How do you protect your x-mas tree from puppies?

We always get a real tree, the last few years I have had young dogs again... so we buy a 5 foot tree and put it on an end table. It does help...

Julie

I'm so glad you brought this up. I have no idea how we are going to keep Murphy away from the tree so I'm definitely listening to all ideas.

So am I!!!

As we are never home for the holidays we have never had a Christmas tree since we got our dogs. I am slightly worried about it in the future.. I can just SEE Sam hiking a leg on one!! :doh:

I don't ever remember any of my puppies causing problems with the tree. In fact, they seemed to give it a wide berth when going by it. Maybe I just have been lucky!!! LOL

Us too!! The menorah at least we can put up on the fireplace ledge, but I haven't quite figured out how we're going to have our tree remain standing with 2 cats and a puppy *literally* running around!

We actually never had a problem with our tree last year when Tucker was a puppy. He around 5 months old during Christmas last year and he didn't really bother the tree too much. We did catch him trying to gnaw on a couple of the branches a few times, but he was also just starting his teething then. We just redirected him and gave him a frozen washcloth or something else to chew on and he was fine with the tree. The cats are a totally different story! We just got a new Russian Blue kitten in April and he gets into EVERYTHING, so I'm a lot more worried about him! Our other 3 cats like to take ornaments off the tree and bat them acorss the floor. One of them brought one of those glass balls into our bed last year and DH didn't see it and sat right on it. :doh::doh::doh:

missmarstar said:

As we are never home for the holidays we have never had a Christmas tree since we got our dogs. I am slightly worried about it in the future.. I can just SEE Sam hiking a leg on one!! :doh:

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Oh jeez, I never even thought about that! :doh:

This year we are putting our tree up in the living room. We have french doors that separate the Living/Dining Rooms from the rest of the house, and Molson doesn't have access to them when we aren't there, so we are safe for the most part. I think my dreams of putting up the green garland things with christmas lights through the railings of the stairs and hallways have been shattered now. I think I can still hang mistle toe though!

We never had a problem. We did put the ornaments up high enough that they couldn't reach them but they never bothered the tree.

Neither one of my dogs give it but a moments sniff, but Rusty's tail is just out of control all the time.... I just make sure any "glass" ornaments go up past where his tail can reach them!

Gate the area off so they can only have access when you are there to supervise. Or put the pup in an x-pen when you cannot supervise. For safety put all glass and round (ball like) ornaments out of reach of mouths and tails.
Usually, the first year/tree is a lot of work on your part, but with the supervision they end up understanding the rules.

I love them knowing how to open gifts. I think it is so much fun for them to do it. But, to insure they don't open all the gifts when the wrapped gifts go under the tree the dogs are not able to get to them until I are able to supervise.

Or (joking) hang the tree from the ceiling.

solinvictus said:

Or (joking) hang the tree from the ceiling.

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No joke I know people who do this. Looks weird.

never had any problems with my dogs. We do put heavy lifting plates on the bottom of the stand,but its mostly from kids.

I have no idea how I'm going to deal with this! I was taking Halloween colored garland down and Rocky immediately thought it was a great toy for tug and grabbed the other end :doh:

My advice.. keep the tree away from windows My bridge dog, Cody, loved to look out the front windows and bark at squirrels, bunnies, etc, and almost knocked down the tree a couple times! Definitely keep ornaments you value towards the top of the tree. We learned this lesson when Cody ate my brother's baby ornament :

My dogs never bothered the tree...Its the darn cats that keep climbing up inside it..

No joke I know people who do this. Looks weird.

Wow! I don't know if I could behave with decorum if I really ran into that.

Another thing I thought of....

For the safety of the dogs don't use those decorative icicles. I have no experience (thank goodness) but I have heard they can really damage a dogs internal system if they digest them.

I've been worrying about the same thing. I'm thinking that my tree is going on my tall coffee table. I've got 25-30 foot ceilings in my living room so hopefully it doesn't look too weird. Sophie is always trying to chew on pine trees when we go for walks so I'm sure a Christmas tree in the house would be pretty tempting for her.

In past years I've had to tie my tree to the wall. I've got a crazy cat who likes to climb the tree. One day I came home to find the tree knocked over into the fish tank. I think she was trying to get a snack!

We have our Christmas tree up already (I'm a Christmas nut. It's been up since November 2nd...) and the only time the puppies tried anything with the tree was the first time they came out of their kennels after putting it up. They haven't bothered it since.

I bought shatterproof ornaments, though, because it's like baseball with their tails swinging and knocking bulbs off the tree.