[Franksinacho]

I have a 7 months old golden retriever just recently start developing destructive behavior. He would chew up & lifted up room carpet when I sleep. and it's not the first time he did it. it happened at least over 6,7 times, he knows it's wrong to chew on the carpet. when he sees me looking at the carpet he destroys he ran away. why would he keep doing it if he knows it's wrong? and he has toys around him, it's not like there no toys for him to chew. i am just getting very frustrated and it's new carpet we just put on a year ago. does anyone have useful advice for me? should i just put him in the crate when i leave the house? but i feel bad for him. would dog school helps him with this behavior? beside this. he would also chew up the window blinds when we leave him at home by himself. PLEASE HELP.

 

[usually lurking]

Your puppy should be crated when you can't watch him for his own safety. Fill up a kong toy with kibble, applesauce, plain nonfat yogurt, peanut butter, and mashed banana. Freeze it. Offer it to your pup when he goes in his crate. It will keep him happy and busy for an extended period of time while you are gone or sleeping.

Also, your dog is bored. He needs mental stimulation and exercise. What kind of exercise is he getting? For mental stimulation, enroll him in an obedience class and spend time training him every day. Right now, he has no outlet for his physical and mental energy other than being destructive. He isn't being bad, he just needs you to give him an appropriate outlet.

 

[solinvictus]

In between 7 - 12 months the pup is permanently setting his adult teeth. There is pain and discomfort during this process. Now that they have adult teeth and strong jaws instead of just chewing on something they are now chewing through it. If you don't supervise and manage them so that they cannot chew on/through things this will become a habit. It is much harder to break habits than to not let them start.

 

[aesthetic]

My puppy did this too at that age. It was an old carpet, so there were already strings unravelling that he liked to pull. He was never left unsupervised so he did it in front of us, but no amount of interrupting him and replacing it with something appropriate to chew worked. We ended up moving to carpet to another location of the house (one he hadn't had access to yet) and then moved it back when he was a little older. He hasn't touched that carpet again

 

[Kalhayd]

Our girl was CRAZY from 7-11 months. Chewed anything she could get her teeth on! I'd also suggest crating him when you're away & at night when you sleep if he is being destructive then.

 

[LynnC]

Yes!!! Crate him when you're gone and I crated my puppy at night. Don't feel bad for your puppy, you're keeping him safe. And when he's awake he should be within eyesight at ALL TIMES. If I couldn't see my puppy I knew she was up to trouble! Good luck!

 

[ceegee]

Yes, crate your dog when you can't supervise him. My dog is 18 months old and still sleeps in his crate at night, not because he's destructive, but because he moves around and wakes me up. I always crate my dogs when I'm out of the house, for their own safety and my piece of mind.

And as an additional comment, your dog doesn't know it's "wrong" to chew the carpet. Dogs don't think like that. He knows you get angry when you look at the carpet and he's reacting to your anger, not to what he's done.

 

[nolefan]

You've received wonderful replies here, I hope you are buying a crate (extra large) if you don't have one and planning how to increase your puppy's daily exercise. Chewing is a way of burning off energy as well as responding to their teeth growing and setting. You have to provide him with appropriate things to chew AND manage him when you can't watch him AND give him hard, aerobic exercise like swimming, off leash hikes in a safe place etc. - all these suggestions work together to make both the dog and the owner happy.

 

[CedarFurbaby]

Life is less frustrating if you accept that a puppy is going to destroy a lot of stuff. Not his fault, it's because we haven't put that interesting stuff away when we don't watch him. My puppy destroyed soooo much stuff, stuff I didn't think he could reach, stuff I didn't think he was interested in, stuff that he didn't mean to destroy (he just crashed into it), stuff I just plain forgot to put away, so I decided anything less than 300 dollars I won't sweat it, it's replaceable and its part of the cost of a puppy's first year. That mindset helped me get through the worst of the chewing days.

 

[nolefan]

Life is less frustrating if you accept that a puppy is going to destroy a lot of stuff....

We ALL have those moments when we realize we didn't put the remote control high enough or shouldn't have left something tempting within reach :banghead:
but honestly, there is no reason to accept that puppies will destroy your home or your valuable items, clothing or furnishings. They truly can be managed so these things rarely happen.

