Every puppy chews. The ones who chew your couch are not bad dogs. They just have a mouth, a lot of energy, and nothing better to do with either one.
The fix is not scolding. Control what your pup can reach, give the chewing somewhere to go, and make trading with you a good deal. Then there are the two pieces most owners never hear about: play with other puppies, and naps. Those two do more than all the rest put together.
Two reasons, and they need different answers.
Teeth. Puppies lose baby teeth and grow adult teeth from about 4 months to 6 months. Chewing feels good on sore gums. You are not going to talk them out of that.
Boredom. This is the bigger one, and it is the one you control. A pup with nothing to do will find something to do. Your baseboards are right there.
You are not going to empty your house. You do not need to. Pick up the things that matter and block the things that are dangerous.
This is not forever. It is for a few weeks while your pup learns what is theirs.
Your pup needs a small set of things that are clearly theirs, and they need to be better than your furniture.
Keep 4 or 5 out at a time and rotate them every few days. A toy your pup has not seen in a week is a new toy. Twenty toys on the floor all the time is just floor.
Pick chews your pup actually works at. Something they can hold down with their feet and gnaw on beats a squeaky toy they carry around for 10 seconds. If your pup walks away from it in a minute, it is not doing the job.
Here is where most owners lose. Your pup grabs a sock, you chase them, and you just showed your pup the best game in the house. Now the sock is a prize.
Trade instead. Walk to them calmly with something good, offer the swap, take the sock when they let go. Say your word for it, every time, so it starts to mean something.
Do this on purpose, when nothing is wrong. Hand your pup a chew, offer a trade, give the chew back. Now giving things up is safe and profitable instead of the end of the fun.
Grabbing, prying, and yelling teach the opposite. They show your pup to run, to swallow it fast, or to guard it. That is a much harder problem than a chewed sock.
A puppy who is loose in the house and not being watched will practice the habit you are trying to stop. If you cannot watch, your pup is in the crate, in a pen, or attached to you on a leash.
The crate is the simplest answer for this. Our crate training plan shows how to build it into a place your pup likes going. One safety note: remove any bedding or toys your dog can destroy before leaving your pup unsupervised in the crate.
A pup who has had a real morning is a different animal in the afternoon. Not a long walk, and not a wild hour at the dog park. I mean work that uses their brain: short training sessions, play with rules, a food puzzle instead of a bowl.
Three to five short sessions a day, about 3 to 5 minutes each, does more than an hour of running. Running builds a fitter puppy. Thinking builds a calmer one.
Here is the part nobody tells you. For a young puppy, socialization is about 80 percent of the fix for biting, and it carries straight over to chewing.
Your pup has a need to bite and wrestle. That need is real and it is not going away. You cannot fill it with a toy, and you cannot fill it with a person. Only another puppy who wants to play can do that.
When a pup gets that outlet, everything else gets easy. The mouth is satisfied. The energy is gone. Now your training sessions land, and leaving a table leg alone is a small ask instead of a fight.
When a pup does not get it, you are asking them to sit on that need all day and then be polite about your furniture. That is not a training problem. It is an outlet problem, and no amount of correcting will fix it.
This is why we build real play with other dogs into our program. Short sessions with you are the brain work. Play with other puppies is the outlet. Your pup needs both, and only one of them can come from another dog.
This is the other half, and it is the one owners fight instead of using.
If your pup is getting short training sessions and real play with other dogs, and they are still tearing into everything, they are almost never underworked. They are overtired. Puppies do not put themselves to bed. They get wild instead.
So when the evening chewing starts, do not add more exercise. That makes it worse. Put your pup in the crate for a nap.
That is the real reason the crate matters here. It is not a time out and it is not a punishment. It is the off switch your pup cannot find on their own.
The crate is the fast answer. It is not the only one.
We also show you how to get your pup to relax at your feet for longer and longer each day, so you are not leaning on the kennel so much. Some dogs pick this up in a few weeks. All of them can have it down by 6 months.
That is the skill you want for the times you are working from home, or watching a movie, or eating dinner. Your pup settles on the floor next to you and stays there, because that is what they know how to do.
With help, the destructive chewing settles down fast. The teething chewing runs its course by about 6 months, and your job in the meantime is to keep pointing it at the right things.
What makes it stick is the habit underneath. A pup who has spent 4 months chewing only their own things does not suddenly start on your table leg at 7 months. That is the whole game. For what else should be happening at each age, see our puppy training schedule by age, and for the bigger picture read how long it takes to train a puppy.
Dependable Dog Guarantee: All pups who train with us will reach their goal or we will add additional sessions FREE until the pup is finished.
We are a school, not a boot camp. We show your pup how to live in your house, not how to survive a program.
No, and they get fixed differently. Chewing is about objects. Biting is about your hands and your pants. Here is how to stop puppy biting and nipping.
Sometimes, on one object, for a while. They do not show your pup what to chew instead, so on their own they mostly move the problem to the next table leg.
That is usually stress, not boredom, and it needs a different plan. Start with the crate work, keep your comings and goings boring, and get eyes on it before it grows.
Most dogs always like to chew. That is fine. The goal was never a dog who does not chew. It is a dog who chews their own things.
If your pup is taking your house apart, we can usually turn it around faster than you think. We train in Salt Lake City and we will tell you straight what is going on. Book a free session or call 801-516-4012.
You can also see everything we offer on our puppy training page.
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