Friday on Talking Dogs Blog, Sue was updating us on puppy Rosie. Sue said, “She is, by far, the easiest puppy we’ve ever had. Zero destruction. All joy.”
Which of course made me think back to my own little punkin, also a very easy puppy.
Me and my Punkin, the first time I held him, he was three weeks old.
Which isn’t to say, he wasn’t a tiny bit destructive.
Dogs are as unique and individual as people. Delilah enjoys agility while Sampson does not. I think this holds true in other things as well.
Delilah loves shredding paper. Paper towels, napkins, tissues. Sampson wouldn’t touch them if they were coated with cheese.
For chewing purposes we will leave Delilah out of that equation, as she will chew just about anything.
Our little Beagle, Roxanne loved to chew plastic, while Sampson has always favored wood.
(Siriusly, what did you think this post was about anyway? It is a DOG blog, get your dirty little mind out of the gutter!)
Case in point, he chewed the feet of my wooden coat rack. We tried to prevent his chewing, we gave him alternative toys, we sprayed bitter apple on it, eventually what worked was removing it from his area until he fully understood what he was allowed to chew and what he wasn’t.
Once the coat rack was removed and he still had the urge to chew wood, he had to look to other items in the kitchen to satisfy his needs.
One day I came home to discover he had chewed the footrest to the breakfast bar! The breakfast bar that Hubby had carefully built and assembled, it was the center piece of our recently completed renovations in our very large and beautiful kitchen.
My first thought was Hubby is going to kill him. I was worried. I had been the one hellbent on getting a puppy and while I knew Hubby loved Sampson, I wasn’t sure that a huge fight wasn’t going to take place, with battle lines drawn, me defending Sampson and Hubby calling for stricter sanctions.
I took Sampson outside for potty and came in to await the storm about to break.
How was your day? I cheerfully asked standing in front of the breakfast bar blocking the chewed footrest from his view.
Frivolities over it was time to face the music.
Um…I have something to show you, please don’t be mad.
WHAT?
When the words eventually finished stumbling out of my mouth, imagine my surprise when Hubby laughed and said, I didn’t like that footrest anyway!
Who could ever stay mad at that little punkin face?
Have you ever had to go to bat for your pet? Did it turn out the way you expected?
This is Monday Mischief. Many thanks to our friends Alfie’s Blog, Snoopy’s Dog Blog and My Brown Newfies.
LOL, that’s a good story. I haven’t run into that, yet.
Beautiful pics Jodi.
May I compliment your eyes? Compliment given.
Doggy has never chew on anything but on Mauri’s glasses and 3d glasses.
He chewed 2 pairs of 3d glasses ($500 between the 2) Mauri’s sunglasses ($200) and 4lbs of gummy bears, all the same day. It was an expensive day for sure, we haven’t replaced the 3d glasses, waiting on a sale.
Other than that we would only chew on his tows and plastic bottles, never touched my sneakers (I would have been really mad) or anything that belonged to me for that matter.
Very funny. I use to bite my peeps ankles and infact I had a game of it today which was not appreciated. I like to chew empty plastic bottle and plant pots. Have a marvellous Monday.
Best wishes Molly
Oh hilarious! I had to go to bat for our last cat more times than I can count. *sigh*
Dakota used to ALWAYS chew wood. Thank goodness he out grew that!
Awwww, what a cutie-patootie! The first time Sam and I held Callie, she was only two weeks old. Her eyes weren’t even open yet, and she was still giving us little puppy whines and whimpers. Hard to believe how our girl has grown up! She’ll be 9 years old next-week Tuesday. And her head is bigger now than her whole little body was back then! She and Shadow were wood chewers, too, but they liked the taste of the bitter apple sprays, especially on the legs of our antique furniture. Thank God Ducky doesn’t! 🙂
No ways anyone could stay mad at that face. Cuteness deluxe. Hmm, I have many memories which are unlikely to fade as I see the results of Litchi’s chewing all around me. So glad she’s out of that phase.
Bailey would chew anything. I’m glad we had Bailey as a puppy. Having adopted Katy at 2, I think our next one will be around that age, too. I love the puppy look, just don’t think I have the puppy patience anymore.
