crate training

[dietstartsmonday]

Hi all I have an 11 week old staff puppy. I have a crate for him but really not entirely sure how I should be using this.
Any advice would be appreciated. I am hoping it will help with house training him

To repeat, the crate replicates the conditions of a warren, the bed doesn't so much. However, if your dog is happy in a bed that is great.

The crate does have advantages over the bed for a puppy as the crated puppy can't chew or scratch furniture/the house, and is safe from DCs and other visitors. As mentioned, puppies tend not to foul where they sleep so crates help with house training, puppies on beds can just get up and foul anywhere else in the room. However if your puppy can do a 4 hour down stay out of sight, kudos to you!

Our dog loved his crate when he was a puppy. We stopped shutting the door at night when he was about 6-7 months old so he chose to go in there.

When he was 9 months old he went to stay with my sister for a few days when we were on holiday. The first night he just could not settle so my sister picked up his crate from our house and took it back to hers. As soon as he saw it he virtually threw himself inside and was obviously very relieved he had his safe place

We don't use a crate at home now but we still use a travel crate in the car and on holiday

Isn't it strange how when it comes to crates people are happy to talk about 'warrens' and a dogs instinct being like a wolf but then the anti dominance people (myself included) are saying dogs are not like wolves !

I completely understand the attraction that a small, quiet, enclosed space creates a feeling safety for a dog. What I don't get is the need to shut the door. I think if you changed the name from crate to cage (which is what it is) people's perception of them might change.

I quite often call it his cage, makes no odds to me what I call it.

It keeps him safe from himself, he hasn't enough stomach left to risk an operation to remove a foreign body...if he didn't electrocute himself first as wires are one of his favourites.

I don't have a room with concrete walls to put him in when he's left and he'll try to chew anything else, can reach anywhere I can and can move all my furniture if he thinks there's something he might like underneath or behind it.

He has pretty severe behavioural issues so it's somewhere he's happy to be if someone is in my house that he can't meet and he has medical issues that have required both periods of crate rest at home and hospital stays...if he wasn't crate trained they'd have been far too stressful for him.

If I thought he'd be ok without it I'd get rid of it in a heartbeat, it's 48" and takes up a huge chunk of my living room...but he wouldn't be, so it stays.

Thanks for explaining things, pro craters. It's an interesting topic and I can go some way towards understanding the benefits.

Bizarrely even my cat loves the crate, I'll often find her asleep in it.

Flora I think you are confusing a few things here. Dogs are believed to be descended from wolves so there is some plausibility that they might share some traits in how they relate to other dogs and, to an extent, to humans to the extent that they are perceived as members of the pack. Dominance theory derives from a theory about dog behaviour involving amongst other things the idea of a dominant alpha male wolf, that was abandoned even by the person who proposed it. He studied wolves in captivity which have seen been shown to behave in ways uncharacteristic of wild wolves due to the stress of the small enclosures.

Presenting a false theory about wolves, using this to draw some wrong conclusions just shows that ethology is a complex science and we have a lot to learn, it doesn't say anything about the extent that we should draw conclusions about dog behaviour from observing wolf behaviour.

JCW I have no problem with cage as a term. If you do not close the door the dog will walk out to urinate/defacate, chew, scratch, jump up on the toddler, etc, but as I said if your puppy does a 4 hour down stay on his bed, well done you and your training efforts!

Unfortunately at times dogs do need to be restricted in their movement. When travelling, when at the vet, maybe recovering from illness or surgery.

Crate training means that the dog is used to this and is happy in these situations. (for what it is worth I also train all my puppies to wear a cone of shame or collar so when they need to wear one it is not a trauma)

I am heavily into dog sport and search and rescue and my dogs need to have a place that they can totally relax in where ever we are. If we have the crate with us I know my dogs will chill relax and be safe what ever the situation they are in. In a major city, on a mountain side or at a busy agility competition for example.

Crate games by Susan Garrett is a great resource to use with your dogs and they all love to play them. The time the spend doing it with you is a great bonding time and gets puppies or young dogs loving to learn from an early age. All force free and fun.

tabula, in very specific circumstances , like the ones you describe, I can see the necessity for a crate.

Booboo, I don't think I ever said my dog can do a 4 hr down stay (can any?). But all the circs you describe are for the benefit of the owner - not the dog. Each to their own and what is right for me isn't what's right for you - and that's ok. I just think for new dog owners nowadays crates are often presented as the only way to go and that's really not the case.

