OK, this is some weird new behavior in an older dog. My 10 year old land manatee/terrier mix has started a bizarre behavior. If he’s given an unusual treat, something he normally doesn’t get, he will start whining and crying at it. He’ll then take the treat to his sitting area, sometimes drop it there or try to bury it, then eventually he will eat it. The whole time he whines and cries like it’s seriously distressing. WTF?
Interestingly, he got into the garbage a few weeks ago and I was sleeping when I heard him whining. He NEVER does that and I was out of bed like a shot to see what was wrong. He was sitting on his sofa with a chicken bone (uneaten) and whining at it the same way he does with the unusual treats. He certainly intended to chew/eat the bone but he gave himself away with his whining and I took it from him.
When I say unusual treats, I mean that I usually just get him Beggin strips and stuff like that…I recently went to a pet store and they had doggie "cookies’ that look like real/regular cookies. That’s when he started this weirdness, it was like he didn’t know what it was and just flipped out some. Additionally I’ll note that he’s a whiny dog in general- he cries when I get home, when he’s excited, when he sees another dog. It always stops fast but he always does vocalize.
Our dog has whined several times when chewing on raw hide strips and those bone-like dog treats, but in our dogs case, it’s mainly because he’s stubborn and stupid:
He has the treat in his mouth vertically (it forces his jaw a bit wide as he’s chewing on the thing all wrong) and he cannot figure out how to get it to a more comfortable position without dropping it so he whines, runs around with it, but doesn’t drop it.
He can’t get outside to bury it outside to dig up the next year, thus he is denied the opportunity to create a disgusting and foul monstrosity. This makes him very sad.
Check for blood on any chew-able items. Occasionally my dog cuts his mouth, but as I mentioned in number 1, this is because he occasionally has the thing in his mouth vertically.
My dog does something like this when she gets extra special treats like a bone. In her case it seems like its overload and she doesn’t know where to begin, “do I hide it, eat it now, choices, choices.”
I thought about tooth issues but he starts whining even before attempting to eat it and he eats his hard kibble with no issues whatsoever. It does strike me like brain overload or something. Like he has a kill and can’t decide what to do with it.
It may be because it’s unfamiliar and may look like “people food” which he knows he isn’t supposed to have. (If you don’t feed him people food) So he’s conflicted.
My dog does this too, and I figured it’s something like **madmonk **says. He also whines when I take him out to a very populated place like the farmer’s market. He gets all wriggly and whines almost constantly. It really does seem like simple overload.