Does anybody want a dog?

[Lewie'sMom]

I am so incredibly disappointed right now I could cry. Lewie did serious damage to my new natural cherry hardwood (or not so hard) floor.

 

I stayed home from work today feeling a bit under the weather. Tuesday would normally be a non day-care day so he'd be at home alone, crated all day. Because I’m not feeling well we've been just hanging around the house all day, vegging out. I assumed that because he was getting a “free day” he’d be mellow and laid back. But, as the day had progressed, he got increasingly active, boisterous and annoying. I'd been able to keep him occupied with his toys, or so I thought. He has a hard plastic Nylabone that he really likes and was chewing on that while I was spaced out in front of the TV.

 

About an hour ago, I turned the TV off to drag myself into the shower when I realized that Lewie hadn't been chewing on the bone but had been chewing and gouging the living room floor! Needless to say, I'm so stunned and so disappointed in him right now I can't even put it into words. I know he's "just a dog" and doesn't "get it" but this is really first thing he's done that's broken my heart.

 

The money I spent to have hardwood floors put in was inheritance money from my late mother. I don't know if I'm so upset because he's damaged something that makes me think of my dear mom, or what. I've even taken away an old Vermont Chewman from him that had belonged to my beloved, late golden so he couldn't destroy that too.

 

I know I'm over reacting, most likely because I'm not feeling well. The floor can be repaired but I feel like I've been wasting my time and resources for the last 8-1/2 months. I've spent more money on this pup in his short life so he’s not cooped up 5 days a week than I care to think about it. He's not a wild dog, he has boundaries and I expect him to obey and to be a good family member. He’s definitely privileged and doesn't want for anything. He really is sweet natured and happy so I can’t figure out why he went cuckoo tonight. I KNOW I can't expect him to understand but I feel like I’ve been betrayed by my best friend.

 

Thanks for letting me vent. I'll get over it eventually.

[diane allen]

Sorry about your floor and the memory connection, but your sign-off says it, "A tired dog is a good dog." This is REALLY hard when you're sick! Will he fetch/retrieve? Its a lazy-woman's way to exercise a dog, but in a pinch....or can someone else work with him when you can't? Just some thoughts...

 

diane

[mbc1963]

Oooh... tough one! My neighbor's lab ate her wallpaper off the walls when she was about 9 months... and then ate the drywall underneath it.

 

My dog stays home alone all day and sleeps under a table, from what I can tell. But if I happen to be home with him on a weekend or a sick day, he seems to expect me to be DOING stuff with him. Sort of like, "Well, you're here, why aren't you PLAYING with me!?"

 

Mary

[Lewie'sMom]

Oooh... tough one! My neighbor's lab ate her wallpaper off the walls when she was about 9 months... and then ate the drywall underneath it.

 

My dog stays home alone all day and sleeps under a table, from what I can tell. But if I happen to be home with him on a weekend or a sick day, he seems to expect me to be DOING stuff with him. Sort of like, "Well, you're here, why aren't you PLAYING with me!?"

 

Mary

 

 

 

That's EXACTLY what he seemed to be saying yesterday, as the day went on, jumping up on me, getting in my face. Sometimes I'm pretty dense even when I'm not sick. And yes, I do think he's smarter than I am.

 

Normally on weekends, we're doing stuff, running errands, buzzing around the house/yard so he's usually got something to entertain him but yesterday I was a complete couch potato.

 

I'll have to remember that "BC" and "couch potato" are completely incompatible.

[Ms.DaisyDuke]

aww. that's too bad. poor floor i am sure it's even worse because there are memories attached to it, and you're sick. i am very emotional when i'm sick.

but remember, it's not like he did it to spite you. i don't think they have those kinds of feelings.

[MrSnappy]

My first border collie Abi ate through a wall. She saw me put her tennis ball in the storage closet, so she ate through the wall to get it.

 

She also ate a jar of multi coloured pens. She ate this on my white carpet in my rental townhouse. She was also mostly white. Or she was before she got the pens anyway.

 

I do believe my darling foster dog Dolly ate most of the leg of an antique desk my partner's recently deceased mother gave us.

 

Etc.

 

Congratulations, you have a dog.

