I feel your pain! My youngest two, now almost three, were quite the challenges as youngsters, too. Panda McHellion and Walter McHooligan. They still are in some ways. The boy is 37% a blend of four Hounds, 13% Husky, plus ten other breeds. I'm sure the girl has some Labby mixed in with the Hound as she is a confirmed fetchaholic. There really needs to be a law about any one organism being allowed THAT much energy. It's not fair to the rest of us. These two were paws down the worst little buggers for eating anything and everything they could find. We wound up having to remove all toxic shrubs and plants from the dog yard, and I got a really good working knowledge of what plants were toxic at what level. I practically had Chewy Ask-A-Vet on speed dial. They dug up roots and chewed on them, yanked bark off trees, unearthed buried hickory nuts as a snack, chewed up two welcome mats, part of the kitchen island, a chunk of the living room rug, and goodness remembers what else. I was keeping a Puppy Destruction Tally, but, understandably, I lost count. True to his Houndy inventiveness, problem solving, and food motivation, my boy kept getting into the cupboards. We put barrel locks on the cupboards. He figured out how to open them. Then he stopped getting into the cupboards. It was as if he just wanted me to know he had the ability to do it, like he had won the game, really. He used this new skill to open the barrel locks on the custom made kitchen gate, too, just to prove a point. They couldn't reach my bamboo windchimes on the porch, so they dragged over one of the folding chairs, got up on it, took the windchimes down and THEN chewed them. Then there was the way the dogs mysteriously kept getting back into the house once we had put them out in their fenced yard. At first, we figured we had simply not pushed the door all the way to click in, so we started double checking that we had. Then one day while the dogs were out, I was peacefully vacuuming the sunroom when I received a launched greeting of exuberant paws in the middle of my back announcing, "We're back in now, Mom! Hooray!" A little detective work later we found out my Hound boy had figured out how to turn the door knob and push. All that aside, crazy lunatic rescue mutts make THE best stories, and the memories of a lifetime to stay with you forever. I wouldn't trade these two wingnuts for anything!
Love "How You and Your Hell Beast Puppy Can Survive the First Year" But many people would not buy it. Because many people think their dog is a Perfect Puppy. It takes a great person to admit they love a relative of the Cartoon Tazmainian Devel.
P.S. We have FOUR dogs in the pack. It's just that the other two are practically sedated librarians by comparison.
I feel your pain! My youngest two, now almost three, were quite the challenges as youngsters, too. Panda McHellion and Walter McHooligan. They still are in some ways. The boy is 37% a blend of four Hounds, 13% Husky, plus ten other breeds. I'm sure the girl has some Labby mixed in with the Hound as she is a confirmed fetchaholic. There really needs to be a law about any one organism being allowed THAT much energy. It's not fair to the rest of us. These two were paws down the worst little buggers for eating anything and everything they could find. We wound up having to remove all toxic shrubs and plants from the dog yard, and I got a really good working knowledge of what plants were toxic at what level. I practically had Chewy Ask-A-Vet on speed dial. They dug up roots and chewed on them, yanked bark off trees, unearthed buried hickory nuts as a snack, chewed up two welcome mats, part of the kitchen island, a chunk of the living room rug, and goodness remembers what else. I was keeping a Puppy Destruction Tally, but, understandably, I lost count. True to his Houndy inventiveness, problem solving, and food motivation, my boy kept getting into the cupboards. We put barrel locks on the cupboards. He figured out how to open them. Then he stopped getting into the cupboards. It was as if he just wanted me to know he had the ability to do it, like he had won the game, really. He used this new skill to open the barrel locks on the custom made kitchen gate, too, just to prove a point. They couldn't reach my bamboo windchimes on the porch, so they dragged over one of the folding chairs, got up on it, took the windchimes down and THEN chewed them. Then there was the way the dogs mysteriously kept getting back into the house once we had put them out in their fenced yard. At first, we figured we had simply not pushed the door all the way to click in, so we started double checking that we had. Then one day while the dogs were out, I was peacefully vacuuming the sunroom when I received a launched greeting of exuberant paws in the middle of my back announcing, "We're back in now, Mom! Hooray!" A little detective work later we found out my Hound boy had figured out how to turn the door knob and push. All that aside, crazy lunatic rescue mutts make THE best stories, and the memories of a lifetime to stay with you forever. I wouldn't trade these two wingnuts for anything!
Love "How You and Your Hell Beast Puppy Can Survive the First Year" But many people would not buy it. Because many people think their dog is a Perfect Puppy. It takes a great person to admit they love a relative of the Cartoon Tazmainian Devel.