Hey guys! I know I've been absent for a while. School has been super crazy and work and house stuff and now I've started a new job. But I'm in need of some advice. If this is in the wrong place let me know!

We have gotten rid of the kennels for Nikita and Archer with the new year. However we have a problem. They have taken to chewing holes in the walls. There's two holes that they've started. We've elected to not patch them until we get it solved so we can fix all the holes at one time instead of one a time. We are 90% sure it's Nikita which is good because bitter spray works for her. (Archer LOVES the taste ) I'm positive it's boredom and not anxiety related. 

Ben and I are gone for a good 8-11 hours a day depending on the day. They don't have access to the yard because it's not finished and we don't want them to escape while we're gone. The only thing I have is Kong's. They use those for a while but it's not enough to keep them entertained for that long. They're either empty or barely touched when we get home but the wall is still chewed most of the time.

What else can we do to keep them from getting bored and resorting to chewing the wall? 

I also want to note that Nikita has a bit of resource guarding so high value stuff is a no go with no one here to watch them. Not even sure that she doesn't steal the Kong from Archer once we leave.

There is a time and place for most anything, and the time for you to be using a kennel is NOW!

Of my three, I'll trust Sasha in the house for a couple of hours - all I'll find is a piddle in the kitchen (damnit!) If Sky stays in the house, she's crated and Avalanche doesn't get a choice, he's outside on lead (which is where Sky normally is if I'm gone for long.) It would be nice to have trustworthy dogs - I don't (and you don't either) so crating them is the best thing for your sanity and their safety.

I have two appointments Friday in Alpine (1.5 hours each way) and will be at each appt for at least an hour with a stop for lunch, it'll be a good 6 - 7 hours before I get home. Sasha will be crated while I'm gone; the other two will be outside so aside from a couple of new 'bomb craters' everyone will be happy when I get home.

Freedom from the kennel is earned not given. When they've shown you they can be trusted is the time to put the kennels away or maybe just leave the doors open (Sasha wouldn't know what to do if she didn't have her 'home' to go to ...)

My fiance does not want the kennels. I tried to get him to do the whole freedom is earned but he says they'll eventually figure out not to chew on the wall. There's not a good place for the kennels anyway in our house so I was happy to have them gone and the bedroom back to normal size. But maybe I gave up too soon.

We thought about blocking off the hallway with gates. Would that be a good compromise?? Give them freedom but not to the area they chew?? And then slowly introduce parts as they gain trust?

I'm sorry but I do not ever trust a husky alone in the house for more than a few minutes. My first girl, circa 1972, was a horror... She managed to pull the heavy vinyl wallpaper off the entire apartment. She destroyed every stay and back cushion on all our upholstered furniture. She peed on our bed. She necessitated vet appointments getting into discard cans and getting them lodged on her snout.

Years later? Ami. Left alone briefly in our sunroom. Shredded sofa pillows. Never again. Crated in house or outside on trolley with doghouse. Zev is crated (he would find a way to strangle himself, hang himself or sever a limb if I left him on any kind of tether.)

Unless you have a concrete basement with nothing in it, no furnace, no wiring, no laundry... Nothing, the dog is not safe if it is chewing things.

If you want i can dig up the pics of what $17k worth of damage looks like. Spider quite literally destroyed a mobile home. At through the walls, the floor, the sub floor, the doorknob. I was gone about 12 hours had to take a bus to denver to buy a new vehicle or i would have brought her. A tether isnt an option because there are too many things that could get to her and i dont trust her not to hurt herself in the process. Basically i either bring her or hire a babysitter.

And yes i know a wolf is destructive, but honestly, i think huskies are worse, and the wolf husky mix seems to bring out the worst in the husky side.

On the other end of the spectrum is squirt. She is fine as long as she doesnt have access to my bed. If she can get to my bed, she will take a shit on my pillow.