 

RDM

[Beach BCs]

My first BC ripped up all the linoleum in the kitchen of our rental. She was so proud of herself. It only took about an hour. My husband was so mad he turned purple every time he looked at Ally for weeks afterward. It was a hard lesson to learn. We replaced the flooring without the landlord knowing it ever happened. After that we would get a 'baby-sitter' whenever we had to leave her. This was before we knew about crates.

 

Oh, she also chewed through drywall. She went through the kitchen wall to our bedroom and then through our bedroom to the living room. We learned alot of DIY skills quick.

 

One more thing (although this could go on forever)...I had rolled about $200 of pennies. That was fun...NOT. Well, while I was in the shower Ally (who loved anything paper) ripped open ALL of the rollers. Now picture me franticly counting all those pennies again to make sure she didn't swallow any.

[Lenajo]

I'm truly sorry about your floor. It's awful right now, but you will find a way to get it fixed, and 16 years from now you will laughingly barely remember the floor as opposed to a lifetime with a great dog.

 

Trust me, I've got a 17 year old right now that pulled up all the new linoleum one afternoon at about that age. It's funny now, and also bittersweet, because I'd give an entire house full of shredded flooring for 17 more years with her.

 

Now...

 

1 word: Crate

 

yep, Crate. If you can't see him, if you aren't attached to him, he needs to be in one. For the next *year* minimum.

 

Exercise him, train him, supervise him, and crate him.

 

When I read stuff like what you are going through, I don't understand the great crate debate on other threads. I wouldn't have lost the floor here if I'd known about them years ago.

 

Again, so sorry about the floor.

[Jedismom]

Hi, I'm so sorry that happened.

 

When I first got him, Jedi broke one of my Christmas collectible mugs which can't be replaced. He also chewed around the frame of a picture of my son when he was in pre-school which my son had made. Can't be replaced, but secretly I thought it was an improvement My son, however, was upset so we collected all the pieces to attempt to glue them back.

 

When Jedi gets the "zoomies" and I don't want to be bothered I will put him in his crate. When I first did this I felt bad about it, but I quickly realized it was better for him in the long run then my getting aggravated with him.

 

I hope you feel better soon.

 

Georgia

[Rockstar]

Let's see, just to make you feel a little better (in a you're-not-the-only-one type of way) Roxy chewed THROUGH her crate, then through a wall, and has chewed more than I care to put a $$ amount to. A leather briefcase, 2 pairs of Oakley sunglasses, too many shoes to count, the blinds, blankets, her crate pad, seatbelts in 2 cars, etc etc. Obviously I could've avoided some of that, but you live and you learn.

 

It does get better!! They do grow out of that stage, well, mine both did anyway.

[Kayleegator]

Hey, I feel your pain, too! Just last week we noticed that Kaylee had clawed deep gouges in our wonderful cork floor, which has amazingly resisted all attempts at damage up to this point: I mean, we play a lot of ball on this floor and it's never had a scratch. She also created a second hole in our LR rug, pulling the wool out so it looks like a giant moth as been at it. Both are just a year old, sigh. So much for the remodel. She was just bored when she ate the rug. The floor, though, was damaged because she was trying to dig up the sunbeam that fell there.

 

By the sound of these posts, though, you and I are lucky! Tough lesson, though, I agree.

 

Hope you are feeling a little better now, and can get that rascal outside for a run!

[Lewie'sMom]

 

Oh my! You're all making me laugh and feel a whole lot better.

 

I know the damage can be repaired/replaced, it was just a shock because he was laying at my feet.

 

I love reading about the antics you've experienced with your BC's. Please, keep 'em coming! It's so good to know that Lewie is acting like a normal BC.

 

And thanks for all the well wishes. I'm back to my normal self today. Back in Jan of 2006 I learned I had breast cancer (metastasized breast cancer is what my dear mom died of) and I'm on Armidex for at least 5 years, which is normal treatment. Sometimes I hit the Armidex wall and just have to sleep, which is what yesterday was.

 

I love BC Boards!

