Bobby the Westie needed a walk as his elderly owner could no longer meet his needs. Not only that, he needed me to administer ear medication on a regular basis but was very snappy and tried to bite anyone that put their hands near his face. His ears must have been very sore and infected as they were swollen inside. I had no idea that my Cinnamon pet would be this troublesome.
For my first visit I had to muzzle him with a soft make-shift muzzle out of his owners tights so I could give him his medication.
I had to find a better way to treat him and to keep my fingertips intact as this had to be done three times a week!
I set about conditioning him to accept a muzzle
- Bobby was free-fed so using his normal food as treats to get him to focus was not really going to work. It had to be chicken! I placed a piece at the bottom of a basket muzzle (these allow normal breathing and drinking) and I introduced it to him.
- I kept letting him eat chicken out of it for a few seconds until he began to shove his own nose into it for me.
- Then I fixed the strap for a few seconds at a time.
- He wasn’t bothered by this as long as I kept offering treats through the basket.
- Eventually he just let me put it on him no problems
- Here’s a great video of conditioning your dog to a muzzle
His favourite activity was going for a walk so this is precisely what happened immediately after I managed to administer ear medication. The quicker he allowed me to do this, the quicker he got out to walk. As his ears and eyes were getting better and as he was getting used to the treatment from me I no longer needed to use the muzzle. He actually looked forward to me stroking his head, eyes and ears. A different and maybe better approach could have been to use Chirag Patel’s The Bucket Game but I had no idea about those types of consent games all those years ago.
Since he had super-sensitive skin I bathed him at the vet’s recommendation once a week which he also disliked. So yet again, when it came to bath time, Bobby got to chomp on pieces of chicken as soon as it was over and also, weather permitting we’d go for a nice walk afterwards.
I would say it took a couple of months to see all the changes taking place but it was well worth it.
Seeing him fit and well was a joy. He trusted me and our relationship improved massively. He was much more playful and much healthier.
Bobby was also deaf! So I got him to learn a hand signal to come back to me when outside.
The North East needs volunteers for the Cinnamon Trust! If you would like to register for volunteering go and grab the Volunteer registration form