@debradownsouth @lizann @roffutt1 @ChrisF Thanks for all the advice and encouragement! So glad to hear those stories about your pups. We are trying to find a crate, but as you can imagine, Burkina Faso doesn't have much in terms of pet supplies... most dogs in the city are strays and having a pet isn't quite the same in this culture. Nonetheless, we heard that we can order a dog crate through AirFrance that can double as the travel crate when we leave in 2 years... it's $250 or so (wild!).

She's a mix, but maybe just slightly so. Her ears don't stand up and she's a bit taller than other pure Basenji's I've seen in the States. In West Africa, though, she looks like all the other dogs! Sometimes I do a double take with the strays when I'm driving home from work!

We've decided to let her on the couch, but no chairs nor the bed. After ignoring her for a few days, she no longer digs or chews (!!) the door at 2:30 am. Now we are training her to not jump on the bed (which she loves to do in the middle of the night).

My husband and I are doing steady training sessions with her, and now I've started doing walk/jogs in the mornings. Slowly but surely, she's trusting us! And then she comes out of left field with some crazy stuff... like she somehow pulled my wedding ring off the chest of drawers and chewed it up! All is well but... omg!

@elbrant We used aluminum foil on a chair and Lola didn’t even care! She jumped right on and started pulling apart the foil!

Hi!

We have a basenji mutt named Lola who is 6 months old. She spent her first 6 months with family, about 3 other dogs. We adopted her a few weeks ago and her behavior has just shifted from high separation anxiety to jumping on furniture, waking up at night and digging at the door, trying to steal our food. We do not allow her on any furniture, never feed her from our plates or the table, and always giveve her two walks and about an hour of high energy play time a day. We even have done the same nightly ritual every night to set precedent for ‘calm time’. We taught her to lightly scratch at the door to be let out or in, so when she started digging at the door, we let her out, but she never goes to relieve herself... she just runs around the house and barks. For the furniture, we don’t have a great bed for her, so we thought that was the problem... but now we’ve made a good, comfy spot she likes and she’s jumping on tables and on our bed (never has been allowed!). We are digging deep into our wells of patience, focusing on praise for good behavior and going hoarse with repeated commands for ‘off’/ lots of praise for the times she is calm/playing off furniture/gives appropriate signals. What is going on here? Is she going into heat (she’s also licking a lot)? I feel like she’s too young to be an adolescent.

Thanks so much in advance. We live in Burkina Faso where pet culture is more ‘leave them outside’ and less ‘train and understand’.