[Nik]

When my two were puppies, we left for all of an hour if that...and I babygated them in the kitchen w/ two kitchen table chairs in front of the gate to make sure they couldn't jump the gate. I came home...no dogs in the kitchen where I left them so I wondered how they got out. No holes in the baby gate and surely they DIDN"T jump the chairs, but there they were in my living room w/ all of my potted plants turned over and dirt ground into the carpet, the corner of my brand new sofa chewed, and the kicker....little doggy footprints tracked all over the place from where one of them pooped and both of them stepped in it and made tracks all over the carpet along w/ the dirt. On OFF-WHITE carpet no less.

 

It took 2 or 3 days of steam cleaning carpet giving the dogs a bath and trying to salvage enough potting soil to keep my plants alive until I could get some more to put in the pots. I fumed for weeks over this. Come to find out they chewed through the babygate but the place they chewed through created a flap instead of a hole so it fell back into place and it took a WHOLE lot of searching to find out where the flap was created. I could just see the whole process going through their little heads as they figured out how to outsmart me on that deal. They definitely had me outwitted for a little while on that.

[Woodenlion]

That is a tough age. Cocoa reduced me to tears when she was that old. And it was my fault for having no idea what she required. I do laugh about it now. Mostly at me and how clueless I was. Frozen kong with peanut butter gave me at least a hour of peace. Good Luck with your treatment.

 

Toni

[juliepoudrier]

Lesson learned? If you hear your youngster chewing, never assume that it's chewing on something appropriate unless you can see it with your own eyes. And even if you check and the pup is chewing on something that's allowed, that doesn't mean that the continued chewing noises you hear 5 minutes later are directed at the same object the dog was chewing on when last you checked. I have several antique items with chew marks that were made by youngsters starting with something innocuous like a cow hoove and just sort of moving on to the furniture--you know, the cow hoof is up against that rocker and "Woops! my teeth just went around cow hoof and rocker. Oh well, the wood is is fun to chew as the hoof, so I'll just keep going...." (I've heard the nearly two year olds chewing on things in the other room, and there are plenty of acceptable things to chew lying around, but invariably I'll get suspicious and go look and they'll have one of my shoes, or worse.)

 

J.

[urge to herd]

No chewing stories, but three times the fun . . .

 

I'm Designated Dog Person in the family, which is fine. When I'm really busy with work DH steps up to the plate, for the most part. A couple years ago, I was working 10 hour days, 6 days a week during December. One Tuesday, I came home to find the house looking a little tornado aftermath-ish, and DH very disgruntled. Sami had overturned the trash, spread it out all over the kitchen and living room, and left a trail of the most yummy things to her crate, where she was contentedly chewing up a microwave popcorn bag, when DH got back from an errand. He cleaned it all up, but she was not his favorite dog that day.

Wednesay, he came home from an errand to find the locked dog kibble bin had been opened and turned over. He said there was kibble from one end of the house to the other, chewies, empty cookie bags, toys, you name it. Our very own Devil in a Border Collie Suit was the criminal in this one, we could tell because Shoshone had eaten so much she looked like she'd swallowed a basketball.

The third day, he came home to find a living room full of diarrhea and dog vomit. We're pretty sure it was Buzz - Shoshone has an iron stomach and Buzz's gut gets upset at the flutter of moth wings - god love him, he cleaned it up the best he could, left the door open because the smell was still bad, and managed to pat Buzz on the head by the evening.

Being as he is retired, and I'm still working, he couldn't complain. Sometimes, karma really does work.

 

Ruth n the BC3

[sweet_ceana]

LOL 7-9 months is a fun age. Ceana pulled up the carpet at all the door ways in our town home. She chewed base boards at our apt... and I am still working on regaining my former shoe glory. I wish we would have crated her! LOL Without a crate I can't even imagine the trouble Poke would get into... he can jump on top of the kitchen counter!

Hang in there, and try to laugh about the whole situation. LOL try and think of it as he was trying to amuse himself so that you could get some rest. LOL if you spin it that way it almost sounds considerate!

[nancy in AZ]

When Minnie was a pup her curiousity got the best of her. She was just dying to findout what was hidden underneath my carpeting. When she discovered it was padding she was elated, cause that's just oodles of fun to shred. Boo has eaten two of my leather bound address books. Well, one I was able to salvage the spiral bound address section . He had hidden it under the garden shed. Thank goodness because since he had already eaten the first one I would have lost forever all my contacts.

