Confused, Need Help Re Puppy And New Crate

[sarmy]

hi im new here. got a cocker spaniel 9.5wks old, had her for 1.5 wks. bought the crate few days after the pup and it has been sleeping in it with it open the entire time whilst shut in the laundry. paper always on floor near crate just in case, working well, if i take pup too loo about 11pm it hangs on till 6am when i get up.

now tonight have just had my 1st puppy class. have talked about the crate and its benefits. have been advised to move crate during day to family area and keep pup locked inside with plently of toys, taking out every hour for drink and toilet. i can handle that but is it ok to put pup back in laundry with open crate for times when im not home and out longer than an hour?

having problems with pup biting and growling at kids, have been given some ideas to work on. need to get this thing sorted b4 i lose the plot and give up on it.

i shut pup in the crate latched the door and its in the laundry with a sheet covering most of the crate and it has settled well an hour ago. im out for at least 4 hours in the morning thats why im asking all this. im out for this length of time about 4 times a week and want to crate train the pup but realise it cant hold for that amount of time and hope im doing it the right way.

see i asked a few q's at the class but of course thought of more once home.

please reply im going crazy here!

[Bubitty]

Hi Sarmy

I think its ok to keep pup in the crate if you are gone for only a few hours. Make sure pup has been toileted and make sure pup has plenty of toys and things to amuse itself with in the crate.

Do you have much time available for pup during the day when you are home? I would advise than you invest a heap of time on “mat training” instead of locking pup in crate when you are home. What I did was I taught my pup to sit on a mat in the same room as me. Pup would get a treat every few minutes for staying calmly on the mat. This has worked very well for me and I now have a very calm pup who will sit nicely as I attend to my chores inside.

If I am very busy and cannot keep an eye on pup and reward her for being on her mat then I will put her in a puppy pen in the backyard with a bone to chew on or some toys. I find that a training session with her before I leave her alone tires her out and she settles well.

When is pup biting and growling at kids? Are kids running around overexcited? Try to promote as much “CALM” as possible. Train pup to sit nicely and only allow kids to pet pup when calm. I don’t have children but I found that initially when my pup wanted to play and I played with her she would get VERY excited and over the top. So instead of playing we would drill through all our commands until she had mellowed down. I would only start a game when she was calm and if she got over the top, game would stop and she will have to sit nicely and calm down.

Also fit as many small training sessions as you can into a day as possible. Just 5 – 7 minute sessions. I did about 5-6 sessions with my pup every day for the first 2 weeks and have now decreased it to about 3 a day. It really wears their mind out and they settle much better.

[chiara]

Hi,

Your pup is doing very well with holding on all night! I think it's ok to leave pup home in the laundry with the crate door open provided the laundry is a safe place, if he sleeps in the crate he will not want to soil his sleeping place, if he has to go toilet and he's locked in the crate it might be distressing to pup, I would leave the crate open and put down a pee pad... they are absorbent sheets (you can get those at pet stores), we used them when my mum would care for our pup when I was at work and she had an apartment so he would go on his pee pad, somehow he knew that's where he had to go.

As bub mentioned I would mat train pup in the living room, the crate is his safe place to get away if things get too exciting so I would leave the crate in the laundry and use a mat in the living room.

As for the growling and biting... well for the biting make sure you have lots and lots of biting toys, we would use old towels and make a knot in the middle he would spend hours biting that, when he bites something he's not supposed to say no and give him something he can bite on. Our pup stopped the nibbling once all his baby teeth fell out.

Growling at the kids is not good... make sure you snap him out of it, when he growls give him a nudge or a firm no. If he continues you might have to dominate pup... don't know if they've touched on that at training but basically you have to hold pup on the ground belly up till he calms down. We had a problem with our pup where he accepted my husband as leader and would growl at me every time I tried to get him to do something he didn't want, domination worked he's now quite mellow with me. Also desexing helped, after his snip snip his aggression went away and he's now very calm.

I hope this helps.

Good luck and don't forget to take lots of snaps they grow up so quickly!!!!

[luvsdogs]

Growling at the kids is not good... make sure you snap him out of it, when he growls give him a nudge or a firm no. If he continues you might have to dominate pup... don't know if they've touched on that at training but basically you have to hold pup on the ground belly up till he calms down. We had a problem with our pup where he accepted my husband as leader and would growl at me every time I tried to get him to do something he didn't want, domination worked he's now quite mellow with me. Also desexing helped, after his snip snip his aggression went away and he's now very calm.

I hope this helps.

Good luck and don't forget to take lots of snaps they grow up so quickly!!!!

I would not follow this advice. You do not want to stop growling. It's a warning & if you take that warning away the pup will go straight to a bite. Teach your children that when a dog growls it's not comfortable with what's going on & is telling you it wants you to stop what you're doing.

Mind you at this age it may be play growling. I don't think it would be dangerous. Puppies play growl with their litter mates & bite. The pup that gets bitten stops play. If a puppy wants to play it soon learns not to bite, or play ends.

http://www.dogstardaily.com/blogs/why-growl-good

http://www.dogstardaily.com/files/DogsChildren.pdf