The clients submitted this case to our diagnostic service, nearly at their wits' end when their maturing male Akita finally grew to the point that he could out-struggle all efforts to clip his toe nails. Fortunately, the dog was not aggressive, strictly strong and determined that the ritual should not be practiced on him.

Fact-finding indicated that the dog was in excellent health, had a great relationship with his owners, but had this single hang-up.

We found that the type of clipper used was a scissors type. Many people use these by cutting from side of the dog's toe nail. Because of the structure of the dog's nails, this means the nail, and hence the tender quick, get squeezed, i.e., compacted before the blades actually start cutting. The result can produce pain. Dogs dislike have their paws held anyway, so when you add pain to the process, a classic operant avoidance conditioning process in underway, and it becomes more and more difficult to even hold the paw still because of the threatened pain.

In cases where the dog hasn't become terribly resistant, the problem may be solved if the scissors type clippers are used so they cut from the top and bottom of the nail rather than the sides. Another solution is to get some of the guillotine type clippers and use them to cut from top and bottom. However, the Akita was beyond these solutions.

We advised the owner to start desensitizing the dog to having his paws held. However, before that we had to get the dog on a program in which he was required to sit before he got any pets and praise, along with the leadership program defined in our BehavioRx Instructions for obedience training preparation. Since food had been used as rewards in past training as well as during the previous nail clipping episodes, we had the clients suspend all food reinforcement. In this way, the dog began functioning for them rather than a goodie.

The next step was to begin gently lifting the dog's forepaw by applying pressure at the back of the pastern (wrist) and simply holding the paw gently for a few moments. Lots of praise when he didn't pull away. Rear paws were lifted gently when he was standing, etc.

The final step was a new tool, one which we highly recommend to anyone who can afford the relatively modest cost... a Dremmel, or Oster Pet-a-cure, i.e., a rotary grinder. This avoids the 'crunch' of the clippers and, instead, simply grinds down the nail. The Oster unit comes complete with excellent instructions.

In about two and a half weeks all the nails could be ground, with the husband gently holding the Akita and rubbing him as a cutaneous distraction as the wife performed the grinding. Every session ended with happy playtimes, rides in the car, etc.