Dog Destroying Furniture

[Miss_Anne_Thrope]

No advice aside from what’s already been given, but I will say that I had a dog for whom a crate did NOT work at all. The dogs I have now LOVE their crates, although they’re good in the house, so they’re never locked in their crates except during their agility classes.

The randomness of the destruction? There might be something that triggers it, like somebody comes and knocks on the door or delivers a package to the porch or a strange dog walks by or a cat or some other wild creature is spotted in the yard and gets him all worked up and he works out that energy on the furniture. Just a thought.

[Bicoastal]

I think the dog, overall, probably received too much autonomy too soon. Take a step back, provide structure, training, and mental and physical exercise. You don’t know who this pup really is yet, and he hasn’t settled into his new home. Have you done the two-week shutdown protocol?

[LauraO]

Rather than a crate, how about an X-Pen, indoors? I got this idea from Ian Dunbar’s books: Before you get your puppy/after you get your puppy.

https://www.dogstardaily.com/files/BEFORE%20You%20Get%20Your%20Puppy.pdf

https://www.dogstardaily.com/files/downloads/AFTER_You_Get_Your_Puppy.pdf

My current puppy, who will be a year old in August:

I disassembled my dining room, because it has a hard easy to clean floor. I attached an X-Pen to the wall, to provide a decent sized area for the puppy, so he was not confined to a small crate and could move around. I bought a crate pan (plastic pan), put some grass sod down in it for a potty area and taped down puppy pee pads under it, so that they extended around the edges for ‘near misses’ of the sod. We hired a dog walker to come mid-day for a half hour walk. Puppy also gets a good half hour walk most mornings. And another in the evenings. Some obedience/agility classes rounded out the exercise and mental stimulation for the week.

This is what the puppy pen looked like on day one, we later updated it with pee pads under the sod, and took out the crate:

https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/15036166_1266759923365843_134252266329376566_n.jpg?oh=3b6c397b8311c91dee5d7024f49080bc&oe=59E5E1AD

There is a bed, lots of toys and chews. We used this set up until about a month ago, and have been slowly dismantling it in the last several weeks. This week we removed the pee pads, the sod has been gone for a while. Now my 10 month old puppy has the entire kitchen/dining/bathroom area (all hard floors), and we pick up the kitchen counters, bathroom trash and other items before leaving the house. There are baby gates to keep him out of the living room and bedroom hallway. The older dog can interact with him if she wants to. She can jump any gate like a gazelle, so confining her doesn’t work really. The cat can also get away from him, or interact with him if she wants to.

Ultimately, the goal is for him to be loose in the house, with the cat, and with the other dog. But its a long road to get there.

[anon99446150]

Thank you to all who have offered suggestions. I really appreciate it.

Re: crate training - I’m not against the idea, but am not sure it’s going to work for this particular dog. He does have access to a crate that is kept open when we are home. Occasionally he will go in and sit there if we are in the same room as the crate, but otherwise he is uninterested. The few times we have attempted to confine him (in either a crate or section of the house) we were able to watch him via iPad and he was incredibly stressed - pacing, panting, and did not give up until he got out (either by jumping over the gate or knocking it down once we got a taller gate). When we had him in a crate, he managed to escape - we’re not sure how - but before he did, he chewed up the bedding that was in the crate.

I like the idea of the X-Pen, because we could put it in a part of the house where he could see us coming and going, which might help his anxiety. When we did confine him, it was in the kitchen. He likes to watch us from the window when we come home/leave. I will have to investigate if there is an X-pen that is sturdy and tall so he can’t knock it over or jump out.

I agree with @Miss Anne Thrope - the randomness does make me think there is some kind of trigger. It is so random and that would make a lot of sense.

You all have given us some great ideas and things to think about - so thank you!