Dog Dilemma

Oh, sweet Bessie. How you frustrate me so. And yet I still adore you.

This dog. The first week we got her, back in 2011, we got a wire crate. She broke it the first time we left her home alone. She broke it, AND broke out. But didn't destroy the house.

So we let her roam the house every time we left.

And she did great.

Until I went back to work, and she spent long days home.

Then she started destroying the house. I mean, DE-STROY-ING. I'd come home from lunch to lamps knocked over, speakers and wires torn up, a sleeping bag torn out of the hall closet, in shreds.

So we got another crate. A plastic one this time.

And somehow we put the door on backwards and she broke it.

So we bought a third crate. (These things run around $100 minimum.)

And she settled in. She even started going willingly into the crate for me every morning, and every lunch hour. She seemed to appreciate the boundary of the crate. She couldn't handle the wide open house by herself, but she could handle the crate.

And then we moved back to Nashville.

And she forgot that the crate is a safe place.

After a few times of leaving her, she broke the door of the third crate.

We started zip tying her in, rather than spending another $100 while I'm not working.

She broke the zip ties.

We found a 4th crate on clearance.

The third time in it, she snapped the wire of the door in half.

This dog only weighs 35 lbs. She has the strength of a cougar. (Are cougars really strong? They seem like they would be.)

Somehow, she couldn't get the zip ties off, but she snapped the wire. Explain that one.

So yeah.

Somehow, a fifth crate seems pointless.