Hi, I am a new member but desperate for advice...(and sorry for the very long post) My 6 year old lab mix spends most of her hours outside in the summer. As a younger pup while we were gone during the day she and her "brother" would spend the day locked in their pen while we were at work (Her 'pen' is approx. 3/4 acre - we live on a farm.) As they've gotten older we've placed less importance on them being locked in the pen because they had a favorite spot outside the pen that they loved to sleep. We would sometimes find missing things such as a plastic watering can, or a chewed up hose inside the pen but nothing major and always very sporadic. Within the past 2 months she has gotten out of control. Anything that is left outside is no longer safe. 8+ pairs of shoes (you would think we would learn to place elsewhere...), anything plastic is a goner, her wooden dog house, my son's outdoor toys - even bigger ones like a bubble lawnmower (the list could go on and on) but now the worst offense - my husband's fishing poles. We have NEVER caught her in the act - we just wake up to chaos each morning. We have tried locking her in her pen at night - every night a new hole is dug (One was dangerously close to the propane gas line). I try to get her to be active during the day but she often refuses to join me on walks. She will not play with toys while outside - no fetch or anything. She will play fetch about 3 times while in the house but she is deathly afraid of the laminate floors so she really won't go far off the rug. She never bothers anything while in the house at night (well except for me when she asks to go outside around 4am) but my husband views being inside as a reward and doesn't want to let her in while shes misbehaving. (We did however let her in the other night and the next night was the fishing poles). She doesn't care much for treats and will rarely eat a rawhide (cat food is another story though...) We have not found a correlation in the weather, moon phasing, storms etc. it is EVERY night. She doesn't show any signs of separation anxiety etc. I am newly pregnant but she did not do this while pregnant with my first. My husband is at wits end which is obviously causing struggles between us. I know there is the obvious - don't leave stuff out for her to get but a) we live on a farm - there is always stuff for her to find and b) she has even stolen stuff from the neighbors' yards on several occasions. Does anyone have any advice? Thank you in advance!
Re: middle aged lab acting out Hi there, and welcome to the forum It is infuriating when an adult dog starts a new (and unwanted behaviour) You’d think you left all that behind when the puppy stage was over. But the truth is, this is very common. Especially when dogs are unsupervised. Dogs get bored, and into mischief. I assume she is damaging your stuff by chewing it. And obviously you can’t put the entire farm away, so the answer is probably to confine the dog when you are not supervising her. Either indoors, or in a dog proof run with a kennel in it. Are you saying she is digging out of her pen? If so, it really isn’t dog proof, and you were quite lucky that she didn’t do this before. Some dogs will dig out of an earth run, some won’t. Some dogs won’t dig out for months or years, then will suddenly do so. The habit often starts because they are digging near the fence just for fun, and accidentally one day discover that it leads to an escape route. For this reason, an outdoor dog run needs to be on a concrete base. Lots of dogs will dig under the fence otherwise, sooner or later. Obviously you can’t concrete a run as big as yours, but if you want to confine her outdoors, then you’ll need to build a dog proof run. There isn’t really any short cut that I know of. Sorry if this seems negative. I get a lot of questions like this from people who live on farms or in remote locations and want their dogs to have lots of freedom and space outdoors. Only to discover that the dog keeps wandering off, or wrecking the place. It is often a question of luck whether or not the dog wanders off or gets into bad habits.
Re: middle aged lab acting out Can't offer any advice, but just wanted to say hi and welcome I think Pippa's advice is the best you will get How old is your dog? You say 'her brother'........is he still with you?
Re: middle aged lab acting out Thank you. Your assumptions are correct, she is chewing everything up and she is digging and escaping out of the pen She is just over 6 years old (don't have an exact date since she was a rescue). We adopted her when she was 4-5 months old. Her brother is still with us (we have no clue what breed he is - he looks like a dingo) he is almost 9 years old. It is very frustrating since the problem has gotten so extreme. I can deal with her escaping the pen but not with destroying anything she can find! It drives me nuts that all day long she won't hardly move even when we try to entice her then something about when the sun goes down she apparently suddenly has energy and is bored.
Re: middle aged lab acting out from a teeny tiny black almost 6 year old Lab known as The DivaDog and her pet human
Re: middle aged lab acting out you might find if you restrict her fun to a smaller concrete run she's more inclined to come and play with you....at the moment she can completely please herself. good luck
