Not keen on crates, anyone else had puppy success without one?

[youaintseenbadboyz2]

Hi everyone
We are welcoming a golden retriever puppy to our home in October . Previously we had a lovely Rommie rescue who we sadly lost in May. He hated his crate and after two nights we couldn’t bear to see him so sad and he thrived in a pen. However full disclosure, he was 6 months so was clean at night.

Our lovely breeder also doesn’t use crates but is completely supportive if we want to but I’m just not sure, if we have a puppy play pen for night times and if we need to pop out briefly, why we need the crate? We also travel to Cornwall a few times a year but again, could we just take the play pen?

There also the fact that as our GR will grow to be a fairly big boy or girl, a crate in the car is not going to work anyway.

Would love your thoughts and experience on this

I have had GR for over 30 years…. Never crated.
They are very very sensitive dogs who love human contact.
They are usually very quick to house train.
We have always slept near them when they are tiny, woken them in the night for toileting… once they are ok in the night they sleep in a basket in our room… realize this is not for everyone… we are a bit attachment parenting with them 😂
I couldn’t in a million years put one in a crate!
Whatever you decide to do, I wish you years of happiness with your dog, they are simply the best dogs in the world. Congratulations.

We have a 42 inch crate for our puppy. It’s huge. We could use dividers and fit 5 puppies in there with room for them to all turn around.
I don’t think it’s lazy to use a crate. We don’t plan on keeping the door closed for long, just until he gets used to it and whilst the kids are off school. There is also a choice of surfaces in there and he wanders around deciding where he wants to settle and moves around 5 times into different places throughout his sleep.
What happened to each to their own? Why so judgemental. It’s also ironic @Blendabrethin you say to train your dog instead of crate training when most dog trainers recommend using a crate now.

@mummyford - Eberything I have read about crating advises using a crate not much bigger than the dog, otherwise they will toilet in an area of the crate. As for how I toilet trained, I never relied on puppy pads. I made sure I planned ahead and hot my puppues in summertime. We spent most of the dirs few days outside, learning the puppies cue toiletting and introducing a marking word. Afyer the first few days, I would take the dog outside every 20-30 mins or when they were circling and gradually extended this time. At night, one of us would take them outside every 3 hours and use the marking word. It took commitment, time and plamning ahead but the dog was trained in 3 weeks.

@jigsawtrain I'm not a believer in 'each to their own' sorry.

Your way is the only way is it.

We've got a crate. (In fact we've got 2). We've never used them, ones in the garage and one sits in the living room as dog toy storage and shoe rack. Dog sleeps in her bed in our room, ends up on our bed. We're working from home and she hasn't had to be left home alone yet.