I agree that a degree of acceptance for mistakes is needed, but the more these incidents occur, the greater your risk that your Golden will ingest something that will kill him. Blockages from just about any little thing you can imagine will absolutely kill a dog if you don't recognize the symptoms in time. The diagnostics, surgery and accompanying meds etc. to treat a blockage runs close to $3500 (U.S. dollars) in my area. (Yes, this is personal experience )

 

[CedarFurbaby]

We ALL have those moments when we realize we didn't put the remote control high enough or shouldn't have left something tempting within reach :banghead:
but honestly, there is no reason to accept that puppies will destroy your home or your valuable items, clothing or furnishings. They truly can be managed so these things rarely happen.

I agree that a degree of acceptance for mistakes is needed, but the more these incidents occur, the greater your risk that your Golden will ingest something that will kill him. Blockages from just about any little thing you can imagine will absolutely kill a dog if you don't recognize the symptoms in time. The diagnostics, surgery and accompanying meds etc. to treat a blockage runs close to $3500 (U.S. dollars) in my area. (Yes, this is personal experience )

Well I agree of course that you should try to manage these things. Some dogs are just stubborn and love their chewing, mine still does at 15 months. And I still keep the tempting things out of reach. I'm just saying that sometimes no matter how much you plan and prepare and try your best to manage it all the time, he still destroyed stuff and if I did not have some level of acceptance I would be mad at him every other day. Which is not healthy for me or him. What worked for me is to keep removing items that he was interested in and not stress that it's new or it's expensive. The item is replaceable, the dog, if he ingested something dangerous, is not.

 

[nolefan]

I think we may be talking about differing definitions of "acceptance". I agree with the idea that when you have a puppy you have to be prepared to have some destruction and that the proper attitude after the event is not anger or frustration with the dog but more of "well, what's done is done, I'll try harder to make sure that he doesn't have that opportunity again." I also agree that some dogs are more challenging than others in terms of looking for things to 'get into'. What I believe is that dogs like that require a higher level of supervision and restriction on their access to the house and it may be that is required for life. We have a 2 story home and I have a built in gate on the landing of my stairs to make sure that I can prevent our dogs from going up there when I'm not aware because I won't accept that Ellie getting bored and going up to find a candy wrapper my kids left in a trash can or chewing up a flavored chapstick etc. is inevitable. My parents' Golden, Sailor, spends a lot of time at my house (they live in my neighborhood) the dog is extremely bright and borderline ADD (I'm not kidding, I she is a handful) I put the "puppy mode" baby gates back up when she's around. For the first year or so of Ellie's life I kept gates up so that she was kept in our kitchen and main living area - I still crate Sailor when I leave the house because I refuse to accept that her destroying stuff is just part of the territory of having a puppy (ok, so she's 4 years old now and still a hot mess) but that is what I meant by "not accepting" that mass destruction has to be the norm with having a puppy.

 

[puddles everywhere]

Well put nolefan... sounds like this pup has way too much free time on his hands.

 

[Foxster]

I think he needs more exercise. My baby destroyed the hime of previous owner but with me its just remotes or anything he feels I value - glasses etc etc which I put out of reach.

For me exercise and mental games have worked - go find tires him out completely... plus he has access to bedroom. Slowly I am leaving shoes put when I sleep and as yet none chewed.

Also he was very mouthy and chewy and tried bad tasting options but for last weekcover myself with extra virgin coconut oil and mouthing has turned to licking...

 

[Sweet Girl]

I have to agree with Nolefan. I didn't have any level of acceptance that things will just get destroyed. Nothing in my house did get destroyed - through two Golden Retriever puppies - because I never gave them the opportunity to destroy anything. There were no shoes left on the floor, no remote control in reach, no phones, no rugs on the floor, no access to table legs or chair rungs. One of my dogs pulled the tea towels down on her first night home, so the tea towels didn't hang til she was over that phase. The bathroom garbage had a lid. The toilet paper roll was on the vanity. And my house had baby gates and x-pens galore for the first little while. She was never left unsupervised, even for 30 seconds. If I was out, she was in her crate. Otherwise, she was with me. It really does work. Don't give them a chance to chew or destroy, and they won't.

 

[1wdmcdonn1]

Ok, let me admit up front that I am again the skunk at the picnic on this subject. I agree with everyone's suggestions here. Despite having lots of toys to chew on, my Bailey still chewed everything in sight, including my hands, as I simply could not put him in his cage every time I could not supervise him. So, several ruined rugs, I made the conscious choice that when I caught him in the act, or even if the act was very recent, I would take him back to the scene of the crime, say "No" very firmly and then spray Bitter Apple directly in his mouth. It took no more than about four times and the problem was completely solved. In fact, he runs in the other direction to avoid the harmless, but really nasty taste.

