A REMINDER

Present day: Sunday 7pm

The phone rings. It’s Jessica
“Hey mom.”
“Hey”
“I’m ready to kill my dog!”
“Oh geez, what happened?”
“She ate twelve cupcakes. Will she be alright?”

Back flash to six months ago:

While I stand in Jess kitchen, S is in her high chair eating her breakfast, rooting on the floor directly under her are Ottis and Amber. When the flow of cheerios stopped, Amber’s front paws make contact with the counter top next to me and she proceeds to “surf.”
With my mouth agape I watched Amber in full sniff mode searching for easy pickings.
I then eyed Jess standing on the other side mindlessly chatting, involved with what she was doing.
Again I looked at Amber, then at Jess. Jess was oblivious to the four legged vacuum working her way across the counters edge.
“Jess!”
“Huh?”
As I directed my gaze back to Amber Jess came back to reality and shooed Amber off. I closed my mouth but couldn’t keep it shut.
“What the heck?”
“What? She got down when I told her to.”

At the risk of being redundant, let’s go back to doggy 101.

Dogs will repeat a behavior if it’s reinforced whether intentionally or not. The higher the payout the stronger the behavior. That is why preventing the behavior from ever happening is vital. Food is highly motivating for most dogs. Combine that with toddlers who drop food and are low to the ground they become food slot machines. Snatching food off the counter just one time will teach a dog where the high payouts can be found.
An owner will drive themselves crazy trying to “correct” the problem of food stealing with punishment than preventing the behavior to begin with. Every time the owner leaves the dog alone with reachable goodies on the counter or free to cleanup while the child is eating, the dog is inadvertently being rewarded for the stealing behavior.

Fast forward to present time:

“Jess, how did she get a hold of twelve cupcakes?”
“They were on the counter cooling while she was outside with us. The neighbors came by with their dogs and I put her inside so she wouldn’t go crazy, and when I came in she had eaten them. "
“And why would you leave cupcakes where she could reach them?!”
“I know... I know. But she was outside; it’s all the neighbors fault!”
“Your not serious right?" I wanted to reach through the phone line and smack her silly. That’s called “positive punishment”
“No, I’m not. I just wasn’t thinking. I forgot all about them. Will she be alright?”
“Where they chocolate?”
“No, vanilla with vanilla icing.”
“She’ll be fine. But remember, what goes in eventually has to come out.”
Hopefully this will be a wake up call for Jessica when she is up at 2:00 in the morning cleaning up a dozen vanilla cupcakes that her dog so enjoyed.