Petie demands a lot of attention! Petie had to live with a friend of mine for a couple months when I was in the middle of moving. My friend gave Petie lots of attention. He took Petie everywhere just like I do, but one week my friend was required to work a couple of twelve hour shifts. After one of these shifts my friend loaded Petie into his car to go to the store. This was a very normal routine thing that the two of them did all the time with no problems, but on this occasion Petie must have been feeling neglected. While my friend was getting groceries Petie tore up the entire back seat of the car and took a big chunk of padding off the shoulder of the driver’s seat.
This destruction could have easily been avoided by having Petie ride in a kennel, but a kennel the size Petie needs just wouldn’t fit in my friend’s Mazda Protégé, and unfortunately a horrible experience in the past created a deep fear of dark confined spaces.
I have read a lot of personal WolfDog web pages that talk about the destruction of their house, furniture, and personal items as if it were uniquely “wolfy” to be destructive. They seem to act as if it’s just something you have to learn to deal with. I read them and can only wonder…why are you keeping this animal in your home unsupervised? When I was volunteering at as a dog walker for the local animal shelter we received two yellow labs, Jack and Jill. They were released by their owner because one liked to rip up and destroy the sheet rock walls of the house and the other rip and destroy the carpet. I believe they were from the same litter and were only a year old. They simply didn’t know proper indoor behavior, but how are they going to learn if they can do as they please when nobody is home!
If you’re tired of your dog destroying the house while you’re gone, but feel it’s cruel to keep Fido in an airline type kennel while you’re at work, an out door kennel is out of the question for whatever reason, or can’t afford to dog proof a one room of the house let me point out a couple things:
1. Fido isn’t going to get a lot of exercise by behaving unless he merely walks himself through the whole house for the full eight hours you’re at work, which he most likely won’t. All he’s really doing is wandering from one room to the next randomly destroying whatever catches his interest. The bulk of his time is spent laying down chewing on your stuff.
2. Destructive Fido can get hurt chewing on electrical chords, wood he splinters from doors and furniture, or mirrors, glass, and ceramic items that he breaks. He may also get into cupboards and find chemicals and cleaners.
I had a friend, whose Labrador was actually very good in the house, one day the dog went through one of the single pane windows for some reason. The dog jumped back in the house when he was done, and when my friend got home he found his dog bleeding to death from a cut on the back ankle. Each time the dog’s heart beat blood squirted and it made for an expensive emergency vet visit and quite an expensive mess!!
Actual WolfDogs, especially those that are really the high content they were advertised as in the paper may be a special case, where they aren’t being destructive out of boredom, feeling neglected, or lack of training. I’ve heard that their curiosity for things surpasses that of a Malamute so far that they will, as one more reputable website put it, destroy a couch simply to find and kill the squeaky spot. If that is the case then the animal probably doesn’t do very well even when people are home watching him and should defiantly be kept either in a safe enclosure inside or in a kennel or fenced yard outside when nobody is home.
I’ve always kept Petie and Chelan outside in a large yard. The only times I leave them inside are when I’m not home in the evenings during the firecracker month of July. Except for this year they have always done well in the room that I keep them in. This year Petie went into the laundry/bath room, where I keep their water bowl, off to the side of the main room. I can only guess that he had become so frightened of the firecrackers that he tried to hide behind the door, which caused it to close locking him in confined space, then he freaked out and scratched at the door, and ripped the molding pieces off the sides of the door. And just for good measure or maybe out of boredom he tore up three of the five rolls of toilet paper stored there.
I haven’t read nor do I have the book, “I’ll be Home Soon!” by Patricia B. McConnell, Ph.D. but I have read three of her other books/booklets and they’re awesome. You can get her books from her site Dog’s Best Friend Ltd. The description of the book is as follows:
This booklet explains the difference between dogs who truly have separation anxiety and those that merely misbehave, and then thoroughly describes a behavior modification program for the prevention and treatment of both problems. A treasure chest of ideas for keeping dogs happy and occupied while owners are gone, this booklet can help prevent and treat both minor and serious behavioral problems related to dogs being “home alone.”
I wish I had a book about separation anxiety when Petie was a pup. He used to howl all the time when I would be at work. It didn’t matter that I left lots of toys for him or that I gave him tree branches to chew on, and a large yard to run in. None of this mattered, and my neighbors were complaining about the noise, even though they were contributing to the problem. I found out that I had three neighbors that would come out and give Petie treats every time he started making noise, which of only encouraged him to become worse. I think some of what I did naturally as part of his socialization helped though.
I took him everywhere I went and of course he couldn’t go inside grocery store and some other places, so when I would get out of my truck I’d pet him and tell him that I would be back and, “be a good boy”. He would howl, whine, and cause people to say, “aaawww poor thing.” He would sit there watching me go into the store and then stare at the door I went in waiting for me to come out again. Eventually he learned that I would come back and now he just watches me go, then lies down and takes a nap. At home I was still having problems, so I decided to get a companion for him to play with, Chelan. Thankfully it worked in my favor instead of creating two noise makers. I’ve read that it’s a bad idea to get a second dog as a ‘cure’ for that very reason.