Although we seldom need to anymore, we were able to train our two girls, Myka and Lyra, to stay home alone without any trouble. It must be noted that these two girls are not the first huskies we have owned, and our earlier experiences helped inform how we trained these two. Our previous girl, Nikita, also chewed through walls when she was young, and our first two huskies, Tonya and Sonya, were just never left in the house alone.

Our "theory of training" started with when we got these pups from the breeder at 8 weeks. Neither was ever out of human contact for the next four weeks. Pretty much held them constantly, playing with them when they were awake, and they slept on our laps for their naps, and at the foot of our bed at night. Never, ever alone. The "theory" argues that the destructive behavior when they are alone is separation anxiety, which is like a phobia in humans, a panic attack. You never want to allow a trigger event to occur. When they are very young any time alone can create the anxiety, so we never let it happen to begin with. As they got older, we would leave them, but only for very short periods at first, and gradually longer and longer periods. Always lots of treats and hugs when we returned. Eventually we could leave them for the 8 or 9 hours that we would be gone to work. Quite possibly, we just got really lucky with these two exceptional girls, and their behavior has nothing to do with our "theory". Our son has a husky that he can leave home alone, but he substituted doggy day care for the gradually longer and longer periods of time where the pup was alone for a number of years, but I think the effect was the same in that the dog never had the first "panic attack" to begin with.

squirt was raised never being left alone and actually i can leave her basically 24 hours. But squirt was a very neat (maybe ocd) puppy. She had her "den" under the table in the camper and went to bed at taps stayed in bed till reveille the next am. Spider was raised the same way (exept a doublewide instead of a 5th wheel), totally different results. Sometimes i come across issues that are neither dog or wolf issues but some mix of the 2. Spider was fine being left home with splinter up until she hit the age where she would join the pack in hunting. A wolf left behind is a dead wolf. So mix that with some high strung husky anxiety. She really is not even ok with being left with a babysitter, she paces and whines constantly but if someone is here she wont start ripping things up.

Doggy daycare seems convenient if its an option. Its not for me because its too far away.

Omg...my husky used to do this too! Whenever the wife and I would leave to work, we'd leave our husky in the garage. He was 1 year old, but the garage in that house was pretty big (2 floors). Anyway, after the 1st week, my wife noticed that the sheetrock on the side had "broken." The following week, we had noticed more holes forming on other parts of the sheetrock. Spied on him one day, and realized it was the husky going at it!

First of all, I don't know how they can eat sheetrock. But a family member whom also had huskies confirmed that they eat crazy things. In her experience, her dogs would run into their garage and grab light bulbs and try to eat those!

I had done research and found out that this is done out of boredom. And I tried everything to stop him!

* I purchased him more toys to play with
* I bought more durable treats so that he could snack on that (i.e. bully sticks)
* I even mentioned it to our trainer @ the time, and he told us about a pepper/acidic spray. Sprayed that all over the sheetrock he had been chewing it

At last, none of the above had worked. Even the simple training of telling him "no" repeatedly did nothing either.

I say this with a grain of salt, but what worked in my situation was a shock collar. I had spied on him again, but this time he had the shock collar on. When I noticed him getting close to the wall again, I would give him warning beeps. And as soon as I saw him chew at the wall, he got the zap. He attempted this two more times, and I took the same steps. After that, NEVER happened again.

You can definitely use a treat training method. But in our situation, we weren't at home. We were commuting about 50mi (one way) to work. So, by the time we had gotten home, the damage was already done. So, we had to work on that training during the weekend.

Huskies are smart though. Once the shock collar comes off, they're like toddlers. They will try and push the boundaries again to see how far they can push.

Just to add a little more context to my above story. You seem to have the same situation as we did. I'm only advocating to the shock collar because it can honestly be a miracle training tool. Of course, to be done properly and not abusively. I know you wont, but just saying.