Of course they are not the only way to go and they do not suit all dogs, like all training you have to be flexible. Of course the benefits I described are for the owner but that would only be a problem if there was a cost to the dog. As I have explained repeatedly a dog trained to the crate should feel secure and happy in one, the owner gets all the other benefits but what is wrong with that.

The point of the 4 hr down stay was to show that training a dog to go to its bed is not comparable with training a dog to go to a crate because sooner or later the dog will get up from the bed and, if so inclined as most puppies are, will foul, chew, scratch, etc. the whole point is that the crate is better because it has a door that closes, and just because a door closes doesn't mean the dog will be unhappy because firstly dogs like confined spaces and secondly they have been trained to associate the crate with good things.

This is a bit like someone saying that they don't like leads because they restrict dogs, but a dog that has been trained to walk on the lead has positive associations of it (lead = walk) and the owner gets the benefits of being able to exercise the dog safely away from cars, other people who may not welcome dogs, other dogs who may not be friendly, without the dog running off, etc. To insist that leads restrict the dog is to miss the point.

But you haven't trained a dog to stay where it's put ,you are giving it no option and because it's not howling etc doesn't mean that it wouldn't rather have the space to walk about . I'm sorry but IMO dogs are not supposed to be kept in cages unless there is a medical reason for doing so . That said everyone to their own thing but I do agree with johncusack that a crate does seem to be at the top of a 'what you need for a pup list ' and it's not always a good thing as they are so easy to abuse .

Dogs that are distressed in crates do howl, scratch and even self-harm by hitting themselves against the sides - generally it is pretty easy to see a dog is distressed in a crate. If you are trying to say that a dog that voluntarily entered a crate, is lying down chewing its treat quietly and then sleeping MAY be distressed because it actually wants to walk...well you are just making things up. Even worse you are making things up that can be generalised to anything else, e.g. how do you know your dog is even happy loose in your house, maybe he is distressed unless he can roam the neighbourhood all day long since dogs are animals that used to cover large distances. You can make up all sorts of stuff, doesn't mean it makes any sense. Emotive reactions to a cage, prison, claustophobia, forceful confinement, etc. say more about human attitudes than dog preferences.

Dogs that are crate trained correctly will be the most chilled relaxed and happy dogs you can find.

Dogs that are crated cruelly will let you know! People can abuse crates as they abuse dogs - some people are idiots.

Generally anxious dogs will pace up and down and around and around. Dogs in crates do not do this and instantly become calm by the action of being still. It gives the most nervous dogs a complete chill out time a bit like meditation and mindfulness for us. You know that feeling when you turn off the mobile phone, lock the door, get a glass of wine and just chill - that is the same for a dog in the crate. They are off duty, they can relax, they can stop working.

Dogs that are nervous will run around and hot stop until they are mentally and physically exhausted crates give dogs the much needed down time.

In my case it is an extreme example but I do need to control when my dogs gets sleep and relaxation. If they have been on a search and rescue job all night they need to wind down and relax - they see their crate as the stimulus to relax.

As I said its down to personal preference and frankly booboo some of your responses are ridiculous .You are happy with your choice ,I'm happy with mine and I think I'm as capable of telling whether my dog is distressed as you are of yours .

Nothing to do with personal preference - no one is suggesting we put YOU in a crate!

My puppy is crate trained. I never shut the door now he's housetrained but he sleeps in there anyway. If there are fireworks, I put a blanket over the top of it and he goes in and stops freaking out. It's very clear that he feels safe in it.

My 3 year old lab is crate trained and won't relax unless I shut the door at night time. We've tried having her in a normal bed, in our bed, having the run of the downstairs but she won't settle and relax until she's in the crate where she lets out a massive big sigh as she's falling asleep. During the day, in the hour she's left alone before she's picked up by our dog minder, she has the run of the downstairs and will more than likely snooze on the sofa. When we're in, in the evening, we'll leave the crate door open and she'll often go in there for a snooze. She takes herself off to the crate around 10 as she knows that's when we go to bed most nights, if we don't shut the door, she'll come out and stand in front of us until we follow her in and shut the door She's having surgery today on her leg after which she'll need complete crate rest for a number of weeks, I'm so glad she is used to her crate as I know she'll be fine in there.

There's nothing cruel, unnecessary or restricted about it if you have the right crate for the dog - ours is massive and she can walk about in there without any issues

Aren't crates rather integral to the housebreaking process?

If left to roam a house at night, won't puppies always poo whenever the mood strikes and grow into adults that do the same?

No, or no dog would ever have been housetrained before people started using crates.

They help a bit, but puppies can't hold overnight wherever they are, so they still need out in the middle of the night or they'll go indoors.