eating poop to hide it when in cage

Question
I rescued a 10 month old toy manchester terrier in June. The reason she was rescued is because the previous owner gave her as a Christmas gift to their 2 boys and they definitely were not dog people. They would leave her in her cage about 16 ours a day. They finally got fed up with her when she started pooping and peeing in her cage during the day. Trixie is almost 15 months old now. She is totally house trained and has been since we brought her home. She tells us when she needs to go out with no problem. We also have another TMC that is 3 years old and when we leave the house we have them trained to stay in their cage. At the beginning, every time we would put her in the cage she would most of the time pee and poop. I stooped the peeing be taking all blankets and anything fabric out of the cage, she now is on the bare floor of the cage. This totally worked for the peeing problem, it has stopped. Then we noticed that as long as we made sure she poops before we put her in the cage she would be fine and not poop. Now she seems to be regressing. Almost every time we put her in her cage she poops and then eats it to hide it! One time she actually vomited it all up. She does this whether she is in the cage 10 minutes or 2 hours. I spoke with the previous owners and they said that was a large problem and the reason why they gave her to the rescue group. They couldn't take having to bath her and clean up every time they came home. When I first brought her home I would make the cage very small and not give her much room. as she stopped I gave her the full cage, which the cage is small anyway. The cage my other dog is in is much larger. The other day when I came home I noticed she pooped and ate it. I reprimanded her and didn't even raise my voice, just asked her what she did and that she needs to do poopies outside. She was shaking like a leaf. This makes me think that the previous owners may have beat her for it. When I put her in her cage it isn't for a very long time. Once in a while she may be in for 5 hours but it is usually an hour or two and it is not every day. When I tell her to go in her "house" she runs right in. She started doing that after about a week or two of us having her. I am at my wits end and don't know how to break this. Can you help?

Answer
Stool eating or 'coprophagia' is a somewhat common problem-and some dogs that are used to being yelled at for making accidents are more prone to this problem,it is believed they are doing this to avoid being punished

There is a product on the market called 'deter' that is a pill you give to the dog,and it just makes there stools taste and smell bad to them-if you can't find that name brand ask your petstore if they have another product that does the same thing

This is a problem in younger dogs and they do tend to grow out of it-and the more used to your place she gets,the less likely she may be to to have this problem-this is often a problem that just clears up on it's own

It may also help to see if you can get some type of behavioral expert to come to your house and see what your dog is like-not an obedience class as your dog is too nervous for that right now,but someone that can see some of the problems you are having with this dog,as she does seem to have been possibly abused in the past