Homer is quite the escape artist and can get out of his cage even with bungee cords holding the door closed. I've posted about Homer escaping from his cage before in April on the thread "Too scared to go outside", but its all started up again. I spent the Summer holidays encouraging him that his cage was a safe place, he was happy to go into his cage to wait about an hour for his dog walker to come and pick him up. All's been good for about three weeks. This week he's been escaping again. Hubby puts him in his cage just before he eaves for work and he goes in happily, sometimes going to lie in his cage even before hubby is ready to leave. The cage is secured with it's normal sliding locks and a stretchy bungee cord clipped from top to bottom to make it more secure and leaves him quite content. By the time the dog walker comes to pick him up he's upstairs on our bed, and has sometimes been scratching at the carpets in the bedroom. (We've already replaced the upstairs hall carpets) Yesterday hubby watched him push the cage door enough to squeeze through a small gap. He altered how he put on the cords and Homer tried to escape again but this time scraping some skin off his nose. Hubby's now got some carbine style mountain climbing clips to use to secure his cage closed so that he cannot escape. I'm in too minds, I don't want Homer to become completely panicked by being secured in his cage but neither do I want to have to replace even more carpets and have even more furniture damaged which could put Homer at even more risk of getting hurt.
Oh you little monkey Homer ! I`m really sorry but I did smile reading that by the time the dog walker arrived, he was upstairs on the bed ! I know, its not funny and I wonder if you could maybe confine him to one room rather than a crate as he does seem to have a total aversion to it ?
We've tried confining him to one room but he just got really panicked. We've tried the kitchen where his cage is but he climbs up onto it and onto the kitchen table or scratches at the door, we've tried the hall with upstairs doors closed as there's no furniture but he's ripped up the carpet. We leave him in the whole house where he makes a nest on the bed but also scratches in various corners. He's been better recently but this last week he's back to his anxious behaviour.
Is there anyway you could leave 30mins later, or your dog walker arrive 30 mins earlier? I agree with the feeling that making the crate secure will not help, it's the underlying anxiety that is the problem. Can your vet review his medication to get him over this bump? My worry is this evolves into a very fixed behaviour. I am so sorry, I can't begin to imagine how frustrating and upsetting this is for you x
