in? [bitter]

I'd buy a neck protector too. My older boy has suddenly discovered the joys of rolling at the grand age of 9 years old. He's not fussy, fox poo, cow or horse poo, anything dead and rotting - the more disgusting the better.

I carry a packed of scrubby anti-bacterial wipes which at least gets us home without him spreading his stink onto my jeans, but then there's the whole tomato ketchup/vinegar palaver to try and remove the lingering stench.

My dog rolls in everything ,the only way I've found to stop him is that as soon as he rolls the walk is over ,it's back on lead and home and I tell him sternly that that is the reason why . He's a lovely dog , not what I consider bright but it does tend to stop him doing it again for a few walks .

Something to stop them eating everything would be good too...fox poo, rabbit poo, cat poo, horse poo...

I've not found ketchup that successful - Tresseme hair shampoo works well though! Although if it can remove that then heaven knows what it does to my hair!

Right that's it then, watch out for me on dragons den.

It would be my luck that they all have perfectly behaved pooches that never roll so can't see any market for it. WELL THEY'RE WRONG.

Seriously though it does make walking with them a chore, I spend just as long cleaning him after a walk as on it. And yes to dead things and horse poo. I'm off to patent my design. Watch this space.

Yelling at them and making a big deal of it has either reinforced the behaviour or made them hurry up and do it quick because they know it makes their human cross.

Work on a solid leave and recall cue. Long line and harness so they don't get the chance to do it.

Disgusting rolling is the only time my lad chooses not to recall to the whistle - I can see him almost wanting to come back, but the lure of the stench is just too much for him to bear. He only ever seems to do it when he's miles away from me too. Even when I get there I can't get him up, he's so euphoric, it's like the rolling gets him into a slightly altered state where the rest of the world just disappears.

Same with leave. He has a solid leave for absolutely everything else, but despite being totally ruled by his stomach, not even his favourite treats trump the opportunity to apply some designer perfume.

The other week he managed to find and roll in another dog's diarrhoea - then of course a few days later he came down with an upset stomach himself.

So infuriating, as it's a totally new behaviour for him - just hope he doesn't teach Pip to do it too - at the moment he just stands there watching him like he thinks he must have lost his mind.

I need to finds somewhere to walk him where there are lots of opportunities to roll, so I can actively work on it. It's a bit hard to do when the opportunities are sporadic and he can go multiple walks without finding anything to indulge himself in.

But for those of us less capable mortals, please hurry the production line along!

Oh god *Moosemama that's vile.

My small long haired dog tends to roll in fairly non smelly stuff: dead worms and their castings mainly, so I've been pretty lucky so far.

It started as more of a reaction on my part than any attempt at training her, but when she does it if I yell tell her in a firm voice to 'get up' she usually does and then comes trotting over for a reward. I suspect dead worms aren't as irresistible as other dogs' diarrhoea though.

Love the idea of the neck cover. However, when my dog rolls she tends to go in with the side of her head so gets most of the stuff at the side of her eyes. The neck cover would need to come much higher on a dog's head than on a horse, but definitely think there would be a market out there for something like that and a lot of the owners of rolling dogs would buy it; not sure dogs would approve though.

There's nothing for it then - it will have to be the whole hog:

Like this.

You could even do them in a range of snazzy fabrics.

Spot on.

That's the sort of thing I had in my mind's eye.

Up to you now Zippy.

Moosemama as designer, Zippy on production and the rest of us on sales?

Dial! Not just a countryside thing! Here in West London we have loads of foxes and the subsequent poo. My oldest DDog loves the stuff.

Where's the vomit emoticon when you need it?

I've trained my male dog to mark poo instead of rolling in it. He gets to sniff the sweet aroma but doesn't bring it home that way, and it's easier to teach an alternative behaviour than to ask them to leave it or recall from it.

My girl loves to roll in dead or stinky but particularly fix poo! If I see the shoulder going down in preparation of a roll and yell 'no rolling!' Then she'll stop, but if I'm a millisecond too late, or she's out of sight, that's it, another day for a bath! She goes in bath so often now that when we get in I just tell her 'bath' and she goes and gets in ready for me to wash her! Stinker!

Spicy how did you train that - clicker? Did you have to take him somewhere where there were lots of lovely poo options to get enough reinforcement.

Yep clicker. I clicked and rewarded him for sniffing and marking various things. Then when we came across poo and looked ready to roll I said his name with a treat in my hand and sure enough he had a go at peeing on it. There is a playing field near me that is covered in fox poo in summer when they eat the blackberries and get the trots. We went on lead round it with the clicker until he got it. I reinforce regularly and the fox poo shampoo has been untouched for months!

Ah, makes perfect sense. Now I just need somewhere that has lots of available poo, rather than just the occasional hidden/stealth poo!

The process you describe worked really well with Pip when he was a pup, to teach him not to eat sheep poo up on the hills, now he sees sheep poo and immediately looks at me for a treat. Have a feeling it's not going to be as easy with Lurcherboy and his aroma-therapy obsession.

I'll be first in line for dog rolling cover-up. We've had human poo (think runner's trots). Not once, but twice.

There are no words.