A dog owner thought it would be fine to leave his husky free to roam around the house while he stepped out for an hour, but he was wrong—very wrong.
Kevin Yu, from Michigan, knew exactly what he was getting into when he brought Lila the 10-month rescue husky home; she is his third dog of the same breed, after all. “We adopted her about four months ago from a local Siberian husky rescue,” Yu told Newsweek. “Her favorite thing to do is play with sticks, no matter how big the size! She also loves staring out the window, and keeping squirrels out of our bird feeders.”
Yu is the first to admit that Lily can be “a little destructive” at times, but he usually takes precautions to curb those tendencies. “She’s crate-trained and, normally when we leave for a shorter period, we would put her in her crate,” Yu said. “But we have been trying to let her loose more.”
That was Yu’s first big mistake that fateful day. The other was leaving Lily with a large potted plant. “That particular day, we had just moved a plant inside because of the cold, and we were trimming the leaves of the plant while she was watching,” Yu said.
Dogs are social animals and can often struggle with being left alone, even if it is for the briefest of periods. In these situations, it is not uncommon for canines to seek out something to chew on as a means of alleviating any negative emotions.
A 2023 study published in the journal Animals found that a long-lasting edible chew had the most positive and calming effect on canines left home alone, compared with a treat-dispensing toy or smart treat-dispensing device. In hindsight, Yu’s mistake may not have been to leave Lily out of her crate, but rather fail to keep her occupied with some kind of long-lasting edible chew.
Ultimately, in the absence of such a treat, it would appear Lily turned to Yu’s plant as a tasty alternative. That wasn’t a huge surprise to her human companion. “That morning, she tore a couple leaves off the plant while we were still in the house,” Yu said. “Before I left, I did think I should put her in her crate just in case; hindsight is 2020, I guess.”
As soon as Yu and his partner returned an hour later, it became clear something was wrong. “When we came home, our other dog came to greet us at the door while Lila hid,” Yu said. “I think she knew she did something bad.”
Once the couple got inside, they discovered the room in disarray with the aforementioned plant and its soil scattered across the room. Lily, meanwhile, was found cowering beside the couch, with the guiltiest of expressions on her face.
Yu had a pet cam set up, so was able to trawl through the footage and see exactly what happened. Sure enough, the video confirmed Lily as the guilty party, with the husky opting to occupy herself with the plant, resulting in one almighty mess.
Tellingly, Yu’s other pup kept a distance throughout, evidently aware that whatever Lily was up to was ill-advised. Though it took some cleaning up to get the place back to normal, Yu was able to see the funny side in it all and felt no ill will toward Lily, who is a dog and a young one at that, still learning about domestic life.
Yu even opted to post a picture of the fallout and Lily’s guilty look to his Reddit, u/cthuwulhuwu1, where it subsequently went viral with over 12,000 upvotes. “I wanted to share on Reddit because I thought the picture was funny,” he said.
The good news is that steps have been taken to avoid a repeat incident. “I have removed all of the plants from indoors to avoid it from happening again,” Yu said.
Though Lily hasn’t been banished to her crate as a result of what happened, Yu will be taking extra steps to keep her occupied and remove any temptations should he decide to go out and leave her free to roam the house again.