 

When I moved in with my parents for six months after college my cat Evelyn used the back of my Mom's Knoll chair as a scratching post. At the time I didn't know that Knoll chairs are considered to be architectural pieces. This was the same cat that vomited on my brand new buckskin colored leather couch 48 hrs after it was delivered. She's gone now (died at age 20) but I still have that stain there to remember her by

 

Personally, I think kids are equally if not more destructive than dogs. When I was small, my father used to call me "Little Adolph" because, he claimed, I destroyed everything in my path. What he didn't know was it was my older brother who was the destroyer. I was just the one who got blamed for everything cause he'd lie about it.

[BCMomma]

We do not own any towels, sheets, blankets or pillows without chewed marks. Most our blankets are ponchos because Rudi chewed holes right in the middle - and she's almost 12!

 

She was a model puppy so I do believe she is reverting back to puppyhood because she has a good time. We just have to laugh because we were very fortunate when she was a puppy - no major damage to anything to speak of. But now she can't be trusted on the bed or in the living room unsupervised or we'll be find pillow stuffing everywhere. And again, SHE'S 12!!!!!

 

But we love her we just don't spend a lot of money on linens or pillows these days.

[Samson]

I'm sorry to hear about your floor. Samson has chewed a number of shoes, furniture, etc. Once we started crating him and really exercising him in the morning, afternoon and night we don't have to worry about it. Tire him out and he'll be less inclined to mischeive. Hope you're feelin better

[border_collie_crazy]

I admit to plenty of detroyers too .

 

Misty broke our bathroom door, our back screen door AND our front door! she completly dug up the floor by our back door(we keep it covered with a rug, she tore through like 5-6 layers of flooring)

 

Electra has a thing for pencils...she will find them anywhere and the next time we need a pencil there wont be a single one unchewed lol. she also has a thing for making off my my other pets toys and eating them, I was so confused when it first started happening, I would be cleaning cages, set down a toy or dish or something and I would go about my buisness, then I would go and grab the objects and they would be gone...before I found out Electra was taking them I thought I was loosing my mind lol

 

Perky put her foot through a wall, she got exited jumped off of some peice of furniture(I cant remeber what) and hit the wall..her leg went straight through lol.

[esox]

Glad to hear you're feeling a bit better. I used to refer to Alex as our furry paper shredder. Newspapers, toilet paper, books. She would walk up to the bookcase and act like she was picking one and then paper would fly. She has 2 Labrador brothers and between the 3 of them they have gone through a banister, several pairs of sunglasses, 1 pair of eyeglasses, and my roomie's dentures.

The best was when her son, thinking she was at home, put them in her room instead of their crates. When we got home from work I realized they were up there. When I went to get them the door wouldn't open. They had pulled the mattress off the bed, shredded it, and the comforter, blanket, and sheets.

 

Good news though. When each one got to be about 1 they stopped. They're now 2 1/2, 3, and 3 1/2.

[afrancis]

Skye had her own moment at about 1 year old.

I had gone out and bought some beautiful new feather pillows (4 in total), put them into freshly washed cases and then onto the bed, plumped them up, smoothed down the duvet and then put a big towel over said duvet (to keep it from getting *soiled* -- I never used that word!) while Skye lay there, as I knew she would, after I left. You can see it coming, right?

I got home later that day and she was in the living room looking at me from around the corner of the coffee table. I immediately knew something was up. Call it bc-owner instinct, but I went upstairs and found, first, the towel scrunched up on the floor and second, the entire bedroom covered in feathers.

Now when I think of this INCIDENT, I imagine her gleefully throwing the pillows up in the air and barking in ecstasy while she is being showered in feathers! And when she thinks of this INCIDENT, she remembers me picking up every last feather, re-stuffing the pillows and stitching them up.

I'm glad you're feeling better and the stories have helped

Ailsa

[Gary M]

I could have strangled her when I got home and found this...

 

 

I'd now give almost anything to be able to come home and see it again.

 

Floors can be replaced.

The love of a good dog cannot.

[Root Beer]

Speedy shredded/partially ate a wooden cross necklace I had that had been blessed by Pope John Paul II.

 

Six years later I laugh about it. When they are young, it is so easy to get angry at things like this. When they start to get older and you realize that they aren't going to be with you forever, those things just don't seem to matter.