Know How To Open Doors?

[Lori, Oliver & Isabel]

Over the past few days we've noticed that our 4 1/2 month old goldendoodle, Ollie, has learned how to open doors in our house. Does anybody else have a doodle who does this and how have you dealt with this behavior?

[Dori]

Yes! Teddy knows how to open doors and gates - anything with a flipper that he can nose up or pull down on with his paw. It doesn't really bother us - as he can only open doors outward (can't pull them towards him) so he can't get outside. We don't often shut our inside doors (with the flipper handles) but even when he does open them it doesn't bother us (we actually think it is cute!). The kennel he stays at when we are travelling says he can pop the gates open - so when he is there they have to put something through the little holes so he can't do it. They (I think fondly!) call him the Gate Popper.

[Kyoko]

Yes. Charlie knows to swat at the door knob to get it turned, and simotaniously push the door with her body to get it open.
She busts into the bathroom while I am showing and stick her face in the shower!!
But same as Dori's comment, she can not open the door to go outside since she can't pull it towards her, it has not been a major issue.

[Lori, Oliver & Isabel]

I think it is cute that he is able to open doors, but there are two potential issues with it right now. He is almost 100% housebroken, but if he is out of our sight and away from the front door - he won't go to the door. He also started counter surfing lately. So, we try to keep most doors closed and keep him in our sight. Until he learns that these are unacceptable behaviors, this door-opening trick could become frustrating :)

I was actually really surprised that he was able to open them. They are not the flipper handles, there are the regular "door knobs" that you have to turn. He has always reached for the door handles when he wants to go outside or get into a room, so I knew he understood that is how the door opens. I just didn't think his furry paws would be able to turn the door knob.

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Ned doesn't open doors but he does unzip pillows and pull the stuffing out. He doesn't even break the zipper and he doesn't destroy the pillows. He never touches pillows that don't have a zipper!

[shelly]

YES! Tori does unzip too! She ruined many a cushion for herself! She used to open doors too. We have the flip handles too. But now.. if they're not clicked shut, she just knows to nudge it and it will open. She still garbage snoops, so we have to be sure we shut the bathroom doors TIGHTLY

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Whenever my son comes home from college, he spends half of his visit cleaning up bathroom trash. We keep the bathroom doors shut and he always forgets to do so. Since it is a bathroom only he uses, I just push the trash back in and close the door! You would think he would learn....

[shelly]

Do they ever???? (learn)? LOL

[shelly]

OOO! Just like a typical "Sherlock HOlmes"! LOL Cute!

[Lori, Oliver & Isabel]

LOL - that is cute!

[Camilla and Darwin]

We don't have any flip handles, but Darwin has figured out how to open our fridge door. (uh oh!) he also jumps up our doors and puts his paws on our doorknobs, luckily he can't twist them.

[Kyoko]

OMG! That's so cute!!

[Bronwen Watts]

Tyson knows how to open the baby gates we use to keep him out of parts of the house, unless we lock them, and he has also figured out how to open some of the doors. We had to start locking our bedroom door because he had figured out how to get into the bedroom, and was having entirely too much fun in there (breaking & sometimes eating blinds, shredding toilet paper, getting into mail, rolling around in our bed and eating anything he could find in our bed). He actually caused us to replace our mattress because he broke into a cabinet, found a bottle of fish oil we were putting in his food, and brought it onto our bed and proceeded to eat it. It made a huge mess, and we couldn't get rid of the smell, so our 3 year old mattress had an early retirment. Crazy dog! So now we lock our bedroom door, and so far that has been working for us.