When I buy the dog a plastic bone she happily chews on it. Sometimes she takes it outside and leaves it for awhile (in the winter we think she likes it chilled–can’t explain the summer), then she brings it back in some other time.
But if it a real bone, a piece of rawhide, a “denta-bone” or one of those bones that is made of cornstarch, she has the immediate need to bury it. Then we never see it again. We just got her a new one thinking this time it would be different. We had to keep un-burying it and giving her a bath because she kept getting all dirty. Now she buries it inside. I just found it at the bottom of the dirty clothes basket and I put it on the stairs. She is now trying to bury it in her cage inside the blanket. Well, I can see it in the corner of her cage, not even covered up. Why did that take five minutes?
I guess she’ll just never have the benefit these bones are supposed to give her teeth.
My six-month-old puppy, Polaris, is a burier. Any “food” toy, rawhide, cornstartch, etc., has to be buried. In the house, she runs around, whining, frantic to find a spot.
Her desperation to bury has led her to try some interesting things. She has tried to bury the toy in my stomach, which was quite painful. If I’m in the chair, reading, she will try to stuff it between my body and the chair, and will tug at my clothing to try to cover it while scraping her nose along the chair, as if pushing imaginary dirt over it. IF I get out of the chair, she immediately jumps up and shoves the toy down into the crevices between the arm and the seat. I’ve found toys in the bookcases, under the bath mats, in the laundry basket and in the houseplants.
We’ve started putting an old blanket on the floor. She happily buries her toys in it.
We’ve also designated a semi-concealed area in the yard as the Digging Spot.
You’re not going to break your dog of the habit. It’s too deeply ingrained in their instincts. It’s better to just channel it into approved ways and areas.