Grossed out by Soba

During our walks, Soba puts things in his mouth. He will walk down the street with the darn thing in his mouth. When he does this with sticks or leaves, he looks really cute. However, in the last few days, he had not so not good stuff in his mouth.

One time it was a dead fish. Now, I am not sure why there was a dead fish on the sidewalk. He smelled the fishy odor and snapped it up very quickly. I wrestled with him for it for about 20 minutes. Unfortunately, I was only able to get the body out of his mouth. He kept the head in his mouth until we got close to home, and then he decided that he wanted to eat it. He chewed the darn thing and then swallowed it. YUCK! Fortunately, he didn't get sick.

The other time is he found some dried up dog poo on the sidewalk. He thought it was dirt. He sniffed it and then determined it was ok. All of a sudden I see it in his mouth. I tried to entice him with a funny looking branch. It actually worked! He relinquish the nasty poo.

It amazes me that he puts these things in his mouth and tummy, but manages not to get sick. I guess that is a dog for you.

Happy Valentine's Day

My neighbor, Song, invited me and bunch of others over to decorate Valentine's Day cookies. So, I made two for my 2 boys! Wade already had his, but I'm giving Soba his today. The frosting on his cookie got rubbed off so it doesn't look so good. Hey! Like he is going to notice right? =)

Kuai Kuai

While growing up in Taiwan, Kuai Kuai was one of my favorite snacks. I found some in the Chinese grocery store today. As I was eating it, it brought back nostalgic memories. I decided to share some with Soba or rather I gave in to his begging.

Rounding up the kibbles

When Soba starts to lose interest in eating from his bowl, Wade & I would put little piles of kibbles around the house so he can "hunt" for his food. He seemed to like working for his food. So, we think anyways! =) I put some kibble on his pet bed this morning. This is what happened when I looked over. He was trying to round up his pile of kibble using his nose. I'm not really sure why!

Guarding

I got Soba a bully stick a few weeks ago, and he seemed to enjoy chewing it while he is outside. It is a considerable upgrade than the branch he was chewing on outside. Since he finished with his bully stick, I went to Petsmart to try to get him something similiar but small enough where he can finish chewing in an afternoon. So, I ended up getting him a bag of beef flavor raw hide.

We gave it to him last night while he was outside. He started to guard the raw hide. He didn't chew it but just stared at it to make sure no one gets near it. We can hear him growling at us through the glass door. So, I decided to do the following base on what I read and what our trainer said:

1) Trade something more valuable for the raw hide. I got some cheese from the fridge. I told him to sit and then gave him a small piece of cheese. While he ate the cheese, I took the raw hide in my hands then I handed back to him. This is to teach him that although we take it away from him we do give it back. It worked for a little bit but he was still guarding. He would push the raw hide close to him.

2) Since this didn't work, I decided to try what our trainer recommended which was to dump the entire bag of raw hide in front of him to show him that it is no big deal that there are alot more. But the reaction we got was he started to collect raw hide into pile and then proceed to guard them. This didn't quite work.

We left him outside for about 2 hours with the lights off. He was still guarding. Finally, Wade decided to bring him in but he went and got a broom. He used the broom to keep Soba away from him and then grab the raw hides. Soba was so vicious. Not only did he growl but he also bit at the broom. After he came in, he became his normal sweet self.

This is a huge problem! We need to help him break the cycle before he hurts someone. I guess back to the drawing board on how to do this.

Playtime with Roxie

Roxie is Josh and Laura's Labrador Retriever. She and Soba are good pals. Whenever they play together, they are like two crazy animals running around. We went to visit Roxie today. For the first time, it looks like Roxie finally pinned Soba down. Most of the time you find Soba on top of Roxie humping her. Yikes!

This is what happened to Soba after we got home from visiting Roxie. Looks like somebody had too much fun playing! There is a "dead" Shiba on the pet bed.