My beagle does the same thing!!! He is great during the day (on weekends when we don't work he will chew his bones like crazy!) but when we are at work, we come home and he has chewed the lamp cords (thank GOD we unplug everything), books, the lamp shades, started putting a hole in the couch and he pees on the sides of the couch! I am wondering if neutering will help which we were planning on doing before he is a year. He is 8 months now and my husband says we need to crate him now. We have a doberman and the beagle thinks he is his dad. I just don't understand why he is destroying things? I am beginning to wonder if it's because he gets sad when we leave. He knows he does wrong, but yet we don't punish him because technically we didn't catch him in the act! I would love advice. I guess right now we are going to crate him, but it really breaks my heart thinking about that. Especially when the dobie gets to roam around the house and he is stuck in the crate!