We used to live on a 1 acre land, and the house had 3 floors. When my wife was pregnant, we had to leave Baloo in the house. I asked my cousin to please check on him and all I remember to this day are these words, "Bro, your dog shit all over the house. I mean, he shit ALL OVER the house."

When I had gotten to the house, he literally pooped on every floor of that house. I had no choice but to pay carpet cleaners to get the stains out. And I cannot fathom to this day how a tiny husky was able to take so many dumps in ONE DAY!!!? lol

But after paying for training, researching videos and forums, getting him toys, buying treats, being patient with the treat training...nothing really worked. At least nothing really was imprinted in his mind. Yet, when I got the training collar, every single training session had been a success.

3 years later, our home is much smaller. 7500 sqft, and 1100sqft home. Now, I trust him enough that I've left him in the house a few times, ranging anywhere from 30min to 5 hours. And (with fingers always crossed) to our surprise, we come home and he's usually napping around the house. During the summers, we'll leave the side garage door open so that he can come into the garage, and be able to have access to the backyard.

Now, all we complain about is the poop that dangles from his butt and sometimes brings it into our house (thank God we have wood floors now!) OR him digging up holes in our backyard.

Check out some videos on shock collar training. The key is the "warning beeps" on the collar, not the zap itself. Once the warning beeps affect their present state, then you know the training is working.

Doggie daycare helps ALOT with high energy dogs if you work a lot. It won't stop the destruction but it will help calm them down making the destruction less and make it easier to train them.

Kavik_the_Havoc wrote:

Doggie daycare helps ALOT with high energy dogs if you work a lot. It won't stop the destruction but it will help calm them down making the destruction less and make it easier to train them.

I'd agree, if you have the $ to throw like that. In my area, it's pricey. I live in the SF Bay Area, and the cost of living here is extremely high. You'll find homes here for $1m that have 1000sqft of property, and 4000sqft of lot lol. The point is, we may have the highest prices vs any other cities/states.

The average price here for doggy day care is about $50 for a full day (8am-6pm). So, $250/week or $1,000/mo. Might be cheaper looking into a training collar & patching up the walls while you train.

Just my 2 cents.

Thats about what the doggy day care in alamosa costs. And alamosa is dirt poor. Still not practical for me because its a 57 mile drive there (one way).

Also i dont work and hubby is disabled vet and doesnt drive so if im alone squirt goes and if jerry goes so does spider and splinter.

arexniba wrote:

Kavik_the_Havoc wrote:

Doggie daycare helps ALOT with high energy dogs if you work a lot. It won't stop the destruction but it will help calm them down making the destruction less and make it easier to train them.

I'd agree, if you have the $ to throw like that. In my area, it's pricey. I live in the SF Bay Area, and the cost of living here is extremely high. You'll find homes here for $1m that have 1000sqft of property, and 4000sqft of lot lol. The point is, we may have the highest prices vs any other cities/states.

The average price here for doggy day care is about $50 for a full day (8am-6pm). So, $250/week or $1,000/mo. Might be cheaper looking into a training collar & patching up the walls while you train.

Just my 2 cents.

That's crazy. There are some ways to stretch it like getting lump day passes and only taking your dog for a half day. It is pricy.

What else. Dog walkers. Walk your dog before and after work. Maybe a pen but most huskies will escape them.

It also matters if the destruction is from boredom, separation anxiety, or both.

Squirt has a dog walker. Squirt is almost as old as the dog walker. She also let my dogs out when i have out of region medical appointments. Her parents both are ems at the fire department. Very ambitious little 11 yr old. She wants a horse and her parents told her she had to pay for it so she has a dog walking/pet sitting business.

Seems like you would have something like that in the sf bay area. Or even out in Tyler tx

This is why I have a outdoor run my to have and will destroy anything and every thing if left alone! I can’t even have plastic bowls they destroy them! Soft toys destroyed in minutes.

