My Sidekick and Me: New Kitchen, Old Habits

By Lisa Desatnik, CPDT-KA, FFCP, FDM, CPBC

Walking onto your kitchen to find your meatloaf…GONE…or you’re turning around from the kitchen sink to find your dog’s front paws on the counter, is VERY irritating!

You may have a few choice words to say out loud or under your breath.

BAD DOG!!!! NAUGHTY BOY!!!

Now, take a deep breath and see this for what it is, from your dog’s perspective.

Your dog, whose ancestors and close relatives spent a great deal of time foraging for food, is doing what dogs do. They are opportunistic animals, scavenging for smelly, tasty meals.

Just using his keen sense of smell to track an order and then using his brain and body to work toward that end goal is highly reinforcing.

When you stop and see this from your dog’s point of view, a good question to ask is, “Why wouldn’t my dog scavenge for food on my counter (also known as counter surfing)?”

Unfortunately, this is not a popular set of behaviors to the humans your dog shares a home with. If you’re in a new home, your dog is also adjusting and that’s a new opportunity to modify behaviors.

What are you to do?

If you do not want your dog hunting on your kitchen counter, the first thing you must do is create a management plan to prevent your dog from rehearsing counter surfing. Here are strategies that must be followed by everyone in your home.

1. Keep ALL food and other temptations out of sight, smell and reach. There should be NOTHING on your counters if you are not there to actively supervise.
2. Wipe down surfaces after cooking or eating in the kitchen.
3. Use gates or other barriers to keep your dog out of the area when there is not a person around.

Here are some management choices for times when you are in the kitchen preparing or cleaning up from food or eating. In a new house, remember, everything is new for your dog too.

1. Have your dog on the other side of a barrier.
2. Give your dog something else to do so that he is not interested in the counter, such as a food dispensing toy, a licking toy or something to chew on.
3. Your dog can be outside doing an enrichment activity such as hunting for food in the grass.

If you have the time and interest in working on teaching your dog what you would rather your dog do instead, then you can be in training mode. You can practice reinforcing your dog for being on a place such as a bed. You can also practice catching your dog with four paws on the ground and reinforcing that.

As you can see, you have many different options. However, one option you SHOULD NOT do is to leave your dog alone in a kitchen that has leftovers on the counter and dirty dishes in the sink.

Unless, of course, you want to teach your dog to counter surf!

Lisa Desatnik, CPDT-KA, FFCP, FDM, CPBC, with So Much PETential was voted 2024 Cincinnati’s Best Community Choice Award winner in pet training. She is a certified dog trainer, a certified Family Dog Mediator, and the first trainer in Hamilton County to earn Fear Free certification. She is also a licensed Family Paws Parent Educator. She is committed to using and teaching the most positive, science-based approaches to changing behavior. For more information, visit SoMuchPETential.com.