# Is ecollar best for Poison Proofing?



## Patrick Murray (Mar 27, 2006)

I have some ideas on how I'd do it based on my recollection of some prior readings. 

My thought would be to have someone drop some hot dog in my back yard. I would walk my dog on a leash and prong and command him to leave it. We would walk by it an additional number of times...if he paid any interest in it he would be corrected on the prong. 

Or, should I be using the ecollar instead of the prong hear? My thought would be to use the trusty old prong for which my dog understands that any prong corrections come from me. As my dog has never before had an ecollar he may not associate an ecollar correction with me, at least not in the beginning, which leads me to the next step. 

I would put the ecollar on my dog and release him into my back yard. I would discreetly watch him, hidden behind a window in my house. I'm guessing he would approach the hot dog cautiously to investigate further. And when he got to within a few feet I would zap :idea: the crapola out of him! :mrgreen: 

And then I would repeat this process both in my yard and out and using different foods until there was no doubt that there is no way he would eat any food on the ground anywhere. 

Ok, stop laughing and calling me stupid and tell me what's wrong with this and the better approach. :wink:


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## Lou Castle (Apr 4, 2006)

Patrick Murray said:


> My thought would be to have someone drop some hot dog in my back yard. I would walk my dog on a leash and prong and command him to leave it. We would walk by it an additional number of times...if he paid any interest in it he would be corrected on the prong.


The problem with this is that because dogs are contextual learners your dog would probably learn not to eat the hot dogs when you were present but when you weren't he'd do as he pleased. If you're training this just for food refusal at competition then the leash and collar method would work just fine since you're going to be present during that competition. 

If you're doing this for the purpose of poison proofing I'll suggest that in reality there's little need for it and it's quite hard to train and just as hard to maintain. 



> I would put the ecollar on my dog and release him into my back yard. I would discreetly watch him, hidden behind a window in my house. I'm guessing he would approach the hot dog cautiously to investigate further. And when he got to within a few feet I would zap :idea: the crapola out of him! :mrgreen:


You could do it this way but you might get some fallout. He might become afraid of the back yard. If a butterfly happened to flit into his field of view, he might become afraid of butterflies. 

I'd suggest that you first train the dog, usually two behaviors are all that's necessary with the Ecollar. The \"how to\" is on my website in the articles section. This uses low level stim where the dog first feels it. It teaches the dog that when the stim starts he's wrong (in the sense that what he's doing isn't correct) and that when it stops, he's done the right thing. 

When this is clear to the dog you can use it at just slightly higher levels to train him to stay away from the hot dogs. Then you can proof at higher levels without fear of fallout.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Welcome Lou! Great to see you here.


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## David Frost (Mar 29, 2006)

Lou, good to see you. Once again, sage advice (which is expected from you) on the use of the e-collar.

DFrost


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## Patrick Murray (Mar 27, 2006)

Welcome and thank you Lou; I for one am glad to see you here! 8)


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## Lou Castle (Apr 4, 2006)

Thanks for the welcome! Good to see some familiar names here.


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## Scott Zettelmeyer (Apr 10, 2006)

+1 to Patrick's post. Good to see ya here, Lou! I was wondering if you'd pop in


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## Lou Castle (Apr 4, 2006)

Scott Zettelmeyer said:


> I was wondering if you'd pop in


Hi Scott. If you, or anyone else reading this knows of an Ecollar discussion going on somewhere, particularly if it's going south and I'm not there. Please drop me a note. I love to teach people how to use this tool.


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## ScottWhigham (Apr 15, 2006)

....and you do it very well, Lou. For the 935th time, I thank you for all of the advice, knowledge and time you've freely given to many over the years.

Scott


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## Guest (May 22, 2006)

Lou, do you think a more suspicious dog naturally avoids food from a stranger? While poisoning is not something I worry about excessively, I'd prefer my dogs not eat anything from strangers. I came home one day to find neighborhood kids in my yard feeding my pekingese grapes. My shepherd and my chihuahua give "geez, you're stupid" looks to anyone who tries to give them food. Just curious...and looking for ways that might even work just a little.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Jenni, I wont try and answer for Lou but a dog accepting food from strangers is totally different from dogs "finding" food in their own yards/runs. This would be more the case if someone is trying to poison a dog.


