How long do you leave your dog for?

[MaMoosie]

We’ve been considering getting a dog, but there are two days a week where the dog would be alone for 2 hours in between my husband leaving by for work and me coming back. I’ve seen quite conflicting advice on what is ok for a dog to be left alone. I am wondering what others do with theirs?

3 hours max, and I start twitching at 2.5 hours. He’s a bit of an old man now and I’m pretty sure he just snoozes

2 hours for a dog - fine
2 hours for a puppy (under a year) - absolutely not fine.

Just factor that in.

Mine is crate trained, she goes in there when I go out and knows she has to sleep. I leave her 3-4 hours max

My dog is 4 and can be left for up to 5 hours but we hardly left him at all as a puppy as he was very clingy. We had to build up to it.

We leave him in the evening for 4 or 5 hours occasionally if we go out. He will have been walked and fed. During the day we rarely leave him for more than 4 hours.

2 hours for a dog that's house trained is fine, mine is left for about 4hrs 3 days a week.

Two hours is absolutely fine but you will need to build a puppy up to that. It all depends on breeds too a working dog will probably be bored and destroy your house if left. My whippet is 5 he's left 3 days a week for 6 hours, in an ideal world I wouldn't leave him that long but change of jobs meant I have to go to the office. He is absolutely fine though, they are a very lazy breed, just sleeps. I have a camera to watch him. My neighbour used to pop and see him lunchtimes when he was younger to break it up but most of the time he didn't even move off the sofa! Just pick the right breed for your lifestyle and build up to leaving.

Generally no more than four hours but has been left for longer the odd time and she is fine just a walk before and after.

He doesn’t need the toilet. He quite regularly goes 10hours without needing the toilet. He didn’t have breakfast though, if he was fed in the morning then he may need to go out during the day.
Hes very lazy in the house, sleeps a lot.

It was 7hrs 4 days a week when I was in the office. Now I work from home and he has the option to go out, he still doesn’t. Doesn’t come downstairs from bed until past midday sometimes, bless him.

Ours can be left quite a while but he is small enough to fit through the cat flap so he has free access to the toilet!

2 hours is fine. When we adopted ours from dogs trust they didn’t want him left more than 4 hours.

We had a puppy with severe separation anxiety, he had to have meds just to be able to leave the room, we tried to build up gradually but after 2 years we got another dog and he is now fine. We can leave them for up to 5 hours and they are mostly OK.

We have a sitter once a week who comes in to walk them/play with them whilst im in the office however they are so attached to her they dont settle that well when she leaves them which is frustrating, it's a new arrangement so hoping it gets better.

2 hours is fine for a dog but with a puppy you’ll need to really gradually build up to it, our dog had such separation anxiety as a puppy and would howl. We both ended ended up taking time off work to help him settle.
He’s an old boy now, and we leave him max 4 hours.

I haven’t read the entire thread but if not already mentioned just also be really aware of weekends as the timings don’t change if you have plans out etc. They can’t be left alone at night, for weekends away and things. Do you have plans as to who will have the dog if you’re on holiday; all things that need serious consideration.

It depends on the dog.
A puppy.... you can't leave them long at all. An older dog.... probably half a day.

It depends on the age of the dog and what steps have been taken to ensure the dog feels comfortable being alone for a couple of hours. Separation anxiety occurs because a dog is continuously with the owner and has not learnt to be alone for a reasonable length of time.

With my dogs, I exposed them at a very young age, 8 or 9 weeks, to being alone starting with me leaving the house for 10 minutes and then returning and building it to up from there. They have always had access to toys and I leave the radio on (low volume.)
I give a couple of treats as I leave and a couple of treats on my return.
Physical and mental exercise (training and play) play a big part too as the dog more than likely will fall asleep whilst you're absent.
If you're leaving a young dog in the chewy stage, be sure to move out of harm's way anything you don't want chewed. You can't chastise a dog after the event for doing something wrong: you either correct inappropriate behaviour at the moment it occurs or the opportunity is lost.

Because mine is an assistance dog, he's with me nearly all the time. But he'll retire one day so, to help him with the transition, I leave him for 10 - 20 minutes almost daily. Perhaps monthly I leave him for up to 2 - 3 hours. Very rarely, it's closer to 4 hours. He copes really well with this.

4-6 hours once not a puppy. people
need to grow up. It’s a dog not a child and will be in a crate.

Our greyhound is on his own for 7 hours once a week and is completely fine - we used to have a dog cam but he doesn’t even get off the sofa, the lazy boy!

It does depend a bit on the dog, my dog is fine to be left for 5-6 hours as long as he's walked before hand they said it's very rare he's actually left that long.

A couple of hours is fine.

You'd probably have to use a crate so the puppy is contained in a safe space for a couple of hours. Leaving a puppy uncontained in a house is risky incase they chew something or get themselves into trouble.

When our dog was a puppy I built up the time in the crate so he would happily sleep for a couple of hours in there if I needed to go out.

I also used doggy daycare and my mum puppy sat occasionally.

We leave her occasionally for 6 hours if we go to a family event or something. Regularly for 3 hours. She got used to it from young. We used to leave her with a filled kong to play with/ eat and ask a friend to pop in for a bit to let her out and play with her. 2 hours is totally fine.

The max we will leave ours alone for is 4 hours but that is quite rare. I work from home full time so I am home a lot. Across a normal 7 day week we might go out and leave her for an hour or so, if we go to the shops or out for dinner or whatever. She is fine alone for a few hours but it’s not daily or sometimes even weekly. If we go out we leave the tv on for her 😆. When I worked out of the house she used to come to work with me, that was pre Covid. You have to work up to these things. She is getting on a bit now and is very used to post Covid life of being at home with her people around.

To be honest, our dog is fine to be left but I feel guilty if it’s hours and hours! A good walk beforehand is always best so that they can have a nap and won’t need a wee anytime soon.

A well-trained, secure adult dog should learn to be fine for 4 hours. If they’re walked, empty bladder and bowel, left in a safe environment with stimulation (I use puzzle toys) it’s good for them to learn not to be surgically attached to their human.
It’s the puppy stage that’s limiting, you have to build up slowly.

Never, but my dog is only 10 months old and very needy! He goes to daycare or has a sitter. It very much depends on the dog. Breed can make a difference - oodles and poos can be very needy, spaniels too, but terriers often don’t give a shit if you’re there or not!

Yes. That is the same as our adult dog. She always has a minimum of 2 good long sniffy walks a day, one in the morning. She also has a really strong bladder.

She has run of the house when home alone. So can sit on the coach or on our bed, which means she can see out the window and she is OK.

She can be left for six hours.