Bones

My dog, like probably most dogs, loves a good bone. The problem is that we can't actually give her anything in the shape of a bone. If we don't break it in half, or into pieces, or misshape it somehow so it no longer looks like a bone, she won't eat it. She will carry it around to different areas of the house and place it carefully into the corners. If allowed outside with it, it will immediately be buried.

The first time we gave her a hard rawhide bone we were surprised to watch her take it and walk to the far corner of the room and place it gently behind the couch. When we went to pick it up to give it to her again we noticed she was obviously stressed by us having 'found' it and quickly went to hide it in another area of the house. She would then sit away from it, so as not to draw attention to it, but would lay in a spot that she could still see the area where she had put it. Over the next few days we would hear the click-click-click of her nails as she walked slowly around the house in the middle of the night and the clank of the rawhide as it hit the ground in another spot.

Finally I took the rawhide and noticed that there was not a single tooth mark on it. It was as though we had just given it to her. I broke off a piece and handed it to her and she stared at me for a moment before chowing down on it as quickly as she could. So there we were- my breaking off piece by piece until it no longer looked like a bone and then my dog happily devouring the rest.