I think it really depends on how much chewing is being done. Many if not most dogs enjoy eating the feces of other animals–with mine it is deer poop or horse poop (which a couple of them also enjoy rolling in!). In years and years of them doing this I've never had a single problem–if anything, the deer poop seems to give some added fiber and just passes through. :lol:
Sticks can be a more serious problem if the dog is chewing it up and swallowing down pieces that could pierce the stomach or intestines. But a couple of mine like to grab large sticks and chew the edges of them and eventually they just drop them and run along -- and I also have never had problems. I think you have to balance the pleasure a dog gets from running free like this against what might be an offensive habit or a very slightly risky one. After all, they are dogs, and eating feces to them is a normal dog behavior, not something that needs to be “corrected” necessarily–but if you don't like them doing this then the issue is just to be able to call them off and get them to stop.
To do this it is better to train a dog to do things that you want to do, rather than relying on what is now seen as an often useless approach to training dogs, of corrections (which often means jerking them around on the lead, which should not be done anyway to this breed
). The easiest and most constructive way to stop a dog from doing something you don't want it to do is not to punish or jerk it back–which often only exacerbates unwanted behavior or causes the dog to do the same thing but when you aren't around or looking. Instead, work in a positive way to improve a dog's recall, so that they always come back every time you call, and also teach the dog to know the word “drop” and “leave it”. None of these things is difficult to teach, but it does take focused training. time and a good, positive methods approach that keeps training enjoyable for owner and dog and makes them want to learn and want to do the things you ask of them.
Often the problems that we have with dogs are more a problem that we as owners haven't put in the time to teach dogs to do what we would like them to do–come back to us when called, give up items easily that they have in their mouths, to ignore something that we don't want them to pick up. Training all of these things is really fun in the right environment–a really good rewards based class, or using the techniques of good, rewards based trainers. The website Dog Spelled Backward has loads of training videos and advice, as does Dr. Ian Dunbar's
www.dogStardaily.com. Those are both good starting places for techniques for training all of those three commands.