Crate Training Your Dog
Crate Training is ineffective and is not an appropriate way to potty train. Puppies under the age of 6 months do not have full control of their bladder yet and locking them in a cage will not change this. Forcing a dog to hold his urine for extended periods is cruel and painful for your dog. Older dogs suffer and hold it in trying to not to soil their space. Many dogs lose the desire to keep their bedding clean and just go. Crate Training is not training, it is simply confinement. Your dog should either have access to a fenced yard through a doggy door, a dog walker, day care or a lunchtime visit from a family member to allow him to go outside.
Crate training does not teach a dog not to chew on objects or be destructive. Dogs learn by positive reinforcement and through association. When you dog chews your shoe and you say "NO" sharply and take the shoe away he learns eventually that the shoe is off limits. When you give him an appropriate toy and praise him for chewing it, he learns that chewing on the toy is a good behavior. Crate Training teaches your dog nothing.
People who don't want to be bothered to train their dog and chose crate training and say a dog needs a "den" and that they love their crate. A dog may indeed enjoy a special place to sleep and a spot that it calls its own. Dogs may sleep in a special spot after a day of exercise, play and relaxation. Being locked into a crate it s another story. Dogs are social pack animals and forced isolation and confinement from movement is not natural. Crate training does not reflect a dog's natural lifestyle.
Many dog owners leave their dogs in a crate for 8-10 hours a day. Can you go all day without going to the bathroom? How does it feel? Can you lay in a confined in a space with about 1 foot of room on each side of you and not stretch or walk all day long. Can you stare at the same wall all day and not look out the window? Every day?
Dogs who are crate trained develop antisocial behaviors, hyperactivity, depression and aggression. People complain that their dog is hyper when it is not in a crate. Of course he is! A dog who has been locked up and lying down all day has an enormous need for exercise, activity and stimulation. It has not learned how to interact as part of a family and may jump, bark and run constantly for lack of knowing what else to do. A human will go crazy in solitary confinement and so will a dog. Crate training does not teach your dog how to be a part of the family.
Keeping your dog in a cage so it can't do anything wrong is not training. If you love your dog, invest the time to make him a part of your family. Train your dog so he can have the run of at least part of the house and be a regular member of the family rather than an animal in a cage. Don't let people tell you crate training is the way to go. Crate training is a cruel practice created for the convenience of the dog owner, not the well being of the dog.
Published by Teresa Hoyt
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- Crate Training is ineffective and is not an appropriate way to potty train.
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- Dogs are social pack animals and forced isolation and confinement from movement is not natural.
4 Comments
Post a CommentI had 6 puppies and I see a great difference in the one that was caged against my wishes. She is much more nervous and actually almost died from her last vaccine because she was depressed and that led her immune system to weaken. My dogs live in a freewill manner and have been trained with kindness not to be destructive or over excited. I see huge differences in dogs that live in this manner and I am convinced that they feel more accepted and loved that they are not caged....crates are for oranges. I have no idea why they call them crates. It is not meant to be. I think it makes a dog owner feel powerful and trainers that encourage this and cage companies make a lot of money. Caging was unheard of for a family dog before and so manypeople are trying to get them out of puppymills and petshops, so for the life of me I don't understand why it is suppose to be acceptable in the home and ofetn in cages that are too small for the pet.
My comment was truncated, so I'll quickly point out that the only criticism I have is the recommendation to have a dog door.
Dogs must be supervised at all times outside the home. Dog doors (like any other manner of allowing dogs to be outdoors unsupervised), have led to all sorts of terrible outcomes including escape, theft, nuisance behaviors and false accusations. I know of one case where an aggressive dog entered a home via a dog door, and killed the resident dog in the kitchen, while the owner was away. I could go on and on with examples of terrible things that have happened to dogs left unsupervised outdoors. I would similarly encourage owners to be extremely cautious about leaving their dogs in the care of anyone they haven't known for a great deal of time, and trust implicitly.
I trained dogs for many years, and agree with virtually all the criticisms about crate usage.
I readily admit that dogs can view their crates as a safe, comfortable place to retreat, at the same time I would remind people that a wild dog's den has no locking door.
Many times I've had to rid owners of their reliance on crates to avoid behavior problems...which seems to be the most common use for crates, regardless what many owners may claim. (They avoid excited behaviors, aggressive behaviors, nuisance behaviors, by locking the dog away, when what they should be doing is training the dog to no longer do those things.)
I have no problem with someone training his/her dog to feel comfortable in a crate, and leave the door open, so it can come and go as it wishes. Afterall, there are many situations where dogs are required to be caged, if the owner wished to avail themselves of this or that service. Airplane travel, for example, requires dogs to be caged. Veterinary clinics wil
I am really glad to see people writing about not caging dogs. I have never caged or crated a dog as a way of training. I have only used it in extreme cases (puppy mill dogs) if they had to learn about actually being in a home. I make beds in the house under tables which also become good storage areas on top.