When it comes to chewing....

[Kirsten]

When it comes to chewing, is your dog a beaver, a Ferengi, or an all-day sucker?

I just handed identical chewies to Luna and Ruby, and went and got a geriatric safe chewie for Cole.  When I returned, Luna had beavered her chewie and all that remained were a few crumbs to clean up.  Ruby is still carefully gnawing from one end to the other, shifting from one set of molars to the other to get an even work out.  Cole is usually my Ferengi because he likes his chewies pre-softened and pre-moistened.  Back when he had strong enough teeth to chew with the rest of them, I'd hand out three identical ones and he'd just wait until one of the girls had one started just right.  Then he would trade with her.  At first there would be confusion.  "Hey, he took my chewie!" then "Hey, look, here's a brand new chewie!"  and finally, "Who would trade a brand new chewie for a used one?  Who cares:  mmmmm...chewie."

So what kind of chewer is your dog?  How do you choose chewies appropriate for his or her style of chewing?  Are there any chewies you forbid your dog to have (and why)?  How do you supervise chewing? 

[Amber]

Maigee's chewies are only available when I'm around, I don't have to necessarily be sitting there staring at her as she chews, but usually she'll get one when I am watching tv, doing homework, or working on the computer.  She does get extra durable nylabones (for dogs twice her size, lol) which are available all the time because she mostly does small scale chewing on those.  Any other nylabones are off limits - the regulars were destroyed to dangerous within about 1 minute.

As far as rawhides, she does well with those.  When younger, she was a devoted I'm going to tear from one end to the other as fast as possible chewer.  I remember the first sign that she was getting over her kennel cough  was when she destroyed the rawhide I had bought for her in a short period of time.  Our previous dog was not interested in rawhides and pretty much ignored all chew toys.  Before this, I didn't realize that dogs ATE rawhide, I thought they chewed on it bit by bit.  But was shocked when she ATE the whole thing.  It led to a frantic search of whether or not rawhide hurt dogs if it was eaten.

Now that she is older, she has slowed down on her chewing.  If I give her a regular bone shaped rawhide, she will chew both ends off first and then eat the middle.  She has a peanut butter rawhide right now that has one end off.  She also got some knots (ends only) and she prefers to carry those around now than to chew it right away.

Previously, she would immediately destroy anything she had within a few minutes, now it is saved and reserved for the perfect opportunity to chew.  Usually when she is on the end of my bed and I'm in a lot of pain and she starts shaking the bed while chewing on it which makes my pain worse.  You should see her face of "I'm pitiful" when she gets kicked off.  Poor thing has to lay in her own (brand new) bed.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v638/salijackt/?action=view&current=Yum.jpg

[BlindMag]

My girls are moderate to light chewers; Pixel, however, is a beaver! He must have been a dachshund in another life .

I semi-supervise with chewies, while moving around the house or working on the computer. I rotate between giving XL hard nylabones, XL deer antlers, and the occasional lamb's ear for special occasions. I will not give any other type of hard chewie, as I have just read too many horror stories--though I know that no chew is 100% safe and believe all chewing should be supervised.

[louie]

Gidget is a non-chewer. I have wondered if there is something wrong with her, as I've tried every kind of chewie available, and she's simply not interested. Her teeth are in fantastic shape, and the vet has asked how I keep them so nice. I don't know. The only time she will chew is if the chihuahua has been chewing something and he leaves it. Then she will nab it and chew for a little while. But really, I can tell she just doesn't "get it."

[Ketreva]

Marley had different chewing styles depending on the item. He would grind bones down, but bubble gum chew on rubber chewies. He also liked to have a stuffy or rope toy in his mouth when he was chillin.. I guess to mop up the drool? 

All my previous dogs were beavers, Windy was a wood chipper, she had no interest in eating edible chews, just littering as many pieces as possible all over.

[Magesteff]

Max is a moderate to low chewer. He gets compressed shredded rawhide sticks and medium rawhide knotted bones. He cews them at a low speed, it takes him 5 to 10 minutes to finish a stick and the knotted ones are around for a couple days. He is not interested in real bones. He likes dog biscuit cookies fairly well, but again, he is not one that gobbles, he eated them at an average speed. I once got a "kennel package"(25 pounds of cookies in a plactic bag inside a cardboard box)  of dog biscuits from a company and put the plasctic bag on the floor and open, he would only take out one or two biscuits a day when he felt like he wanted one - which was why I felt it was safe to leave the bag open and someplace he could get to it.

Ozzie is a fast and hard chewer - he gets a couple of rawhide sticks and a couple "bull wrinkles" after his meals, he eats those like they were god's gift to dogs. He loved bones he gets the occassional commercially produced rib bone or a shank bone with marrow in it.  THose bones get taken away when they start splitting or cracking.

[sunshineone]

Juno is a chew monster. You would not believe what all she has chewed. Now I have lots of toys suited for her ways. I also found that hooves, while smelling nasty lasts several days.

Scruffy is not much of a chewer but likes whatever Juno softens up for him. Nothing is wrong with his teeth. He is just lazy.  Also while Juno will kill toys, he makes sure they stay nice.

[blkpanther0001]

Neiko is an average chewer,he will chew nylabones, regular bones for a few minutes at at time, then save them for later, he does not care for rawhide bones at all.

Moulin love rawhide bones and will UN-knot the ends of them, she loves nylabones and will chew on them for hours at a time, still has the first ones she got when I got her at 3 months old, they are chewed but still safe. (got her the giant ones largest they had).

I never leave them chewing rawhide's, or real bones unsupervised, but will leave nylabones and frozen stuffed kongs with them unsupervised.

[arrianya]

Sadie- my dainty brat chewer that guards hers until either a the boys have demolished theirs (average jumbo rawhide bone lasts the boys about 2 hours IF I'm lucky) or b she gets the one SHE wants.  Aka beef basted rawhide roll or a "geriatric softy bone" aka a semi soft dentabone.

The boys.... HA! It can be rope, fleece, stuffy, rawhide, pressed rawhide.  You name it they have destroyed it. Tennis balls last 20 minutes max....  Only exception is the two year old marrow filled rib bones that Sadie didn't demolish to nothing and thus are now a very hard bone.  They still have yet to demolish a single one of the 3.

And Sadie is the only one I trust to be an unsupervised chewer.  Reason being she is now 10 years old and has had a rock fetish from puppy hood on.  She has yet to swallow a rock and filed her canines down to dull points a long time ago.  She learned the hard way by chipping a canine that some things just AREN'T for chewing.  Now she is a bone connoisseur.

The boys- don't trust em for a minute if there is anything that even REMOTELY resembles a dog toy that they don't already avoid like the plague (aka MY stuffies. They only stole one ONCE *insert evil cackle and mousetraps all around stuffies*)