Herbal Dog Tea

A beautiful & fragrant blend of Nettle, Lemon Balm, Chamomile, Mint, Rosehips, Passion flower, Calendula, Rose, Cornflower, Fennel seed

Why the ingredients were specifically chosen for this tea:

Nettle- rich in minerals and contains natural antihistamine properties

Lemon Balm – relaxing & calming

Mint – Refreshing and uplifting and digestive stimulant

Chamomile – calming to body and mind

Rosehips – rich in antioxidants and vitamin C

Calendula – soothing for the skin and has anti-inflammatory effects

Fennel seed – very good for the digestive system

A few ideas of how to use:

The herbs can be used to make a tea which when cool, offered as a refreshing drink.

Make a strong brew and when cool, transfer into shaped moulds and place in the freezer

Add the tea directly into your dogs meals

If you feed vegetables, add to your dogs veg or blend with raw vegetables and freeze in ice cube trays for later use.

Stir some of the tea and a sprinkling of the herbs into natural yoghurt, place into a shallow tray, level out and then pop in the freezer for a couple of hours. You`ll then have a dog friendly ice cream treat for a hot, sunny day.

Once the tea has been made, the remaining herbs, which are now rehydrated, can be placed into your dogs meals or used in treat recipes

Here`s to many relaxing, balmy days in the garden with our beloved dogs.

Resource Guarding

Resource guarding is what happens when a dog tries to control access to something it values highly. It is usually food, bones, toys, people or places, but it can be anything the dog finds it wants more than another dog or a human. 

Not all dogs will resource guard though; some will guard one thing or just in one particular situation, while others guard everything, everywhere! Many dogs don’t resource guard at all.

You might think that dogs in animal abuse cases, who have been starved, are more likely to guard food, but it isn’t always the case. Sometimes it is the dog who has food available all day long or who is overweight that guards their food. You won’t be surprised to learn that the dogs who do guard, do it with varying degrees of intensity.

Why do they do it?

It is something that has been a very successful strategy for dogs during their evolution. He who controls the resources, eats today or has shelter tonight! So, resource guarding is instinctual  and has provided an evolutionary advantage to some dogs over many years.

It also used to be a behaviour that was better understood and tolerated in the past. It used to be the case that most people would say “don’t go near that dog, he is eating/has a bone/sleeping (take your pick)”. I wonder why have we apparently lost that level of understanding of this behaviour?  Perhaps it is the increased number of multiple dog homes we have nowadays? Perhaps more frequent fights are occurring where two or more dogs in one household resource guards?

How do you recognise it?

Dogs resource guard by using defensive body language. Hunching over the item and showing the whites of their eyes is a good first indicator. They may put a paw on it indicating ‘this is mine!’ to whoever is approaching. They might run over, barge past you and grab an item – a bone or a toy – if another dog or person dares to approach it. 

It is generally explicitly clear that they want it for themselves, and they are not going to give it up easily.  If no one is likely to get injured (human or dog),  perhaps this behaviour can be viewed as, fair enough! Dogs have very little choice in their lives nowadays so why not let them keep something they value so much?

If it is safe and not going to do anyone any harm, I personally, would probably leave a dog to it. Dogs in my household seem to respect it and are perfectly happy to allow the resource guarder amongst them to get just on with it. The item is clearly not that valuable to the other dogs.  It is almost like they have personal preferences and are accommodating to each other. However, if a dog is unfairly resource guarding all the toys, all the bones etc, then yes, I would step in, to even things up. I won’t tolerate one dog bullying the others.  

What happens when the item being guarded is dangerous to them or valuable to me?

Sometimes though, it isn’t well tolerated by the other dogs in a household, or a dog resource guards from a human. What happens if the item is not safe for the dog to keep? It might be something inappropriate, like a tv remote, a child’s toy or worse, something that is downright dangerous for the dog – your dropped medication! Then you would want a way to safely take it away from the dog without getting injured or causing a huge rift in your relationship by having a ‘stand-off’ or confrontation with your dog.   

What not to do!

So, what could you do when you are facing a lip lifting or growling dog who now sees you as the person who is going to take away the most valuable thing they have ever had in their entire life? Well, the one thing you shouldn’t do is chase them or attempt to get the item away from them. If you do, you or someone else could get injured. Badly!

All that chasing and tugging teaches a dog is that it must be an ultra-valuable resource, really worth guarding, at all costs! Sadly, all you have done is reinforce that it is definitely worth guarding.  They may even think it is a fun game that you are happy to partake in and do it all the more just to get some additional attention from you.