 

[puddles everywhere]

Maybe I'm just an old prude... spraying something at my dog (and certainly not in his mouth) and them running from me isn't the type of bond I choose to have with my dog.
Much like Sweetgirl I had zero destruction from any puppy I've had in the last 50 yrs, land shark only lasted a few weeks and never resurfaced.
Prior to picking my pup up I puppy proofed every room. If she happened to pick up a sock while doing laundry or a shoe when i got dressed I happily tell her thank you and what a good girl she is. When I accidentally drop something she happily picks it up for me.
If she was trying to chew at my hands we played a quick game of "touch" and learned how to sit, down, turn circles, retrieves. It takes just as long to stop and do something positive as it does to fuss.
Most times it's you they want to play with and not the toys but you have to teach them how to play with people, they only know how to play with other puppies. Because we built a bond on trust she brings me things vs. running and hiding or guarding it. Every situation is a chance for them to learn. Giving them too much freedom without knowing the rules is an invitation for destruction. They are being a puppy... it's up to you to set the boundaries and teach them what is acceptable.
I love that my girl never fears me for doing anything. I love that she brings me things even if it's something the cats knocked to the floor. I love that she crawled into the washer to get the socks when she was 4 months old ... still does but now she can reach without getting all the way in. I love that she brings me the food bowls for me to wash after each meal. She carries my empty water bottles to the trash and will bring me a new bottle off the shelf. She is inventing games she thinks will make me happy vs. tearing something up. She is now 16 months and laying under my feet, she is always beside me and always happy.
What did you teach your dog by spraying something in their mouth?

 

[Sweet Girl]

Maybe I'm just an old prude... spraying something at my dog (and certainly not in his mouth) and them running from me isn't the type of bond I choose to have with my dog.
Much like Sweetgirl I had zero destruction from any puppy I've had in the last 50 yrs, land shark only lasted a few weeks and never resurfaced.
Prior to picking my pup up I puppy proofed every room. If she happened to pick up a sock while doing laundry or a shoe when i got dressed I happily tell her thank you and what a good girl she is. When I accidentally drop something she happily picks it up for me.
If she was trying to chew at my hands we played a quick game of "touch" and learned how to sit, down, turn circles, retrieves. It takes just as long to stop and do something positive as it does to fuss.
Most times it's you they want to play with and not the toys but you have to teach them how to play with people, they only know how to play with other puppies. Because we built a bond on trust she brings me things vs. running and hiding or guarding it. Every situation is a chance for them to learn. Giving them too much freedom without knowing the rules is an invitation for destruction. They are being a puppy... it's up to you to set the boundaries and teach them what is acceptable.
I love that my girl never fears me for doing anything. I love that she brings me things even if it's something the cats knocked to the floor. I love that she crawled into the washer to get the socks when she was 4 months old ... still does but now she can reach without getting all the way in. I love that she brings me the food bowls for me to wash after each meal. She carries my empty water bottles to the trash and will bring me a new bottle off the shelf. She is inventing games she thinks will make me happy vs. tearing something up. She is now 16 months and laying under my feet, she is always beside me and always happy.
What did you teach your dog by spraying something in their mouth?

I love this!! I've never thought of that - but Shala is the same. For some reason, she has a thing for beeswax candles. When she was three years old, we were at my aunt's for Christmas, and she was fascinated by these candles my aunt had bought for friends of hers. There must be something about the smell of them? Anyway. My aunt brought them upstairs and stored them away in her room. The next day, we were in the kitchen having breakfast, and Shala appeared, very carefully holding one of the candles. She brought it over to me and gently dropped it into my hand. She hadn't gotten even a single tooth mark on it, and my aunt was still able to give it as a gift! I thought at the time it was so interesting that she didn't stay up in my aunt's room and chew and destroy it - but brought it to me instead.

 

[nolefan]

Ellie let's me know she's bored by finding trash left around by the kids (tissue, paper cup etc.) and bringing it to me. She sits and looks at me and holds it while thumping her tail and I laugh and say "Give". Then she reluctantly spits it out. I make a big deal out of praising her and telling her what a good girl she is. Cracks me up.

 

[1wdmcdonn1]

I respect how you choose to discipline your dog, Sweet Girl, in this case, with a very gentle approach. In my case, multiple efforts to redirect his negative energy resulted in no progress, so I felt something firmer was necessary. The good news is that it took no more than three or four such reprimands for the problem to be totally resolved.