Crates and a wee tartan hat

1/13/2012

Bailey is in her crate today. When we first brought her home, she was so well behaved. Because of this, we decided to lock her up in a room instead of using a crate. This method had been working really well until a few weeks ago, when little miss likes to chew started to munch on whatever she could find. And so, today is her first day in a crate.
Out of curiousity, do you crate train your dog? How do they like the crate? Do they have a designated 'space' during the day? What was your dog's first experience like in the crate?

On a happier note, I took some funny pictures last night of my pets with this tartan hat Bailey got for Christmas (it is a part of a tartan ensemble). Before you roll your eyes at the word 'tartan', I should tell you that I'm a highland dancer and Scottish, so tartan of all kinds make several appearances in my house (and apparently on my pets).
So here's the outfit that Bailey got for Christmas from my Aunt and Uncle

And because I'm terribly mean, I decided to put the hat on my cats.

I could not stop laughing. I'm surprised these pictures didn't come out all blurry- my hands were shaking from laughter. I don't think Rascal or Zoe appreciated their time playing dress up. Oh well!

Have a great weekend!

10 Comments

Kimmy

1/13/2012 12:11:28 am

Rascal looks mad enough to tip a plant, smash a glass and shred a lamp shade. I would have put him in the crate for the day, ha ha

Ali link

1/13/2012 04:32:48 am

AH!! They all look sooo cute. Can't handle.
We used to have Barley in his crate for the day and he absolutely hated it. We didn't know if we could trust him though, so we would test it by leaving him for 10 minutes, then 20, then and hour, and then half a day, and then a full day. Lucky for us, Bar is respective. But Annie (Remi and Mac's Boxer) can't be left roaming the house. She will rip up the garbage, poo in their room, drag garbage all around the house..... It's a nightmare. Or so I've heard. But she loves her crate and is very used to it!

Barley is uber food motivated, so I used to associate "in your crate" with a big treat... and his love of food won over his mind and he would go in his crate and wait... it got him used to the crate and he didn't mind so much when he had a distraction.

Also, we took the laptop and set it to take a picture every 4 minutes one day to see what the heck Barley did while we were away.... the result: http://barleyandali.weebly.com/1/post/2011/10/a-day-in-the-life-of-barley.html

Chelsea link

1/16/2012 11:52:00 pm

Oh my goodness Ali. Scott watched that video of Barley last night and laughed sooo hard. He thought it was the funniest thing! You should have seen him. He had like the full on, super jolly laugh happening. I wish I had taken a video of him watching it!

Bailey seems to really like her crate. I used your treat idea for when she goes in the crate. Has worked really well :)

Katie link

1/14/2012 09:59:33 am

Oh there is nothing better than cats in hats!

Eleanor is kind of crate trained, but she hates it! She'd rather be in bed all day but I have nightmares she'll jump off and hurt her sensitive dachshund back. She's ok for a few hours, but I've heard from the neighbors that she does howl once in a while. We've tried leaving her off the bed, but locked in the bedroom and she managed to pull down the sheets and pillows and chew and pee on them! Good luck with Bailey!

Mel link

1/15/2012 09:32:16 am

We've never crated any of our dogs. When Halladay was a pup we put him in a little playpen but he cried and we gave in WAY too soon. So he spent his puppyhood eating everything in our apartment. Thankfully that's long over.

Wookie arrived housetrained and not at all destructive, so we never had to crate him. Except now when he's really sleepy he'll crawl into the crate we have set up the fosters and sleep.. which is super weird.

We've tried to crate various fosters and it's always been a challenge. But now we're crating Bogey and it's going wonderful so far, only because he spent his life in a mill I suppose. He seems to like it, though. He spent his first night in there and slept the entire night without a peep.

Chelsea link

1/15/2012 09:44:35 am

Bailey actually did really well in her crate! I'm pretty sure the whole experience was more stressful to me then it was to her- I dreamed out a thousand different ways she could hurt herself in a crate lol. I rushed home only to find her sleeping peacefully in the crate. Got my knickers in a bunch over nothing.
Thank you everyone for the helpful advice! So nice to have other dog owners out there to go to for advice!

Hailey's Lady

1/16/2012 04:22:03 am

Dear Bailey,

I am sorry your people dress you up, but your outfit is better than the one I had to wear.

When my people got me I was crate trained. I had been living with several other dogs (up to 13 in the rescue) who were all in a big barn crated. I did ok with this. However, once I found my forever home I was crated alone. At the time I had a big sister Gemi. She was not crated. I didn't like being alone (and still suffer from separation anxiety but generally only if my routine is changed). So I figured out how to destroy the crates and get out. I even destroyed the crate they said I wouldn't be able to. I am proud of that fact. Now I get left out and I occasionally get into things, but I am less destructive. If you need hints on how to destroy a crate, let me know.

Love Hailey Bug (my lady says I should add ger to that!)

Erin link

1/16/2012 11:39:57 pm

Hey Chelsea! Glad I found your blog via your comment on mine! We keep Buzz and Bella is separate crates (although they are only 2 feet apart) during the day while we are at work. This makes it easy to clean up any messes they make. Since Buzz is diabetic, he pees A LOT. And Bella gets bladder stones, which cause her to pee A LOT. By confining them to a certain space, we know they can't cause any damage to furniture, appliances, etc. We didn't really 'train' them, per se - and they hate the crate, they'd much rather sleep on the couch - but they tolerate it. They just hunker down and fall asleep (which is exactly what they'd be doing if they weren't in the crate). We keep antimicrobial crate beds in there for comfort, and the dogs seem to like them.

I've heard crate training makes putting your pup in it a lot easier, but for our purposes, our method works fine. My only advice is to be careful if Bailey is wearing a collar. I've heard stories of collars getting caught in the wire on dogs who have melt-downs or freak outs, and nothing good can come of that. Good luck!

Chelsea link

1/16/2012 11:56:06 pm

Hey Erin!
Ya, I think Bailey would much rather sleep on the couch! We try and limit her time in the crate as much as possible. She gets to sleep on the bed (and my 'gets' I mean take over completely). She's also got an antimicrobial crate bed in there :D looks comfy enough.
Thanks for all the crate advice!

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Crates and a wee tartan hat

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