OMG!!! You’re making me cry!!
Lol. Love the picture of you and Sampson!
Sherman is a wood chewer and Leroy is a rock chewer among other things.
I’ve had to go to bat for Leroy many times, especially when he was about a year old and he ate my husbands cell phone 🙂
Sampson sure was a cutie. Who could stay mad at that? lol
I was going to say that if you had crate trained Sampson then the wood stuffs would have been safe. But wait…Freighter is crate trained and we still lot how many throw rugs and part of the carpet…lol. Puppies!
We had a puppy once who literally ate my son’s homework. I had to gather up the pieces, try to tape together what was left and take them to school to show the teacher. For the obvious reason.
My dining rooms chairs and bar stools, a newel post, and my porch steps all have my ol’ pal Jasper’s teeth marks all over them! My husband still gets mad (5years later) when he notices them again!
You sound like my mom…always wanting to defend the pets bad mischief! Glad it all worked out ok.
I sure couldn’t be mad at that face! Gambler likes to destroy everything, Glory not so much but loves to carry rocks around.
Not me…that punkin face would win me over every time
We were warned by Rita’s foster mom that she’d “eaten an ottoman.” But we think Rita was framed. She’s never once tried to chew anything that isn’t hers (oh, except for that one time with my weights. She chewed my plastic covered 5lb. weight – guess she wanted me to stop working out and pay attention to her. That might be the last time I picked up those weights……)
Our beagle chewed the corner of our coffee table – but luckily we were grad students at the time, with crappy cheap grad-student-type furniture!
Silas wasn’t too bad as a puppy, aside from him chewing our dining chairs while we ate dinner, but it was because we’re neat freaks. Now he’s an adult who will steal things at random if he gets the chance. I wonder if we would have been better off leaving more of “our” stuff around when he was a puppy.
Ahahahaha!
Blueberry’s newest obsession is the packing peanuts – she hunts for them and somehow always manages to find one even though I am certain I’ve hidden them all! But hey, what’s a peanut compared to wood damage? 😉
Hehe…since the Hubster gave Hurley to me as a present, it was always his fault when the Hurley Badger destroyed anything and therefore, the Hubster could not be mad at me when time and again, Hurley chose to destroy his things and not mine.
Puppy Sampson is really too cute for words!
That face is irresistible. Definitely. Cupcake is not a destructive chewer, but she drives me crazy licking the floor.
No one could ever be mad at a face like that!
🙂
Oh my gosh he was so darn cute! Hard to believe he could have ever been destructive 🙂
I have been told I spoil my dogs and my response “that’s right their mine to spoil” 😉
OMG he was such a cutie little puppy! And no, you can’t stay mad at a puppy for long. Henri chewed the corner of my bar, and two sections of my staircase, but … he just needed the right toy. Couldn’t stay mad for long.
Oh dear, you have a “bad dog” key phrase. As if!
My Airedale wasn’t safe around paper products ever. He was a shredder on four legs. Mango seemed to abhore straight edges and gnawed nice round corners on all our patio furniture and the deck railings. Luckily, Dexter was a quick study when it came to inappropriate chewing. Dogs will be dogs, right? If only they could always be directed towards objects we never liked in the first place.
Mango Momma
Oh…. Sampson puppy pictures! He reminds me so very much of my Lucy.
You know, Rudy was not a “perfect” puppy… quite a chewer. Mostly he destroyed things that were important to me, not the dog daddy. The leg off the little footstool that my grandpa made – and my grandma needlepointed the top covering which also has a hole in it – still make my chest tighten and stomach roll with regret. Courtesy of Rudy. Ah well, such is life.
When that’s the response, you know you married a good one!
LOL! Nick always tells me I make it worse when I start the conversation with, “please don’t be mad, BUT….”
Toby agrees with Delilah’s tastes. The more paper in his diet, the better.
Koly loved wood too. Antique wood, like that only found on my great grandmother’s antique bedroom furniture…and Italian leather, like that on my couch or countless pairs of designer pumps **sigh**