General Question?

[BeckyNC]

My girl is 21 mos and she is allowed to spend the day (7:45-5:30) downstairs in my living room and kitchen M-F. I would prefer to crate her, but she panics in the crate, drools, and chews on the bars. She is relatively well-behaved, though on Friday she chewed on my berber carpet--sheesh!

 

[abradbury.5]

I've been lucky and have worked at home since I brought Toffee home. When I travel for work (which is non-stop some of the time), she stays with my retired parents who are home almost always with her.

Still, even working from home, I left to run errands and attend meetings. When she was really young, she stayed in a crate when I left. She has always been very well behaved though, and so I stopped crating her when she was about 4 months old. She had access to the entire house at that point (and she never abused that privilege!!).

I think a crate is a good way to go for a younger dog, and once they become comfortable in the home (and it's been dog-proofed), are housebroken, and you can trust them, you can limit your pup's access to certain rooms (or the whole house depending on what you're comfortable with).

 

[owen's mum]

I have to crate my boy as well.

About a week after we got him, I left him for about five hours(with three toys and a kong). BF check on him after three hours and all was well. I got home after two more hours and he had eaten fire starter pine cones and barfed everywhere. ER vet...$200...$35 crate at Walmart.

He's totally worth it. I make "kennel" one of his commands and treat him when he's in there and NEVER say "kennel" in the mad mom voice, so he likes it.

 

[BoxerDaneMom]

When Murph, now at the bridge, was a pup I crated him and would come home at lunch time. I only had 30 minutes so I had at the most 1o minutes at home, but it worked out well to let him out. Once he hit about 2 he was trusted out loose. Hugo came to me at 2 1/2 and he was trusted from the beginning.

 

[Faughtey]

I have a doggie door in the laundry room that goes out into a run. The dogs are gated in the laundry room when I go to work. They prefer to stay in the air conditioning most of the time, but also can go outside if they want to.

 

[delilahbelle]

Both my babies stay in crates. Every morning when I put my perfume on, they know it's time and they run to their crate room and wait on me to 'lock them down' and give them their treat.

 

[Kenosmom]

I would definatly start right off with using a crate for your new puppy...we have a 17 wk old boxer who we started right off crating...I am a stay at home mom so he doesn't have to be crated all day or anything, but he is crated all night and whenever we leave the house...he loves his crate and goes in there off & on thru out the day (for naps) on his own...I would say that if you do go with a crate then you should crate him at night too--but you'll need to get up in the middle of the night & take him outside...if you go with crating it will also make housebreaking easier too...puppies are less likely to soil thier sleeping area then they would be to soil in the house...
here's a good article on crate training that you might want to read to help you decide if crate training is something you want to do...http://www.barkbytes.com/training/crate.htm

Good Luck!
Angie

 

[PingsMomNiki]

We didnt use crates with Ping but we were lucky since we had a nice big tiled area for him to stay in while at work, we put down pads and newspapers..but It was really hard at first, because of course its hard to potty train when your gone during the day! Thankfully I worked close to home and BF got off work at 3 so between us we got home at lunch and my BF home early to take him out. Now, he's old enough to hold it - we take him out in the mornings and a friend that lives at our apartments takes him out mid-day and then he goes out again when we get home. Sometimes our friend has to work a full day and cant take him out mid-day but Ping "holds it" until we get home. He hasnt had an accident since he was about 5 months old, and he hadnt had one for awhile before that, he's about 17 months now. They learn pretty quick and dont like "going" where they live, sleep, eat. Good luck, try to get help at first because the first couple of weeks and months are important in emphasizing good "potty etiquette" and training. Use treats as rewards that sort of thing and it wont take too long until he's got the point and waiting for you to return!