We are currently training a Boston Terrier mix named Marley, he came to us through Forever Homes in Iredell County. Its seems that Marley had agression issues, especially over food, the couch, and anything else he decided to growl about. He has never bitten anyone and seems perfectly harmless, he just gets a little scary from time to time. Just a little background on Marley, back in July Marley was taken to the vet for his aggression issues and was placed on what we like to call “doggy prozac” to no avail.

We decided to move Marley into our home so we could observe his behaviors on a daily basis, since he seemed fine in the kennel environment. We noticed to Marley definitley had issues with food aggression but he would also growl, howl, or even bite at the air at random times, to the point where we could not identify the cause to this behavior. You see, at times, when Marley would have one of these bizarre episodes, no one (or animals ) would be around Marley. We had a tough time diagnosing his behavior, to the point where we decided to take him to the vets office to get looked over.

I work part -time at Iredell Companion Animal Hospital so I loaded Marley in the car and took him with me to work. Marley had a complete exam by Dr. McCurry (checking his hearing and sight, we were starting to wonder if Marley could see things that we could not) and he checked out just fine. Later that afternoon Doc happened to look in on Marley and noticed that he didn’t seem quite normal, that in fact, he noticed a slight twitch with his body and Marley’s eyes had a slight twitch as well. Marley was having a mild, almost impossible to see, seizure that the average eye probably would not even notice. Doc then asked me if I had noticed this behavior before …and we had, then he asked if I had noticed Marley clamping his teeth together like he’s biting at the air, and of course I answered yes! Dr. McCurry then advised me that alot of people refer to this behavior as bubble gum seizures.

Keep in mind that all of the behaviors together contributed to this diagnosis, We have a dog that bites his water but that doesn’t mean he is having a mild seizure! Marley has been put on medication and seems to be doing much better already, no encounters with the paranormal yet, however we are still working on his food aggression! The lesson here is that the diagnosis is the most important part of dog training and identifying the cause of behavioral issues in dogs.