I plan on using crates more often for Nextdog for sure. It's bitten me in the butt that I never really crate trained Mia. Summer came crate trained but seemed to have forgotten it over her period of SA. She's good in the car but at home, she's not. And at class... oy.
But I'm not going to keep Nextdog in the crate while I'm at work or anything. I will use a run for that. But crate games? DEFINITELY. And I think it'll be nice to have the crate training separate from the 'keep the dog safe while I'm at work' area. I can really build the crate up in very short intervals. I want my dog happy and content in their crate for travel time and class time.
I can't imagine having a dog that can run loose. It's funny because all my past dogs prior to Mia earned the ability to be loose in the house without supervision. Mia has me completely paranoid. She is just not safe loose, even if I pick up everything. I can't see her ever getting free roam. Every time I would give in and test her out loose for even 5 minutes... she'd get into loads of trouble. Doesn't matter if I've run her 3 hours prior or not. When I'm home to watch her, she's perfect around the house these days. Second I leave though, all bets are off. She may have ruined it for all the other dogs in my future, lol.
But I'm not going to keep Nextdog in the crate while I'm at work or anything. I will use a run for that. But crate games? DEFINITELY. And I think it'll be nice to have the crate training separate from the 'keep the dog safe while I'm at work' area. I can really build the crate up in very short intervals. I want my dog happy and content in their crate for travel time and class time.
I can't imagine having a dog that can run loose. It's funny because all my past dogs prior to Mia earned the ability to be loose in the house without supervision. Mia has me completely paranoid. She is just not safe loose, even if I pick up everything. I can't see her ever getting free roam. Every time I would give in and test her out loose for even 5 minutes... she'd get into loads of trouble. Doesn't matter if I've run her 3 hours prior or not. When I'm home to watch her, she's perfect around the house these days. Second I leave though, all bets are off. She may have ruined it for all the other dogs in my future, lol.
I have a feeling my next dog will give me more trouble than I'm prepared for. I've had it pretty easy with Jackson. He can be super annoying if not exercised, etc, but he's never really been 'destructive'. He was like 4 1/2 months old and I left him loose WITH my dads dog and nothing ever happened. He's just always proved to be reliable while we were gone, from the start. He used to stay loose with my moms dog too. Now, when he was young, I didn't just go straight to the whole house or anything, but pretty early on he was reliable. All my our families dogs have been like this so I guess we've just been... lucky.
I do kinda wish I had trained him to like a crate though. Because he would NEVER stand to be put into a crate during agility, or dock diving, or anything like that. Certainly not in the car. (tried it as a pup- SCREAMED for over an hour). And definitely not if I'm in the room.