Lostmaniac wrote:

Squirt has a dog walker. Squirt is almost as old as the dog walker. She also let my dogs out when i have out of region medical appointments. Her parents both are ems at the fire department. Very ambitious little 11 yr old.  She wants a horse and her parents told her she had to pay for it so she has a dog walking/pet sitting business.

Seems like you would have something like that in the sf bay area. Or even out in Tyler tx

Yes, tried this, too. But it's $20 to pay a stranger to go walk your dog for 30min's. My wife and I had actually caught one of them "walking" our dog. I was about to head to work that day, and my wife had called me to let me know she was coming back to the house because she had forgotten her purse. As she was getting closer to the house, she noticed the dog walker get into her car and put our dog in there. I remember being shocked and scared because I had no clue what she was up to. She was a young girl, maybe in her late teens or early 20's. So, we followed her. She went to the park where she sat down and stared at her phone while she had our dog leashed and sitting next to her. Never again...

Now that Baloo is 3 years old, I purchased this contraption that goes on the bike. It's a pole that you lock on to your bicycle and it has a rope. You connect that leash to your dog's collar or harness. You won't fall because inside the device is a spring that holds the rope. So, if the dog pulls, he will actually be pulled back, not the biker. It's awesome because I am not a good runner/jogger--lots of shin splints. But on bike, I let him pull for the first few minutes. Then, we take a steady pace for another 5-10min. During that time, I'll let him go to the side of the street and sniff plants, pee, etc. Finally, on the last stretch home, I bike faster to really get his energy out.

This works great because he comes back tired and that translates to more relaxed. It's called the Walky Dog Plus Bicycle Exercise Dog Leash. I got lucky, purchased this from Chewy back in 2017 for $60, but now they don't sell it, just the parts. However, it looks like other sites have them, but they've jacked the price up to around $80. Nonetheless, best investment I ever made, and my husky never seems bothered by it. I think the steady pace from the bike and being able to keep up with him, doesn't interfere with his fun.

Well i dont know the girl well but i know her parents so i dont consider her a stranger. I dont own a bike anymore because its bad for my back but if i did squirt wouldn't need a weird contraption because shes been trained to motorized wheelchairs and shopping carts. And i would never put spider next to a bike. She does this pause and bolt backwards thing. She even got out of her harness at the vet office. Ive been thinking skis but they are expensive and my dogs are all getting too old to pull me(and i dont trust spider).

Something i used to do alot with squirt at the afb was letting her chase an rc car now squirts exercise mostly involves swimming or wading upstream. Good for her joints

Lostmaniac wrote:

Well i dont know the girl well but i know her parents so i dont consider her a stranger.  I dont own a bike anymore because its bad for my back but if i did squirt wouldn't need a weird contraption because shes been trained to motorized wheelchairs and shopping carts. And i would never put spider next to a bike. She does this pause and bolt backwards thing.  She even got out of her harness at the vet office. Ive been thinking skis but they are expensive and my dogs are all getting too old to pull me(and i dont trust spider).

Something i used to do alot with squirt at the afb was letting her chase an rc car now squirts exercise mostly involves swimming or wading upstream. Good for her joints

May be some confusion here, but I was referring to the OP (original poster) of this thread.

Nonetheless, the exercises that you've implemented for your dog are great, anything to exert their energy.

And heres a random idea but what about the tv. Spider loves watching the Addams family, and any documentary that features bison or baby animals.

Really i could probably fix the spider being home issue if i tried, it just became something i chose to ignore. I have much much bigger issues like squirt wanting to kill the other 3 dogs and jerrys medical stuff and shadow being a medical disaster and going down hill kind of quickly. So while a babysitter or taking spider is a pain in the ass, I've been been managing it for 6 years now and i can leave her in the car if i need too and shes ok for about an hour or so and when jerry starts having issues he can claim he needs to go check the dog without seeming rude or dysfunctional.