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## Lou Castle (Apr 4, 2006)

Jenni Williams said:


> Lou, do you think a more suspicious dog naturally avoids food from a stranger? While poisoning is not something I worry about excessively, I'd prefer my dogs not eat anything from strangers.


Probably, but if he's hungry enough or the treat smells good, he might take it. If the stranger wanted to poison your dog he'd probably toss something over your fence that contained the poison. If he hand fed it someone might see him handing it to the dog and he'd be ID'd. 



Jenni Williams said:


> I came home one day to find neighborhood kids in my yard feeding my pekingese grapes.


Careful. Grapes contain (now I've forgotten) but in large quantities they can be poisonous to dogs. It depends on dose and for a small dog like your Peke, it wouldn't take much. In large dosages you'll see vomiting, diarrhea and in severe cases, kidney failure. A couple once in a while probably won't hurt, but limit the quantities. I'm sure that the kids weren't being careful. 

http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_toxic_raisins.htm



Bob Scott said:


> Jenni, I wont try and answer for Lou


But you did, and I agree. LOL.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

:wink:


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## Guest (May 22, 2006)

Lou, I know grapes are bad, which is why it might have been nice if that cute little moron wouldn't eat every dang thing someone gave him. I asked her how many he had and she swore he only had 2, so I took my chances and he's fine. I told the kids not to feed them just about every toxic or potentially harmful thing I could think of, and they really mean well, so I don't worry too much. It's a lost cause to get them not to do it at all, so I thought if I'd just tell them what they COULD feed them it'd be my best bet. I guess they're not strangers though, are they? :| Overall, I'm lucky to live near the neighbors that I do. They look out for me and my pets, and NOTHING goes unnoticed...so I feel a little better about not checking my yard every time I come home. Those kids see EVERYTHING and report it to EVERYONE. It' s not the street for someone having an affair :lol: . I do know one psycho who would try to poison my dogs  if he knew where I lived, so I never leave them unattended for more than a few minutes while I go inside. Am I understanding that poison proofing sounds much better in theory?


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## Lou Castle (Apr 4, 2006)

Jenni Williams said:


> I asked her how many he had and she swore he only had 2


Moderately humorous aside. Almost every drunk driver I arrested swore he'd only had two beers. 



Jenni Williams said:


> Am I understanding that poison proofing sounds much better in theory?


Yes it's very difficult. Koehler recommended using a fence charger (VERY high level of stim) to rig it so that pieces of it stuck up randomly around the yard and leaving pieces of meat on it all the time. It has to be moved and the food has to be changed frequently. 

I wrote an article on this a few years back. It's on Dr. P's website. 

http://www.uwsp.edu/psych/dog/LA/castle2.htm


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## Guest (May 22, 2006)

Thanks Lou. I actually believe her that he only had 2 because she was very upset that she'd given him something bad. I told her that he'd need to go to the vet ASAP, and he'd know how many he had. So, when she maintained that he only had 2, I believed her. But, 2 is a good number when you're coming up w/a reasonable lie! :lol:


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Jenni Williams said:


> .......Those kids see EVERYTHING and report it to EVERYONE. ......


I have been involved in two extensive searches for missing dogs -- one stolen from the yard and one slipped out and picked up by someone (and essentially then stolen).

BOTH were recovered during door-to-door searches, both several days aftre the loss, by neighborhood kids "squealing" on the people who had the dog when the searchers were canvassing.

One case: This one was the dog who slipped out an opened gate and was "adopted" by a family several blocks away -- maybe 1/2 mile -- who didn't want to give him up. The search-team member had been to the house where the dog was and been lied to, and when she headed to the next house, the neighborhood kids told her the dog "was so there."

The other one (stolen) was found out when neighborhood kids biked over to the owner's house (from the fliers), en masse, to tell him that their neighbor had barking going on in the back yard "and didn't have a dog."

So you are so right about that! Never underestimate the observation powers of kids! :lol:


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