We crate Chachi at night. Woke up this morning to poop in his food bowl! So yucky. He plays with his poop. He also has a nibble every now and then. I pick up his poohs during the day, fast as I can..but at night...he is sneaky. We have gotten to where we call him Turdling.

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You dont mention how old your chi is, but a few pointers.

1)The crate should be just big enough for the dog to walk into, turn around and lay down during potty training (can be bigger once trained). If you have a bigger crate pack the end with a box or old blankets, anything you can to make it smaller. as small as they are you can even use a cardboard box to start with for a chi.

2) food should be fed at specific times. Not left for the dog to graze. Your chi will survive the night without food. Your dog will need to potty 5-20 minutes after eatting. if you dont know when they eat, you wont know when to take them out. pick up that food bowl.

3) take the dog out often, with young dogs, this may mean setting an alarm clock to get you up for a middle of the night potty break.

4) keep track of what your dog does and when. Most dogs will fowm a schedual and you will know to let them out at those times.

5) If your chi is eatting the poo, take some tabasco sauce when they are not looking, pour it on then leave the poo. the next 'nibble' will be unappitizing. the dogs do this to clean up (momma eats the babies poo to keep the area clean for them) make sure the area is clean at all times if its in thier sleeping/eatting area they just want the area clean. If it is outside pick up or hire a pooper scooper company.


hope this helps some.

Chachi eating own poop can be drawn by many things. Luck of nutrients, boredom or stress. It could be caused by desire to please you or hide "bad" thing as well (ie punishing for pooping).

You need to find a way to stop this behavior, since Chachi may ingest parasites and will put himself into indefinite loop of reinfecting himself over and over.

From what you described it Chachi just bored or stressed while you are not around. May be putting or finding favorite toys which he can play with while you are asleep or away could help him go through this.

Amazon sells over the counter remedies for this problem. Deter and Nasty Habit by Nutri Vet helped other dog owners to take care of this issue.

I would suggest you to - make sure that diet is complete and he is feed properly (that way he will stop eating it in case if he is hungry); - try to slow him down if he its too fast as well (again back to nutrients, large pebbles mixed with food may help); - provide enough stimulation;
If none of this works see if Amazon stuff will work.

Good luck.

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Dmitry

Thanks guys! I do feed at specific times so his bowl was empty last night when we went to bed. LOL It was like he put it in there as a prize for us.

I will try putting in a toy at night. He does play with his poop at night, so maybe he is bored.

Will add he doesn't eat poop all the time...he just takes a teensy tiny nibble of it every now and then.

He is 4 months, so I am hoping he will outgrow it.

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When you gotta go, you gotta go. lol He was trying to be neat for you. I have a few dogs that still can't make it through the night without peeing or pooing. I have potty pads in my bedroom. As for the playing and nibbling on the poo, try adding a little pineapple juice to his kibble each meal for two weeks. The pineapple juice will make the poo taste bad and should stop the behavior.

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Thank you Jan for the wonderful siggy!