I went through two foam beds in eleven months. Both ended the same way: a pile of shredded filling spread across the rug and Biscuit standing over it looking pleased with her work. Biscuit is my 6-year-old blue-nose pit bull, 58 pounds of muscle and jaw, and she does not chew out of boredom. She chews because the thing in front of her gives way. Foam gives way. That is the whole problem in one sentence.
Fourteen months ago I bought a Veehoo chew proof elevated dog bed, the 42 by 30 inch model, and put it together myself on the covered back patio in about 20 minutes with a coffee going cold beside me. It has not been shredded. It has barely been chewed at all, as far as I can tell. That is the short version. Here is the longer one, in ten parts, for anybody with a strong dog and a floor that has already been covered in foam once.
The bed that outlasted the two before it
A raised cot, 42 by 30 inches, sitting 7 inches off the ground. Fourteen months with a heavy chewer in the house and no chew damage yet.
Amazon Check Today's Price on Amazon →It has gone 14 months without a single chew mark
I am not going to sit here and tell you a bed is indestructible. I have watched Biscuit take apart things that were sold as tough. What I will tell you is that this one has held. Fourteen months, warm months on the covered patio and winter in the living room corner, and the cot surface has no tears, no pulled threads, no corner worked loose. She tested it that first week. Then she stopped testing it.
There is no filling to pull out onto your floor
The reason the two foam beds died is simple. A foam bed is a shell around a filling, and a determined dog only has to win once. Get a tooth through the edge and the whole thing empties onto your carpet. This Veehoo bed is a taut cot surface stretched across a frame, not a sack of anything. There is no loose edge to grab and nothing to gut. That changes the entire calculation for a dog built like mine.
Seven inches up keeps her off hot patio concrete
Albuquerque summers are hard on a patio, and concrete holds heat well into the evening. The bed sits 7 inches off the ground, so Biscuit is up on the cot instead of flat against the slab. On a July afternoon she will walk past the shaded spot she used to use to get up on it. I noticed that in the first month and I have not stopped noticing it since.
Air moves underneath, so she does not get up damp
The other half of the raised design is airflow. A cot that lets air pass under and around a dog dries faster than anything with padding in it. Biscuit runs hot, and after a walk she used to leave a wet patch on a foam bed that stayed wet for hours. Here the surface is dry again in a few minutes. Nobody is lying in damp fabric, which matters for a dog who already licks at her skin in this dry air.
It holds a strong dog without sagging in the middle
Biscuit is 58 pounds and she does not step onto a bed, she lands on it. The listing calls the material and structure upgraded, and whatever that means on the factory floor, it translates to a surface that does not bow. After 14 months the cot is as tight as the day I assembled it. There is no dip where she always lies down, which is more than I can say for either foam bed after two months of her.
The non skid bottom stays put when she launches onto it
A bed that slides is a bed that ends up against the wall with the dog half on the tile. The bottom of this one is non skid, and it grips the patio and the hardwood equally well. She launches onto it from a running start most afternoons and it has never traveled more than an inch. Small thing. It stops being small when you are the one shoving the bed back into place four times a day.
Twenty minutes with the hex tool that comes in the box
I am 56 and I put this together alone on the patio. The screws and the hex tool are in the box, which meant no rooting through the garage for the wrong size and no second trip. Twenty minutes start to finish, and most of that was me rereading the sheet twice. It has stayed tight since. I tightened nothing after the first week, and nothing has worked loose in the fourteen months since.
It moves where you need it, inside or out
This bed lives on the covered back patio from about April through October and in the living room corner the rest of the year. It is light enough that I carry it in myself, and it goes through the back door without folding, dragging or swearing. The listing mentions indoor, outdoor, camping and training, and I believe all of it. For one dog in one house, the indoor and outdoor part is the part I actually use.
Mud wipes off instead of soaking in
Biscuit digs. There is a spot by the fence she has claimed, and she comes in with paws like a coal miner. The listing says stain resistant and it behaves that way in practice. A damp rag takes the mud off and the cot is dry a few minutes later. I have never had to take anything off it or put it through a machine. With the foam beds, mud meant a wash, a wait, and a smell that never quite left.
42 by 30 inches is room for a dog to sprawl out flat
Biscuit likes to lie flat with her back legs stretched out behind her. The 42 by 30 inch size gives her room to do that without hanging an elbow off the edge. A much smaller dog would rattle around in it, and a much bigger one would want the next size up. For a dog in her weight range it fits right. She curls up small on it in January and takes up the whole thing in July.
Fourteen months, two shredded foam beds behind it, and the cot surface still has no tears in it.
What I'd Skip
Two things, honest as I can put them. First, do not buy this thinking it fixes a hip or a joint. It is a comfortable place for a dog to rest and that is the whole of it. If Biscuit were favoring a leg, I would be at the vet's office, not on a shopping page. Second, do not expect a nervous dog to fall in love with it on day one. She sniffed it, walked a circle around it, and slept on the floor beside it for about a week before she trusted the thing to hold her weight. Give it that week. And if your dog is a puppy or a light chewer, this is more bed than you need. A foam bed would likely survive your dog just fine, and the chew proof part is the only reason I am here writing this. If you do not need that part, skip it.
Fourteen months, no chew damage, one happy 58 pound dog
The 42 by 30 inch Veehoo cot. Assembled in about 20 minutes. Raised 7 inches off the ground. Still in one piece.
Amazon See the Veehoo Elevated Bed on Amazon →