Simple crate training question!

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Sormeh
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Simple crate training question!

Post by Sormeh »

Hi all,
We have a 4-month-old puppy that we recently started crate training. She is definitely not taking it easily and panics when she's in and we see signs of separation and confinement anxiety. Anyways, my question is actually very simple. You know how everyone says slowly increase the amount of time she's in the crate? So I plan on increasing the time 1 minute every time she goes in the crate, but when she's asleep and when she's awake is totally different. If I take her for a walk and come back and put her in the crate and she sleeps the whole time (let's say I had planned 30 mins), do I open the door after 30 mins? She was asleep the whole time and didn't even realize she was there! Or do I wait for her to wake up and increase the time she is awake in there? I basically don't know what to do if she's asleep in the crate, open the door at the planned time or not? Thanks!!
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zeta1454
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by zeta1454 »

Hi Najmeh and welcome to the Forum :-)

When you say that you have just started crate training, is this after a period of time when Sormeh has been with you and not in a crate at all or have you just got her recently? At 4 months of age, puppies often start to feel fear and anxiety about situations which are strange to them so it is understandable if she is panicking about this new experience if she has never known it before.

Try to make the crate a place she will feel comfortable and put a favourite toy or safe chew item in with her. If she is asleep, do not disturb her by opening the door but wait until she wakes and wants to come out. Leave the crate door open when you do not want her to be confined so she can go in at other times of her own accord and will not feel that it is only a place of confinement but a safe den where she can sleep or rest with her toy / chew.

How long are you planning to leave her in the crate in the future and is this at night or through the day? Will you be home or out when she is crated? Some dogs may not take to a crate, others will get used to one and some really love them! We have some of our dogs who prefer to sleep in a crate at night, others that will use a crate as a den during the day but, apart from when a puppy is very young, we would not leave any of the dogs crated when we were out and even with a puppy only for very short periods. You can use a playpen set up for puppies as well or instead of a crate which gives more space for toys and bedding and ( if the puppy is not yet housetrained) allows for an area where they can toilet away from their bed- if they are being left unattended for an hour or two.

Although your plan to slowly increase the time that Sormeh is in the crate is a good one, I would not get too worried about specific timing when she is asleep. If she is settling down for a nap in the crate, that is progress in itself and should get her used to the crate as a place of rest. Good luck :)
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Sormeh
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Sormeh »

zeta1454 wrote: 02 Dec 2018, 12:45 Hi Najmeh and welcome to the Forum :-)

When you say that you have just started crate training, is this after a period of time when Sormeh has been with you and not in a crate at all or have you just got her recently? At 4 months of age, puppies often start to feel fear and anxiety about situations which are strange to them so it is understandable if she is panicking about this new experience if she has never known it before.

Try to make the crate a place she will feel comfortable and put a favourite toy or safe chew item in with her. If she is asleep, do not disturb her by opening the door but wait until she wakes and wants to come out. Leave the crate door open when you do not want her to be confined so she can go in at other times of her own accord and will not feel that it is only a place of confinement but a safe den where she can sleep or rest with her toy / chew.

How long are you planning to leave her in the crate in the future and is this at night or through the day? Will you be home or out when she is crated? Some dogs may not take to a crate, others will get used to one and some really love them! We have some of our dogs who prefer to sleep in a crate at night, others that will use a crate as a den during the day but, apart from when a puppy is very young, we would not leave any of the dogs crated when we were out and even with a puppy only for very short periods. You can use a playpen set up for puppies as well or instead of a crate which gives more space for toys and bedding and ( if the puppy is not yet housetrained) allows for an area where they can toilet away from their bed- if they are being left unattended for an hour or two.

Although your plan to slowly increase the time that Sormeh is in the crate is a good one, I would not get too worried about specific timing when she is asleep. If she is settling down for a nap in the crate, that is progress in itself and should get her used to the crate as a place of rest. Good luck :)
Hello,
Thank you for the warm welcome :)

Yes, unfortunately, when we first brought her, we didn't start crate training right away. She got used to being open and the house and then when we saw signs of separation anxiety we thought we should start crate training.

She sleeps in it at night with the door open (although she goes in and out a number of times). She also goes in and out during the day, but as soon as the door is closed she panics. She's peed and pooped in it a couple of times as well and the crate is not big for her. Now when she starts panicking and circling, I order her to stop and sit and she settles down a bit, but when she falls asleep I get confused when to open the door because I'm afraid if I wait till she wakes up she might start whining and I don't want to open the door in response to that and that means I will have to wait who knows how long for her to calm down again and not pee/poop either! It sounds like such a simple funny question I had but I swear I searched everywhere and found no answer online so your help is very much appreciated and I will simply wait for her to wake up and then I'll open the door before she gets hyped up, if I can :)

We only plan on leaving her in the crate when we are not home. Currently, that rarely happens but possibly 4-5 hours when we are invited somewhere. She decides to sleep in it herself at night without us putting her there. I understand that leaving her open in the house might also be an option where she doesn't panic but we would like to exhaust the crate training option first as we also have a cat and would prefer her to stay safe from the bully cat :-S
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by zeta1454 »

No worries about asking any question regarding your mini - if anyone on the Forum can help, we will :-)

It doesn't sound as though the crate is really an issue, just getting her used to having the door closed. I would try to work on that as often as you can. If she is awake when you go to shut the door, give her a reward as you close it. When we were training little puppies (6-7 weeks old) to sleep alone at night in a crate, I would give them a biscuit when they were in the crate, as I fastened the door, and it became a routine which they knew and they would go into the crate very soon of their own accord to go to bed. It is harder with an older puppy but, if you get into a routine of regularly rewarding her for the behaviour you want, it should still work out.