Prevention is better than cure

My first important advice is to understand when your dog is likely to resource guard so you can take steps to prevent it. Write a list of all the occasions your dog guards’ items. Most people know about food, bones, chews and toys but it can also be dog beds (or your bed), clothing, chairs, your lap, an area under a table and even things with particular scents.  

Writing down what they guard and where they guard it, taking into consideration what time of day it is, are they hungry or full, previously relaxed or excited, at home or away from home, guards from other dogs or people, feeling ill or are in good health, in pain or not, will be extremely valuable information for you and any behaviourist you subsequently engage to help you.

If you know when it is likely to occur, then you can put in place measures to ensure it is either prevented altogether or at least minimised. Your plan may include clearing up the children’s toys before allowing your dog into the room, making sure the remote control is not left in a place accessible to your dog (this may be valuable as it will smell of you). All the socks and shoes are tidied away promptly, and medications are handled well away from your dog over a kitchen or bathroom worktop. Bones and chews can be picked up when your dog is safely away from them (perhaps while they are having their dinner or out on a walk). Prevention is absolutely vital!

What do you do if they get hold of something they shouldn’t have?

You will need a strategy to handle the times when you have not been able to prevent it and I would suggest the first thing you do is take a deep breath and keep calm. Then, walk away and say, ‘Let’s Go’. This means you walk into another room, for me it is the kitchen, where there is a treat jar full of my dogs’ favourite goodies.

Then ask for a well-practiced behaviour or ‘trick’ - a sit, a wave or a down, something you can cue them to do and then can reward them for doing it. As their reward, toss them a treat (in the direction furthest away from the thing they were resource guarding) and while they are distracted retrieving the treat, calmly walk the other way, close the door between you and your dog and pick up the item they discarded in their excitement to follow you.  Return and carry on with some more sits, downs, waves and shaking of paws.  It’s a fun time for them, they are getting rewarded, and the guarded item is almost certainly forgotten.

Being prepared for when prevention fails

Okay, this doesn’t happen without training. The ‘Let’s Go’ cue needs to be well practiced and practiced without the resource guarding actually happening. Don’t leave it until you have a situation you need to handle. It needs to be an instinctive reaction to your invitation to leave the room and your dog needs to know for sure that they will be getting an opportunity to perform an easy ‘trick’ for a huge reward.

By adding in a cued trick or behaviour, you are breaking the link to the guarding eliciting a reward (for those that were wondering about us just rewarding a dog for guarding).  It is a distraction technique that can get you out of all sorts of bother indoors or out. Teach this one now and think of it as an emergency technique included in your toolkit. 

Teaching an alternative ‘mutually exclusive’ behaviour

The other thing that worked wonderfully well for me was teaching my dog an alternative behaviour that he just couldn’t do while holding on to his resource guarded item (a mutually exclusive behaviour).  Firstly, I taught him how to catch a toy and eventually the game of ‘fetch’. I did spend quite a long time sitting with an open hand waiting for the exact moment he dropped it, just to be able to capture the moment with a ‘yes’, before throwing it back to him, showing him there was more fun in releasing the item than holding on to it.  I eventually added a cue, ‘drop’. 

Once he got the idea of catching, fetching and dropping, and realised how much fun it could be, he never resource guarded a toy ever again. Well, almost never! A brand-new toy might be guarded for the first 5 minutes but after that it was just like all the other toys in the house; meant for sharing and being caught in mid-air and not for holding on to it for hours at a time (and he did at first)!

Using an old ‘low value’ toy that your dog doesn’t guard when working on teaching catch, fetch and drop will help speed things up.  Other things you could teach is ‘leave it’’, ‘go to your bed’, ‘wave’, shake paw’, or ‘back-up’.

Seeking professional help

Of course, if you are worried about your dog biting (in this or any other situation), then you really should seek help and I recommend you always look for a positive, force-free, rewards-based behaviourist.

Please avoid anyone who tells you that you need to punish your dog for resource guarding (or anything else!). It won’t help and it can make things worse.  Remember it has been a successful strategy for dogs for many thousands of years and it is a perfectly natural instinct that some dogs utilise more than others.

Don’t allow dogs to sort it out amongst themselves (well, not all the time)

Dogs have a way of setting rules for themselves, for example, if one dog has a toy between his paws and is looking at it, then he should be able to keep it and the other dog should respect that. However, if the toy is between their paws and they are looking around, that usually indicates that the other dog is free to take it.  This is great communication and the last thing you want to do is intervene as you could just spoil their perfectly normal relationship.  

