Your couch doesn’t stand a chance. Neither does your dining room chair, that rug you spent too much money on, or the baseboard in your hallway. If you’ve got a pet with energy and instinct, your furniture is basically a giant toy waiting to happen. But here’s what I’ve learned after years of helping people work through this stuff: the destruction isn’t the problem. It’s a symptom of an animal doing exactly what it was built to do, in a space that doesn’t give it a better option.
The trick — and this took me way too long to fully internalize — is that you can’t erase these behaviors. You redirect them. Dogs chew. Cats scratch. Both species will find an outlet, and if you haven’t provided a good one, they’ll improvise. Your job is to make the right choice easy and the wrong choice inconvenient.
Why They Do It: Different Drives, Same Result
Let’s separate the two behaviors, because even though the outcome looks similar (your stuff is ruined), the motivations are completely different.
Dogs and the Need to Chew
Chewing is self-reinforcing for dogs. It releases endorphins, relieves stress, and gives their jaws something to do. Puppies chew because they’re teething — those adult teeth are pushing through gums, and the pressure feels good. Adult dogs chew to decompress, to alleviate boredom, or because the item smells interesting.
I worked with a Labradoodle named Murray who had systematically destroyed every wooden leg on his owner’s kitchen table over the course of three weeks. His owner was furious, convinced Murray was “getting back at her” for going back to the office. Here’s what was actually happening: Murray had gone from six hours of daily engagement with his person to eight hours alone in a quiet apartment. He was understimulated, anxious, and the table legs smelled like food. That’s not spite. That’s a dog solving a problem with the tools available to him.
Cats and the Biology of Scratching
Scratching is even more hardwired than chewing — it’s a.[1] They do it to mark territory visually and through scent glands in their paws. They do it to stretch the muscles in their backs and shoulders. And they do it to shed the dead outer layers of their claws, keeping them sharp and healthy.
This isn’t something you can train out of a cat. It would be like trying to train a person to never stretch when they wake up. The behavior is necessary for their physical and psychological wellbeing. Cornell’s Feline Health Center is explicit about this: scratching is normal, natural, and necessary. Trying to eliminate it entirely is ineffective and unfair.
Redirection Beats Restriction Every Time
Here’s the approach that actually works for both species: stop trying to prevent the behavior and start giving the animal a better place to do it.
For dogs, this means providing appropriate chew outlets and managing access to the things you don’t want chewed. For cats, it means offering scratching surfaces that match their preferences and making your furniture less appealing.
I used to tell dog owners to just “correct” the chewing — interrupt it, say no, move on. That’s what I was taught early on. What I noticed, though, was that the dogs I worked with kept finding new things to destroy. I’d stop them from chewing the table, and they’d move to the remote. I’d fix that, and they’d start on the doorframe. The behavior wasn’t going away. It was just relocating.
The same thing happens with cats. Yell at a cat for scratching the couch, and they’ll wait until you leave the room. Spray them with water, and they’ll learn to fear you, not the couch. Punishment teaches animals to avoid getting caught. It doesn’t teach them what to do instead.
Matching Preferences: Why the “Right” Alternative Often Fails
This is where most people mess up — and I include my past self in that group. You buy a scratching post or a chew toy, your pet ignores it completely, and you conclude that redirection doesn’t work. Nine times out of ten, the problem is that you bought the wrong thing.
For Cats: Texture, Orientation, and Location
Cats have strong preferences about what they scratch. Some love vertical surfaces; others prefer horizontal. Some want sisal rope, others want cardboard, and some will only touch natural wood. A cat who’s been shredding your upholstered couch arm isn’t going to suddenly love a cheap carpeted post in the corner of the spare bedroom.
To successfully redirect scratching, you need to match three things: texture (what the surface feels like), orientation (vertical vs. horizontal), and location (where the post lives in your home). A [2] is that the scratching post needs to be right next to the furniture the cat was already using. Cats scratch where they spend time. Put the post in the basement, and it might as well not exist.
Once the cat is using the appropriate surface consistently, you can gradually move it to a better location. But start where they already are.
For Dogs: Texture, Durability, and Novelty
Dogs are equally particular. A dog who’s been chewing wooden furniture probably wants something with give and texture — natural wood chews, nylon bones, or hard rubber toys might work. A dog who’s been shredding pillows and blankets needs soft, fabric-based toys that satisfy that tearing instinct without being your actual bedding.
Durability matters enormously. I once gave a client’s German Shepherd a standard plush toy as a chewing alternative. It lasted about ninety seconds. The dog wasn’t being destructive — the toy was simply not designed for a dog with that jaw strength. Match the equipment to the individual. A heavy chewer needs heavy-duty options.
Novelty plays a role too. Rotating toys every few days keeps them interesting. A chew toy that’s been sitting in the toy bin for two weeks is boring. Pull it out again after some time has passed, and it’s exciting again.
Deterrents and Attractants: Stacking the Deck
Redirection works best when you combine two strategies simultaneously: make the appropriate outlet irresistible and make the off-limits item unappealing. You’re not picking one approach — you’re layering them.
For cats, this might mean applying double-sided tape or furniture-protecting sheets to the couch corners they’ve been targeting while simultaneously dusting the new scratching post with catnip or using a pheromone attractant. The couch feels wrong now. The post smells amazing. The choice becomes obvious.
For dogs, it means using taste deterrents on furniture legs (bitter apple sprays are widely available) while making sure the chew alternative you’ve provided is genuinely satisfying. If the table leg tastes terrible and the elk antler in the corner is delicious, the dog will figure it out.
Management also means controlling access when you can’t supervise. Crates, baby gates, and closed doors aren’t punishment — they’re prevention. They keep the animal from practicing the behavior you don’t want while you build the habit of using the appropriate outlet.
The Real Conversation: Living With Animals Means Accommodating Them
There’s an uncomfortable truth that comes up in [2] more and more: if you can’t tolerate any damage to your furniture, a pet might genuinely not be the right fit for your life right now. And that’s okay. It’s more fair to everyone involved to acknowledge that than to bring an animal home and spend years fighting its biology.
But most people fall somewhere in the middle. They love their pets and they also love their couches. The good news is that with the right setup — appropriate outlets, smart deterrents, and realistic expectations — you can have both. Your couch might get a few snagged threads. Your table legs might have some character marks. But total destruction isn’t inevitable, and neither is living in a home that looks like you’ve surrendered it to the animals.
The shift that matters most is mental. Stop seeing chewing and scratching as problems to eliminate. Start seeing them as needs to meet. Once you do that, the solutions start making sense, and your furniture gets to live another day.
Sources
- biological imperative for cats — vet.cornell.edu
- common thread in advice from experienced cat owners — reddit.com