Okay I'm gonna try to reply to everyone. But general thoughts, thanks for the replies! Fiance is not keen on bringing the dog kennels back down, so I think I'm gonna try some stuff from the replies and see if those help and then revisit it if they don't. Maybe after some fails, (hopefully none occur but if they do) he will be more willing to bring them back. We have had 2 days without chewing using the bitterspray. We'll see how it goes.

Amy, we do have concrete floors so that eliminates the chewing of the floor. The chewing on things not intended is a new behavior that I think stemmed from a bout of separation anxiety shortly after moving in but now is linked to boredom. 

Emily, that sounds like something I definitely don't want to happen. It seems to be only nibbles so definitely not that kind of damage. They don't chew or mess with anything other than two spots on the walls. Archer will pull blankets off of the couch and curl up with them but nothing else destructive. They've been in doggy daycare before but it got to where I couldn't afford. I just started an internship making more money so hopefully I can get them back in even though it's a little out of the way to drive. I've thought of a dog walker but we live in the middle of nowhere and I am not okay with people I don't know coming into my home. It's something that's always bothered me no matter the reason. And I don't trust people to be able to handle my pups without it triggering some anxiety in me. We have the TV playing for most of the day. We don't pay for cable so we play youtube but it only plays for about 6 hours before autopausing and we can't find a way around it. Netflix and other stuff are the same way. I will look into the rc car chase though.

Kevin, thanks for the input, your profile pic is so cute!! These are my first huskies so I'm sure I've made some mistakes along the way. They're also my first dogs that are really my responsibility so it's all been a learning curve. I don't think it's separation anxiety because we leave and go to the store for a few hours and they're fine. It's just the longer days where we have problems. I am going to keep your theory marked or written down for future dogs though. I thinks it makes a lot of sense.

Alex, we do have a camera that we can use to watch, speak, hear, whatever them. Unfortunately it must be plugged in and there's no outlet in a spot where we can see the walls and have the camera in a spot other than the floor. I am going to look into rigging something up, maybe a series of extension cords, until we can get them to stop. The first time we saw the hole we were mind blown. Neither hole is on a corner or anything, just right smack in the middle of the wall. No idea how they could've even started the hole in the first place.
In Emily's section of the reply you can see that I am not comfortable with dog walker or really anyone I don't coming into my house. I think it would be a great option and maybe I am being selfish in letting my anxiety make the decision but I just can't do it. I feel bad but on top of that we're in a tiny town now that is mostly retired and the nearest reputable dog walker is 30 minutes away. I will however look into the bike and bike training. 
Do you have any recommendations on toys or chews that might work? Even though they didn't work for you?? The bitter spray seems to be working right now but we have to remember to use it and hope that Archer doesn't decide to chew the wall because he loves the spray stuff. 

Kavik_the_Havoc, I've definitely seen how well daycare tires them out. It has been out of my budget for the past year but Im hoping my new job will put it back in. I'm 95% sure it's from boredom. They can go a few hours on the weekend or days I work half days just fine. But the long days which are gonna be more often for the foreseeable future are problems.

So what about toys like this https://fradgets.net/products/intelligent-escaping-toy?utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=google&utm_campaign=Google Shopping&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIw73ZqrCL7gIVLv_jBx0c1gKLEAUYECABEgKQePD_BwE

That's a good idea Emily! I hadn't even thought of those! I have a coupon for chewys so I'm gonna look there for something like that.

ETA: I couldn't find any on Chewy but I found some other stuff might would help too. I am going to get something like that but idk about minions lol.

I saw one that even has the ability for you to talk to the dog from it and stuff but it seemed kind of expensive and more geared for smaller dogs or dogs that dont chew. I googled robots for dogs and lots came up although most of it was robotic dogs.

We had 3 dogs in a camper for a few years while we were at the air force base. We got creative about exercise. Something else we did (not a left home thing) dog toys on fishing poles are awesome. Great way to wear them out.