Too smart for his own good - Help please!

[R0ckets]

We have a 1 year old rescue and he's settled in beautifully and despite some hiccups we're slowly seeing him turn into a lovely family pet however he's too damn smart for his own good despite training, brain games, puzzle toys etc.

Anyway his new game is to open doors and despite blocking with baby gates, using childproof locks and now changing the blooming handles from lever ones to round knobs he can still get the doors open when left unsupervised.

Despite extensive googling I have not found any other solutions and am hoping you clever lot can help me outsmart the four legged fiend.

No advice but I'd like to his name please - he sounds marvellous!

Have you tried putting the lever handles back in, but upside down so that you have to lift it?
I’ve not found a dog yet who’s outwitted that one.

failing that, crate training is your friend. With a trigger clip on the bolt so he can’t let himself back out!

Lock the doors with bolts?

His name is how the fuck have you managed to open the f'ing door again ffs aka Bear.

We tried turning the lever handles before buying the knobs and that didn't stop him either sadly.

He's crate trained but gets distressed if left in his crate when there's no one in the house so is supposed to be confined to one room.

No advice i'm afraid but my dog does the same plus can open zips and sliding patio doors!

I don't really want to start putting locks on the doors if possible. I'm not keen on the idea of bolts on children's bedroom doors.

In the kindest way possible then, he is not crate trained.
tbh it’s sounding more like separation anxiety with you update. Have you talked to a professional?

In the kindest way possible then, he is not crate trained.
tbh it’s sounding more like separation anxiety with you update. Have you talked to a professional?

Yes we have had professional advice and he is crate trained in that he's content to go in it during the day and will take himself there as its his safe space and he sleeps all night in it but he doesn't like being locked in the crate, he feels secure in it so long as he's not physically contained its almost like he's claustrophobic if that makes sense.

Professional advice has worked well on all other obstacles and when left with space to roam he's not at all fussed about us leaving. The only issue is going into rooms he shouldn't be, no barking, destruction or other signs of anxiety etc.

In all honesty then, I would go go back to your behaviourist (not a job for a trainer, this really needs a behavioural specialist imo)
The frantic ‘escape’ behaviours around doors coupled with the unease behind the crate door sounds like a behaviour issue which even if you fix the physical issue of the barrier by locking the door etc, it will manifest itself in another way if you don’t address the cause

You are right not to lock him in the crate. Dogs are pack animals and need to be with their family. People who use crates as punishment should be locked in a crate themselves. See how they like it!

Well the obvious answer is internal door locks

The frantic ‘escape’ behaviours around doors coupled with the unease behind the crate door sounds like a behaviour issue which even if you fix the physical issue of the barrier by locking the door etc, it will manifest itself in another way if you don’t address the cause

I don't think his behaviour is frantic and neither do the professionals we've spoken to and worked with, he just doesn't like being shut in the crate.

He's honestly totally calm and fine being left in the room and not at all frantic to escape the shut door it's just now he knows how to do it he seems to see it as a game. He figured it out once, I changed the rules I.e turned the handles around and he worked out how to do it again.

Fair enough, could be your wording made me read more into it?
I would say though that a content and relaxed dog will almost always just lay down and snooze when you are out. That’s what rings an alarm for me.

guess you’ll have to use locks then?

You just need to put them on the outside and high up so the only people who can access them are adults.

Photo!

You just need to put them on the outside and high up so the only people who can access them are adults.

Which is what I will do if there are no other great ideas but I figured someone else must ahve come across similar and maybe they found a solution I hadn't thought of. Locks on the actual door are hopefully a last resort option.

Photo!

Sorry I know it's the rules in the doghouse but alas he's painfully camera shy, even a sneaky one when I think he's asleep is practically impossible, he's a camera detection ninja and as already stated too bleeding smart for his own good.

I have no ideas apart from raising the handles. I am aghast at your dog’s ingenuity. Initially I thought (in a depressed sort of way) golly my dog is thick and lacking in determination. And on reflection I still think that, but in a pleased way. Don’t worry, she doesn’t know I think she’s a bit dense.

When my collie cross worked out how to open doors we conceded defeat and he's had the run of the house ever since! Luckily he was 2-ish and had stopped chewing, he just used to go upstairs and sleep on our bed

We had a collie cross lab when I was little that could open doors. We ended up putting strong “door closers” on the back of all the doors around the room that he slept in. They were too strong for him to pull open, and it kept him in! (Sorry I couldn’t think of the technical term, but those arms on the top of the door, like you’d get on a fire door..)

You could use hooks and eyes at the tops of the doors. Easy to repair afterwards & would prevent the children from being able to lock themselves in.

I repurposed an old cot to make a stair gate out of the sides. hinges on one side attached to the wall and then put simple bolt locks on with a hole drilled into stair frame. Could you do the same and put double bolts on each side so whatever side he's on, bolt the other so he can't get his nose/paw to it?

Hard to explain!

Crikey he's a clever boy. My lass came to find me in the bathroom the other day. The door half shut behind her- and it completely bamboozled her. She's not the brightest spark but she's a lovable idiot.

Oh he definitely has his daft moments too, he frequently steps in his water bowl and then looks confused at his wet foot. 😅

I love the bones off of him but sometimes his cleverness does get frustrating as he rarely puts it it good use. If he were a child he would be a the smart annoying kid who got top marks with no bloody effort and coasted his whole life.

Will definitely look into locks though as it seems that there isn't much alternative. He shall have to join the clever pups on this thread who have been locked out and I shall have to hope he eventually gets fed up of trying to break into the rooms he's not supposed to be in.

Unfortunately letting him have free reign of the house isn't possible yet as he's still in the Kevin the teenage stage and would totally get into more mischief by knocking stuff off the sides etc if he had the chance.

Won't putting the door handles up higher work?

Our dog can open doors including sliding patio ones. We lock the patio doors and put round handles on the lounge door, tall baby gate in the hall. The round handles are so difficult to open we struggle at times so that worked for him.

Trying to stop him jumping over the garden walls is an issue now!

Won't putting the door handles up higher work?

He's a tall lad and would easily reach most of the way up the door. I think he'd definitely be able to get to handles I couldn't even reach if he put his mind to it.

Trying to stop him jumping over the garden walls is an issue now!

Hope you manage to succeed in thwarting his attempts. We've not faced this issue yet, hopefully stopping him getting into forbidden rooms doesn't lead to him finding new ways such as jumping walls to exasperate me.

Ours is about 5ft8 stretched out but he only opened doors by using his weight to push the handles down so really high handles are tricky for him, although I'm only 5ft4 so potentially if we had needed them higher I wouldn't have been able to reach lol.

We have put temporary netting up now, NDN wanted to do the fences but hasn't got round to it so we needed to do something. We were chasing him around next doors garden at 11pm one night after he saw a fox, it took 2 of us to lift him back over 😂 Weirdly we have a baby gate over the kitchen entrance, it's only 70cm, he could literally step over it but it's like a force field against him 😁