Hello everybody. My wife and I just rescued a two year old female siberian. She shows alot of the signs of separation anxiety. She whines and cries when we leave, she follows our every move and can't be alone, and whines and cries in her crate. I exercise both of my siberians daily. We go on long walks and runs. This morning I came back after two hours and she had broke out of her crate and tore the carpet by the door up! My other 2 year old siberian has never destroyed anything in her life, so we let her have free reign of the house and she does just fine. I'm sure our other girl was on the other side of the door making it worse though. Any suggestions on what to do? Should lock the crate somehow? Is there certain training that will ease her anxiety? Free reign would be a bad idea right? I don't know if she's out of the crate with sister would help her to be calm. She has a vet appointment tomorrow (regular checkup) and i'll be bringing up everything with him. I just thought I'd try to get some input from all of you since you guys are so knowledgeable. Thank you!

Jon, thank you for rescuing, she is going through change, and huskies just do not do real well with change. I haven't experienced, this type of separation anxiety, since she is a rescue. You do indeed need to find a way to secure her crate. I was wondering though, if her crate can be accessible to your other husky, that may be a better way to help her relax. Maybe her escape was to get to your other girl. My girl had bad separation anxiety, but as a pup. When we leave her alone now, we need to leave the light on, I do not understand this, but she goes crazy if the lights are off, lol. For us, we did very short trips, and I have read that leaving for say 15 minutes and working your way up is a good way to help them transition. Some dogs do fine being able to be loose in the house, others not so much. And since she did a number on the carpet, I would have to say she is not ready to be left outside of her crate.

Do you have any background info on her, what was her last living arrangements, was she properly crate trained. This may help with others to give advice. What about your situation? Is 2 hours going to be it, or it will be more like an 8 hour day alone?

Btw, Miya can now be trusted for about 4 hours alone, and we do leave her loose, she hasn't destroyed a thing, as long as the light is on. Silly dogs. I hope that I helped a little.

When we got Ami, the shelter volunteer recommended that we use carabiners on ALL joints and doors of the crate. Ami has never broken out but he has dragged a king sized bed sheet INTO the crate...I have no idea how. He is not crated now, but we've never left him inside the house when we are gone, he's on a trolley in the fenced backyard, hidden from view with shrubbery. Though come to think of it, he's been inside sleeping while we've been outside doing yard chores with no damage. Archer? Left him inside for 4 minutes while we looked at the roof progress and damn pup ate my husband's lunch - the last of the eggplant parm

I'm not sure having 1 in the crate and 1 out will help - may make it worse if she wants to join the free-range pup. I would start as Renee suggests, a bit at a time. Like, both dogs in the house, you go outside for...a minute And build from there depending on the results.

Hey guys thank you so much for the advice. We have left lana out with meeka for an hour and she did great! Didn't destroy anything and didn't even cry when we left. We have actually done it a couple times since I first posted. I guess she really just has crate anxiety and didnt like being isolated from her "sister". They are getting along amazing.

I had that feeling. They are pack animals, and would rather be with their pack. Since your first husky is good roaming the house, so I assume Lana will learn from her sister. I also think that once they mature, somewhere around 1-2 years of age destruction goes down, for most huskies. I would continue to do this in small time increments. I am so happy things are working out. Keep us posted.