If you are expecting to leave Sormeh for several hours in the future (even if only now and again) you will need to build up to this gradually. Dogs are best with regular routines as they like to know what to expect and this helps prevent anxiety or panic. If you are almost always at home and then suddenly you are not, Sormeh will not know whether you are ever coming back. However if you go out at a certain time and return at roughly the same time, it is much easier for her to become used to this "repeated behaviour" and less likely that she will panic. Of course, you don't want to be going out for hours on end for no reason but, if you can, begin to regularly leave Sormeh for a short period of time, every day, and make a routine of the actions you do before you leave. This way she will recognise that you are going and learn that you always come back and you can extend the time to longer periods gradually, to make it easier for Sormeh to adjust to being left when you are invited out. Make sure that she has exercised, pee'd and poo'd, and is ready to settle down in her crate with a safe chew or favourite toy, give her a treat and close the door, before going out.

An alternative, if possible, when you are likely to be away for many hours, is to have a family member, friend or dog sitter to come and spend time with Sormeh while you are out. Four to five hours is a very long time for her to be confined and especially if she does panic and mess her crate. Do be very sure that she is relaxed about being in the crate with the door shut for an extended time, before you leave her as it could make her even more anxious if she has the traumatic experience of being locked in with the fear that you will not return.
Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole. ~Roger Caras

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Theo18
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Re: Night time toilet training

Post by Theo18 »

Hi all wondering if you can help
We have just got our new puppy Theo. He’s 12 weeks old. We had him at 10 weeks. He’s so good at going out to do his business when asked. We have him sleeping in a crate at night and have been getting up initially at 2.30am to let him out and he now makes it to 5am. I left him a bit longer until 6.15am this morning but he had pee’d and poo’d. He was initially on 4 feeds a day which I have reduced to 3 but am wondering if I’m giving him his food too late in the evening 7.30pm. Could this be why he hasn’t made it through the night yet? Thanks! 😁
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by zeta1454 »

Hi Roz and welcome to the Forum :-)

I would usually have a puppy on 3 meals a day by 12 weeks of age and have the last meal at about 6-6.30 p.m. However, from your post, it seems that you have moved on quite quickly from 5 a.m. to 6.15 a.m. and it may be just too big an extension of the time. You could move the last meal to an earlier time depending on when you are expecting to give Theo his last meal of the day in future when it reduces down to twice a day. I would try going back to nearer 5 a.m. though if Theo can last that long and then extend by 15 minutes a time each week until you reach 6.15 or whatever time you prefer to get up. You don't want to set back his house training by going too fast at this stage - he is still very young and sounds to be a great little pup :-)
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Oscar 12345
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Oscar 12345 »

Hi Roz, are mini pups can be quite different. 7.30 pm sounds about right for last meal when being fed 3 times, you don't want to leave too large a gap between last meal and breakfast. Is he going out for a wee and poo immediately before bed? My 1st schnauzer when pretty much clean all night from day one. My 2nd took much longer and if there was an accident then I had to get up a little earlier and then attempted to extend the time again. It won't be long now.
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Sormeh
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Sormeh »

Ok so we've been adding one minute each day and we are at about 1 hour and 19 minutes now without any accidents in the crate. She also no longer circles in the crate, but she does pant sometimes (she panted the whole time just a few days ago). I find that she is associating the crate with a very depressed mood. She doesn't eat anything in the crate anymore. I leave in all sorts of pig ears and bones and tasty treats she would die for out of the crate, but inside, she just doesn't eat anything at all, pushes them aside with her nose and loses appetite altogether. But when she's not in the crate she's fine and not depressed at all so I don't think it's affecting her mood outside the crate. But do you think this will get better over time or are we not on the right path? I just want to make sure we don't continue doing something that could potentially be harmful or damaging.
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Oscar 12345 »

I would be leaving the crate door open for her and letting her have free access to the room. If her bed is in there she will I am sure be happy to take herself to it when she wants but I don't see the point of trying to force her to stay in with the door closed unless she isn't safe having free access to the room the crate is in and then I would be making the area safe for her. My boy started in his pen with the door closed only at bedtime or when we left him and then at 12 months it was time to remove the pen completely. It is lovely giving the option of where they would like to sleep if you can.
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Sormeh
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Sormeh »

Oscar 12345 wrote: 12 Dec 2018, 12:04 I would be leaving the crate door open for her and letting her have free access to the room. If her bed is in there she will I am sure be happy to take herself to it when she wants but I don't see the point of trying to force her to stay in with the door closed unless she isn't safe having free access to the room the crate is in and then I would be making the area safe for her. My boy started in his pen with the door closed only at bedtime or when we left him and then at 12 months it was time to remove the pen completely. It is lovely giving the option of where they would like to sleep if you can.
For sleeping actually, she sleeps where she wants and the crate door is open, she goes in and out many times. But she is showing signs of separation anxiety so we'd like her to learn to stay alone. We haven't been able to both leave the house since we got her and we'd like to be able to get a life back not for long times but short, like grocery shopping, dr's office, etc. She starts circling and freaking out and having accidents all over the house (not like one place, 10 places) and will get in a fight with our cat so for the sake of her own safety we need to crate train her a bit. During the rest of the day her crate is open as well.
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Re: Simple crate training question!

Post by Oscar 12345 »

I would seek some expert help with this as she sounds like she is getting incredibly stressed and needs helps with dealing with the anxiety caused by being left alone and the relationship with the cat.
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