Finally, if you have more than one dog that resource guards, please don’t allow your dogs to ‘sort it out amongst themselves’, this could be terribly dangerous. They are unlikely to come up with a ‘pecking order’ no matter what your friend who ‘has had dogs all their life’ says! It is much more likely, they will fight! If you then try to intervene you will almost certainly get injured too.  

Living with that level of tension and possible intimidation in a household is stressful and can cause other behavioural issues and even stress related illnesses.  Much better to get professional help, well before you end up with expensive vets’ bills!

 June Pennell, ISCP.Dip.Canine.Prac., MCMA ISCP Principal

 Qualified behavioural help can be found at this link Practitioner | The ISCP

Carnivore or Omnivore?

 Whether dogs are carnivores or omnivores seems to spark many a passionate debate.

All their anatomical attributes point to them being facultative (scavenging) carnivores. Which in general terms means that they are predominately meat eaters but they can, if needed survive on plant matter.

One way to explore what our dogs are designed to eat is to look at their anatomical and physiological features and what nature has given them in order to survive to the best of their abilities.  

Dogs come in a vast array of shapes, sizes and specific breed types but basically their anatomy and how their bodies work has barely changed over thousands of years. 

The natural wild survival and behavioural traits may have lessened over the centuries but there are still many attributes that our pet dogs have in common with their distant ancestors.

Scenting ability

Nature has given the dog the most exceptional sense of smell for a very good reason. Dogs dedicate 33% of their brain for the very important task of following a scent, which is essential if you need to track and kill your own dinner or seek out something tasty to scavenge.   

Their ability to recognise a scent is exceptionable and with 300 million olfactory receptors compared to our 5 million they are in a different league to most other mammals when it comes to scenting ability.

A dog can quickly use his nose to gain lots of information about his environment and also to detect species that have travelled through the surrounding area. They also have the physique to run at speed with their nose a matter of centimetres from the ground and to follow a scent over many miles, even when the “prey” has long since passed by.   

Dew Claws

Dogs have a pointed dew claw on the inner aspect of their front legs which does not come into contact with the ground until they are moving through the faster paces, then it provides a very important role.

Many people think that dew claws have no purpose, but if you have ever observed a dog eating a raw bone you will see that they dig the dew claw into the meat or sinew to position and prevent movement of the bone while eating.

Dew claws also have a vital role in stabilising the lower leg and in particular when cornering at speed, as there are five tendon attachments coming off it leading to muscles that prevent twisting of the limb when it comes into contact with the ground. This can prove essential in injury prevention when travelling over uneven terrain at high speed, such as the chasing of prey or needing to flee a source of danger.     

Head

Carnivores have very big jaws in relation to the size of their heads. Although they have reduced facial muscles to allow for the opening of the mouth, the primary muscles that operate the jaws are the large, developed temporalis muscle on their skull and combined with powerful neck and shoulder muscles, overpower, hold prey , crush bones and have the strength to carry away items that have been scavenged so they can be eaten in a safe environment.      

Teeth

The teeth of the dog are probably the biggest clue as to what canines are designed to eat. Like a Swiss army knife, each group of teeth have a very specific job to do in order to deal with capturing, puncturing and devouring almost a whole carcass. None of the structure or function of the dogs teeth and jaws lend themselves to eating or grinding cereals.  

Incisors are the small teeth at the front of the mouth, they are used to nibble and strip away sinew and meat from the bone.

Canine teeth also referred to as fangs or cuspids are the long pointed teeth used for holding and puncturing flesh. There are two canines in the upper jaw (maxilla) and two in the lower jaw (mandible). They are single rooted teeth and the upper canine tends to be longer and more pointed than the lower.

Premolars are designed to crush and slice due to their uneven surface and scissor like action. There is a modified molar called a Carnassial which you will see as the largest and most jagged premolar. It has three roots and is a heavy-duty tool to crush bones and meat. A dog will often tilt their head to one side to gain full use of this tooth when gnawing on a bone or to slice through a large chunk of meat for easier swallowing. The top jaw has two molars each side and the bottom jaw has three which are used for crushing.    

 Mouth

Dogs do not have any side to side action in their jaws so unlike ourselves or herbivores they can’t grind their food before swallowing. Their jaw is a simple hinge joint and has a chomping up and down movement and a strong, muscular tongue which can manipulate food to where it can be crushed by the powerful jaws.

They do not possess any salivary amylase, which is a specialised digestive enzyme that herbivores and omnivores produce in their mouth and together with the chewing and grinding action of the molars starts to immediately break down starchy carbohydrates before we even swallow.      

