To crate or not?

[wintersgold]

We're bringing home our golden retriever puppy in a couple weeks & still haven't settled on whether to use a crate or not.

If we do decide to use one it will only be for the first few weeks (or until the puppy's housetrained). We'll obviously have puppy proofed rooms and play pens too so he doesn't get into danger.

Personally I would prefer not to crate but it seems to be the "done thing" now. I've read that it's pretty much essential for housetraining.

How true is that? If anyone managed to successfully housetrain their puppy without a crate please could you share any advice!

Thank you
(I don't want to start a debate on the ethics of crating please! Just looking for advice on other methods)

A massive YES from me. Our puppies have loved their crates and have headed in there when they need a break. Our 12 year old was crate trained and a happier dog would be hard to find.

Those who don’t like them are giving human feelings to dogs. They see it putting a dog in a cage, the dog sees it as their basket and place of safety.

How are they used to toilet train?

The idea is that puppies won't toilet where they sleep, so they'll "hold it" for longer if they're crated.

But the reality is that if the puppy is desperate, they'll go, and then they're just stuck in a crate with their own mess.

But a crate wouldn't have stopped your puppy needing the toilet in the night

Thanks 🙂

Then give the dog a basket , it’s nothing about human feelings it’s about not locking animals into small cages . It’s strange really that there is a growing movement / trend against keeping small animals like rabbits and Guinea pigs in cages but in the dog world it’s increasingly seen as the norm to lock a dog in one .

It's not essential - but some dogs do like a cosy covered crate.

The most important thing with house training is watching them like a hawk and putting them outside every time they wake up, after play, after food, after a drink, after they look at you, or sniff the floor, or blink 😂 it works well to have a word associated with toileting. You say that word every time they do it, and praise them hugely. Eventually they will do it on command. Guide dogs use the term "busy busy".

This.

A crate is only a "den" and "safe place" if the door is left open. If the dog is locked in there, it's not really their choice.

Dogs don't belong in small cages. If rabbits and guinea pigs are unhappy in them, imagine how a dog feels.

It's not essential I don't think but we did it with our Labrador, she loved her crate so much. When she was two we slowly phased it out. It was sad but our house is so small, we needed the space.

So anyway it's a yes from me, as long as it's treated as a training tool not a cage, there are people who mistreat them. I recommend reading Pippa Mattinson's book the Happy Puppy

Perhaps I haven’t explained very well.

a crate or a pen (with waterproof table cloth if not pads) would have meant I could have slept properly and not been all on edge all night in case she hopped down and pissed in our room.

I am a very light sleeper and a puppy that could roam around my room at night made me sleep very badly for 6 months. I became quite neurotic!

so basically I would advocate for a system where the little puppy is near the owners so they can take it out but not giving it complete freedom (as I did) because that way madness lies (for me).

Honestly - you would have been woken anyway by the puppy moving about in their crate and whining/crying because they need the toilet - the only difference is they then have to sleep in the area where they've toileted if you don't wake up and clean it up or take them out before they mess inside.

I was always very happy to take her out and did several times a night for many months. It was the jolt of adrenaline whenever she stirred because I thought that the agile little thing was about to get up and go to the loo on my bedroom floor (as she would) that made me develop nervous sleep issues.

It might have worked with a different and more easy going dog. Maybe a more easy going owner.

I actually ended up training her to wake me unnecessarily and for company in the night but this isn’t the place to go into that story!

it doesn’t need to be a cage / crate but I would definitely use some kind of pen in future.

1 lab, 4 lurchers, 1 yorkie, 1 JRT. Never used a crate for any of them. Make your home safe, supervise properly and put the effort into house training and they're not needed.

People seem to misunderstand the overnight crating. The idea is they wake you rather than toileting where they sleep if they are in a crate whereas if they were free roaming they might just go pee/poo in the corner without alerting you to the fact they need the toilet.

The idea is not that they sleep in their own mess whilst the owner sleeps through the whole night.

Yes indeed.

We crate trained and it was excellent, puppy loved it as her safe space and after not very long we could keep the door open, she still chose to stay there.

We got rid of it at about 6 months but can still use it for overnight stays etc. IMO it’s really useful for that.

You don’t know the temperament of the puppy either. Some don’t chew anything and some will eat the kitchen walls. Having a puppy proof space is really useful and useful to be able to pop them in for enforced naps too which helps to avoid some of the land sharkiness.

People who are against them don’t understand the proper use.

If a dog has to stay overnight at the vets, needs bedrest at home to recuperate from an injury, or needs to travel in a vehicle it’s a very good idea to have them crate trained.

To put a dog in a crate in these circumstances, if they are not used to it, would be incredibly stressful for them.

So crate training is an essential life skill for a dog, regardless of how regularly you use it at home.

That’s going to be pretty difficult for all the pups that are shut in a cage downstairs when the owner is asleep upstairs - even if they have the sense to bark they will likely have done it by the time the owner appears .

No. They're horrible. Unless you're going to leave the door open all of the time, in which case just get a dog bed.

“That’s going to be pretty difficult for all the pups that are shut in a cage downstairs when the owner is asleep upstairs - even if they have the sense to bark they will likely have done it by the time the owner appears .”

all the pups?

Crate training isn’t instant, it usually takes a few weeks, so people either put a crate in their bedroom or sleep in the room the puppy is going to sleep in. By the time the puppy is actually crate trained, they’ve usually got into a fairly predictable routine overnight anyway and they’d either be not going to the toilet overnight or you’d be setting an alarm and trying to get them to go overnight without toileting anyway.

Crate training is one thing I’ve always struggled with.
No matter how great I tried to make it, the dogs were always unhappy. I followed all of the guides to the letter and still couldn’t get it right.

In the end I gave up. My dogs sleep wherever they want, if they are hot they move somewhere else and can sprawl out in various places. The house surprising had very minimal damage from the last 2 puppies and more importantly the dogs have grown into happy settled personalities who can happily be left to roam the house without tearing it up!

We had a crate and it was the best thing we did. The first night he cried for 10 minutes, then slept till around 3.30 am. He was directly under our bedroom, so we could hear him when he woke up. He had shredded the pad and upturned the water bowl, so we gave up on both of these. Next night he went in happily, no crying and slept till 4 am. By 2 weeks home he was sleeping till 6 am and went in crate by himself in the daytime. He hated the car, so whenever I picked up my keys he would go into the crate. He was a destroyer, coffee table, dining table and chairs all chewed, so I think if he were left out at night he would have just chewed everything. A pen wouldn’t have been no good, he is a border collie, so a medium sized dog, but could easily jump out from about 3 months old. He slept in crate nighttime till around 10 months old and if left alone daytime went in there till around 18 months old. He now sleeps where he wants, which is usually on the lounge floor.

I've seen this argument on here a lot, but I know plenty of dogs who have never been crate trained in their lives and they still manage to go to the vets, recover from surgery and travel in vehicles with absolutely no issues whatsoever.

I'm not anti-crate but I'm really nor convinced that crate-training is as essential as some people make it out to be either.

I wasn't thinking about toilet training when I crated. I work at home so I just used it as a safe place when I popped out for school runs etc ... safe from her chewing things, getting through the cat flap, to prevent anxiety etc. For a long time after she was sensible enough to not use the crate, she went in there anyway whilst we were out, with the door open. So she really did see it as her safe place.

I rest my case.

if you crate train, you need to set your alarm and get up in the night to take them out. You do this when they are small and can’t wait. You don’t leave a puppy to mess their bed, that would be awful.