What do you have in your puppy's crate overnight?

[missymoola]

Getting our little Daisie (JRT) pup in 4 weeks when she will be 10 weeks old. She is sleeping in a crate with the rest of her litter atm.

I have heard that puppies don't go to the toilet in their crate unless they absolutely can't hold it. We are planning on having the crate in our room so when she needs to go she will hopefully wake us up and we can take her straight out with a torch and let her get on with it and praise only when she has been, then back in the crate to sleep.

Has anybody else done a similar routine? In our experience, all pets end up sleeping in our bed, under our bed, on the sofa etc so we were only planning on having her in the crate until she is used to waking us up to go outside.

• Do we put puppy pads in the crate in case of accidents?
• Do we put food/water in or let her have a drink after she's been out?
• The crate we've got will be a bit big for her. We got it for our larger terrier a few years ago. We were planning on putting in an old pillow and blanket with a blanket over the top overnight. Do we fill it up as much as possible?
• Do we put it toys in? We have gotten her a puppy kong teething stick and wondered weather to give it her overnight.

Thanks

We have our pups crate out in the utility room, covered in blankets to keep things dark. She has a fleece blanket, her smelly blanket from home, a puppy warmer a couple of toys, and a kong filled with a few bits. Sometimes frozen with kong puppy paste, peanut butter etc She listens to Radio 4-is a bit posh and clever :o

Make crate smaller, just enough room for her to turn around in. I don't put food and water in, last food/drink at 9 so wee,poo before bed. I also don't puppy pad, and leave her all night. Am terrible puppy mummy I know, but I need my sleep. She has never gone to the toilet in her crate, and only howled on her first night. She's a 9wk old lab. I really don't want her upstairs though, so positioning is quite a personal thing.

You sound v experienced though, so should be learning from you! I post daily with yet another problem! :)

I just have her bed, a fleece and a heat pad. I tried putting a cushion in too but she didn't seem to like it.

I don't have food or toys overnight to try to establish that it is a time for sleeping or resting, and also put a blanket over the crate to keep it dark.

I have read that you should always have water available but I don't put that in either, to avoid spills and wees really, and she seems fine - usually doesn't bother with a drink when she gets up in the morning.

I am getting up at intervals during the night to take her out so haven't needed paper or puppy pads, but with limited success because there was a poo this morning! Apparently they are not supposed to poo in their crate if it is small enough, and you can buy dividers to reduce the available space, but what do I know? Just off to bath a poo-ey dog - lovely start to the day!

Happymm - I learnt everything from here and puppies for dummies! Our last pup training was terrible because I got ill and couldn't cope or bare to part with him. Had to do majority of his training when he was 2 which was so much harder. Determined to get it right with her.

& Thank you, I won't bother with the water thing then. Will look into a divider Howdoes

We have a divider in ours, I think by company called Savic-got it off Amazon