The oesophagus is capable of allowing the passage of large pieces of meat, after all the dog isn't capable of breaking the meat down by chewing or salivary amylase, so it needs to get the food to where that can happen, which is in the stomach.

Stomach and Digestive tract

Dogs have a short digestive tract so they can expel waste quickly which is particularly important if they have been eating food that is covered in bacteria.

We have all seen dogs eat the most disgusting and decaying of items, which if eaten by ourselves would have us omitted to hospital, yet at worst they may have a slight upset tummy for 24 hours.

They have an incredibly strong stomach acid of around pH1 which is needed to break down large amounts of protein, to dissolve bone and as a protection against any decaying food that may have been scavenged. The walls of their stomach are covered in a thick mucosa to provide protection from the corrosive acid and to literally stop the stomach from digesting itself.     

Dogs produce amylase in their pancreas which is passed into the blood stream to assist in digesting carbohydrates.

All the leading dog food companies state that dogs have no nutritional need for carbohydrates in their diet, yet they appear in very large amounts in the majority of processed foods.

Recent studies have shown that there has been some adaptation over the years in dogs’ ability to digest starch. One study comparing wolves to our domestic dogs showed that dogs of today had between 4 – 30 copies of a gene code for amylase while wolves had 2 copies. This shows that dogs may now find it easier to digest carbohydrates, but with such a large gap between 4 and 30 copies it also shows that some dogs will not thrive as well as others on a high carbohydrate diet. It comes back to the importance of treating a dog as an individual and just like ourselves, what is ideal for one person can be very detrimental to the health of another.   

Behaviour traits

Dogs still exhibit some of the behaviour traits of their ancestors and in certain breeds this will be particularly noticeable.  

Man has taken full advantage of these natural behaviours and over many hundreds of years, through selective breeding have created companions to work alongside them. This can be anything from using their natural herding instinct to manage sheep, tracking and bringing down prey to feed the owners family and retrieving shot game.

Many dogs are keen diggers and will bury food and in particular bones as if storing them for a time when food is scarce.  

Heightened senses and prey drive

All their senses are heightened, eyesight, hearing and in particular sense of smell so they can continually analyse who is approachable and where any potential food source may be.     

This strong prey drive is still noticeable today in the gundog, terrier and hound groups who are just primed to follow a scent or in the case of sight hounds to chase sudden movement.      

Instinctively driven to eat seasonal berries, grasses and herbivore droppings.

If dogs are given a large, natural environment to wander over it is surprising how much time they spend exploring, sniffing, experimenting what is edible and generally foraging. This can include a particular type of grass, seasonal berries, herbs, plant roots or tubers, clay soil or rotting wood. This could be for medicinal use, to ease a stomach upset, rid the body of parasites, provide additional fibre and moisture or to top up on minerals that are lacking in their diet.

Studies of wild canine populations demonstrate the wide variety of food stuffs that they will eat over the changing seasons. This is also dependant on location and if there is access to fallen fruit, nuts, berries, fish, small mammals or waste food from human inhabitation nearby in which to supplement the diet. 

Dogs particularly favour the droppings of herbivores such as horses, cows and deer. Although this is only digested, fermented grass and possibly hay in the case of domesticated animals, it does provide enzymes, fibre, moisture and have probiotic qualities.

What are dogs?

Set aside for a moment your views on what dogs should be eating and look instead at what Canis Lupus Familiaris, aka our dogs, actually are?

They are highly intelligent, inquisitive, scavengers, exploring their world primarily by scent. They investigate aroma, taste, texture and edibility with all their senses. They are foragers, trackers, diggers, chewers, adventurers, opportunists and hunters. They are playful, problem solvers that adapt to their environment and not only the food source that is available at that given time but also the volume and frequency of that food.

Nature has given them the anatomy and physiology to eat a vast array of food types and if it was absolutely necessary, the ability to track, catch or at least scavenge their own dinner.  

Baring all this in mind, are we not doing them a major disservice by serving up the same beige pellets in a bowl, every single day for a lifetime?

I am certainly not suggesting that you encourage or allow your dog to chase and catch wildlife, but could you offer some more enrichment at mealtimes?

This could be by adding a little steamed or pureed vegetables into their meals, a sprinkling of herbs or blackberries, offering some appropriate fresh cooked food, rotating the flavour or type of food you offer, the use of interactive food toys, snuffle mats, games in the garden that involve tracking and finding their favourite treats or food. This will make meals times more than just filling an empty stomach and go some way to enriching the life of a highly sensory being that is our beloved dog.