Benefits Of Crate Training

Hi,

New dog owners are usually not sure how to crate train your puppy and what could be the benefits.

I came across their concern in forums and dog communities.

So what are the benefits?

Importantly, giving your puppy a crate is like presenting it his own den or personal sleeping quarters. It is like their home or bedroom where it would go to to rest and sleep or seek comfort or security ( eg. when it rain with thunder and lighting ).

Because the puppy will treat it like its own personal space, it will not soil it unless it really cannot help it. Therefore, crate training is also good for potty training.

What do I mean by that?

After his evening meal, let your puppy out and let it pee. Then when it is ready to sleep, put it into the crate until next morning.

When you let it out in the early morning for his meal, it will go for his pee. Over time, the puppy will learn to control his bladder and pee after his meals.

Depending on where you live, you may not want to let your puppy or dog out in the yard all day so you would keep it indoor most of the time.

So either your home is readily open to your dog or you can confine it to his own space otherwise it may mess up your home. This is where a crate may come in handy. This is especially true for those living in apartments in the city area.

The other occasion that you may want to crate your dog is when you have to leave it alone in the house or apartment; eg. you have to go to do some shopping or run some errand or even going to your 9 to 5 office job.

So another question is how long can you put your dog in its crate?

Well, based on my own experiences with my 2 dogs, I have put Ruby in her crate every night for about 8 hours at one go and she is so used to it that she look forward to it every night. You can see a video of it later in my posting.

Of course, I would not recommend you putting your dog in a crate for unnecessary long hours unless you have trained your dog accordingly.

In theory, you should NOT put your dog inside the crate as some form of punishment though.

The other important factor is to buy the appropriate crate for your dog, which I will touch on in my next posting.

David