Dogs and bird food

Question

Does anyone else have my problem? I would love to have one or two ground feeding stations for the blackbirds, dunnocks etc etc but my dog eats it all! Please don't suggest a protective cage because she would either break in or carry it off! She totally ignores the birds and they totally ignore her, by the way. She just likes bird food! All I can do at the moment is spread some meal worms in the flower pots and borders, but any fruit, fat, and even seed, gets eaten.

Cheers, Linda.

See my photos on Flickr

KatTai · Answer

My aunts dog would scrounge around the bird feeders, my old dog would take the tastier morsels put out for the birds, including a whole load of uncooked bacon rind on one occassion! I think the best is to catch her at it and stop her - call her over for a reward (food would probably work by the sounds of it!) or play, make a loud clapping noise/shake a bottle filled with nails to deter her The food reward is probably be the best one to start with. It will probably take time but she should learn to ignore the food that is out there but it has to be consistant and she can't be allowed to swipe a bit of food while no one is watching. Have you thought of trying putting a short fence around the feeding area (one of the border-type fences) so the feeder side is a no-go area for her? It might help to create a boundary that she should learn not to cross. So, say we are using a food reward (this does rely on the dog having good recall): 
 1. put out food for the birds 
 2. Allow dog to wander round garden 
 3. when dog goes to bird food area call back and immediately reward with treat (might be worth getting something extra tasty in such as cooked chicken, cheese, corned beef or something equally yummy) and ONLY give that type of treat as a reward for leaving the food. So that treat is an exclusive treat for not eating all the bird seed. 
 4. send dog away and repeat 
 5. reduce the frequence of the rewards to one every two returns and continue to reduce the frequency of treats until she leaves the bird food without needing a reward. 
 I would avoid leaving the dog out in the garden when you or someone else isn't there to watch and reward until she starts to ignore the bird feeding area otherwise it will spoil previous training.

Sparrow · Answer

Thanks everyone for your replies, especially KatTai with your free dog training lesson!!!!! Much appreciated. I think Lucybob has asked the right question - is it something about Boxers? It most certainly is. They are puppies until the day they die, unlike any other breed, and we should know. Lola is the latest in a long line of boxers owned, worked, and loved by us. I have had 50 continuous years of this breed. All they want to do is play, and this stealing tendancy is a form of play to them. It is a huge game and a lot of fun, partly attention seeking, and partly because they only have one brain cell. They are the clowns of the dog world, and it is part of their nature. Just as different bird species have different behaviour patterns, so do dogs. If she were a collie, a lab, a poodle or a German Shepherd, it might be different! 
 However, I will give KatTai's suggestions a go starting tomorrow ... but I'm not holding my breath!!!