Hi Everyone, I posted on here a few months back but can't find my post again to revive it! I have an 8 month old female who is completely destroying my house bit by bit every single time she is alone, whether it be for 5 minutes or an hour and it is becoming worse by the day. She has tonnes of toys that I'm adding to weekly so she always has something new, she is left with 2 frozen kongs with treats, scatter mat full of biscuits, card board boxes to rip up and plastic bottles full of treats to play with too. She is also exercised before and after she is left alone. I will add that before the destruction began, at around 4 months old, she would bark non-stop the entire time she was home alone. She has stopped the full on barking (still barks periodically throughout the home alone time) but obviously now turned more to destructive chewing. Just the past week I have come home to the couch chewed, the floorboards ripped up, the blinds ripped off the window and the carpet ripped up. I have tried everything that I can think of to fix this so I'm becoming quite desperate for ideas. I also have a vet behaviourist coming out sometime over the next week to access her for anxiety. I also have been crate training for 2-3 months every day but she is just not ready to be put in there and left alone for 3-4 hours at a time while I'm at work. We are up to about 5 minutes left home alone before she starts crying. She is the most perfect dog when someone is home, but it just seems like she can't cope being home alone! Any advice would be great! Thank you!
Here's the past thread @Renee May https://thelabradorforum.com/threads/puppy-destroying-the-house-when-left-alone.25639/#post-383619 Before you behaviourist arrives I would film the dog for about 10 before before you leave and about 1 hour after you leave. I suspect she has separation anxiety. Filming her will help with the diagnosis.
Please post what the vet behaviourist recommends . . . and how much it will cost. Know that not all dogs are fixable at any price.
Could you try a doggie pen instead of a crate. We used a pen in the kitchen for both Tilly and Cooper when they were to young to let loose in the house. Fortunately they were pretty dependable at 4 or 5 months, and while they want to be with us, they are fine when we are gone.
Thanks everyone. Yes, the behaviourist has asked me to send through recordings of her just before we leave and while we’re gone. I usually have a live video on her but no recordings yet. I suspect she has separation anxiety too. It will cost $500 for us just to get pup assessed, and most likely will result in her being medicated while we are gone, provided she has anxiety of course. This behaviourist has helped us with our other older rescued dog, he has major general anxiety. I wonder if she has picked this up from him? We have tried a play pen. She learnt to jump over it at around 4 months old even though it was over a meter high! She would just get so upset and escape. We ended up just letting her free roam since she escaped anyway and she was good for a few months until she developed this destructive chewing. I will post what the behaviourist recommends once she has been assessed.
The best book on separation anxiety is this one: https://www.amazon.co.uk/TREATING-S...00&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=maria+demartiniprice You can find it on Amazon Australia I'm sure, or elsewhere. I highly recommend you read it. The biggest problem with fixing separation anxiety, is that during the entire training process, the dog can never be left alone for longer than you have worked up to. That means: If the dog can only be left for 30 seconds, you can't go out for 30minutes - let alone 4-5 hours. It is an absolute essential that you figure out a way for the dog NOT to be left, whilst you train up the duration.... This might be: A family member or friend pup-sitting, either at your house or dropping the dog off at theirs. A doggie daycare. An elderly person who might like the company of a dog for a few hours but doesn't want the responsibility of owning one. And so on... But you really need to think outside the box and work out how she can never be left alone - before you start implementing the excellent training programme in the book above. Otherwise you will be constantly undoing all your work and training.
