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Yoshi's bad behavior

Yoshi has been demonstrating some unusual behavior the last few weeks.

It started with coming home one evening to find that he ate the two envelopes of our Netflix DVD's and chewed on one of the discs, which caused a tooth puncture in it. After that, we decided we can't leave dvd's on the coffee table. We have to store them somewhere.

Then, last week, I went out to dinner with a friend, I was barely gone two hours, and I came home to my Land's End catalog chewed to pieces on one of the corners. So now we have removed our magazines from the coffee table as well.

Last night, my husband and I went out to dinner. We left a little before 7 and we were back by 8 or so. I walked in the house worried to see what I would find this time. I walked over to Yoshi's pillow to find a chewed up plastic pen.

I don't know what's going on with him. He has NEVER done anything like this all these years I've had him. It seems to me he's acting out. Maybe he's mad that we're leaving him home alone -- but this is nothing new, so I don't understand why he's doing this all of a sudden. I even started to give him a treat before we leave thinking it will distract him or calm him down or at least make him happy. But I guess that's not enough.

My husband also found Yoshi on the couch the other day and he's not allowed up there. It's like he's totally abandoned all rules in the house.

I'm worried about him. Has anyone experienced this? Is it separation anxiety? Does anyone have any tricks for preventing behavior like this? I'm mostly worried that he's going to eat something and get really sick or hurt. The ink pen last night freaked me out.

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Tags: Yoshi

Posted by Carla Kucinski on Thursday, October 8, 2009 at 11:15 am

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Andrea Martin

October 8, 2009 - 11:43 am EDT

Hmm. I know that I can't compare exact situations with you, but yeah, it seems to me that he's acting out to get your attention. Sort of like a cry for help. In our case, anytime the girls start to tear something up it's always the result of them being left to their own devices for too long, or not getting enough exercise, something like that. For example, Saturday night when we went to the U2 concert, we were gone for hours. The dogs were in the backyard, perfectly fine and safe. Fed and watered, but we weren't home and didn't get them put to bed until about three hours past normal bedtime for them. They had completely dug up the new tree in the backyard to such an extreme that it looked like we had just put it in the hole and hadn't covered it with dirt yet. We were appalled.

RandolphBloke

October 9, 2009 - 2:03 pm EDT

Is he getting enough exercise? This is really common when dogs get bored from lack of exercise and mental stimulation. Try getting him moving more and maybe get a Kong brand treat you can stuff with treats & a little bit of peanut butter. They'll play with those for hours.

Carla Kucinski

October 9, 2009 - 2:14 pm EDT

Thanks so much for the suggestion. I think you're probably right about the exercise. It's been getting dark earlier so we've been skipping his evening walks, so I think we probably need to get back to that.