Hi! I have a 6 months old silver lab named Blu and he is pretty well behaved. He rarely has accidents in the house, doesn’t chew on furniture, and if he is doing something wrong he stops once he is told “no”. However, he does sometimes still chew on shoes/stuff when it is left lying around (after all he is still a pup). He has slept through the night in his crate since he was three months old and never whines whenever he has to go in - at night time he even voluntarily gets in. I currently am a full time student and I leave for 3-4 hours a day at different times of the week and during that time I put him in his crate. I was wondering when/how I should start leaving him out of his crate whenever I leave during the day? Even though he enjoys being in his crate I feel guilty that he can’t walk around or play while I’m gone. Thanks!
No personal experience, as my 6 month old is not trustworthy on his own. But I get the impression that puppies can be great at something, and then seriously regress without warning. A lab puppy could cause an amazing amount of damage fast. Plus, the bad habits are all self-reinforcing. My vote is crate
I had a bed next to my girl's crate and that and the crate were behind a gate in the kitchen. When she started to choose to spend more time in the bed than the crate, which was about 5 months, I left her in the kitchen in the bed and removed the crate. She was still behind the baby gate. Over the next couple of months we graduated to the lounge, but I popped out for periods of time during the day to see how she got on. I guess by about 8 months she had free run of kitchen, lounge and hallway. For a very long time I kept certain things out of reach lest she chew them (shoes, rug with tassels, slippers, remote control, bin) and now I only keep the bin locked up (she's 18 months).
Ours had free run by 6 months, but they didn't chew up shoes etc either. I might decrate, but I think a puppy pen or pet gate would still be required in your case.
My pups have all decrated around six months, but it depends massively on the dog as to when the right time is. I would say that I wouldn't leave a dog in a crate for 4 hours at a time, as it can be damaging to joints to not be able to stretch their legs for extended periods, so I'd suggest using a puppy pen instead, or confining him to a room where he can't do any damage, such as a utility room. Some dogs will be more anxious in a small room such as a utility than they will be in a puppy pen in a larger room.
Agree with above, 3-4 hours alone in a crate is questionable. When my boy was that age we'd take trips out in increasingly longer time, and we didn't leave shoes, gloves, sharp implements lying about. As he get a bit older we removed the crate door but still kept it covered with a blanket. It was his safe place that he would hang out in on his own. Not sure if he did when we left. No web cameras in my home. Now that he's over two we feel comfortable leaving him alone for up to 5 hours. Nothing destroyed upon our return. We're blessed.
When my boy was a pup when we were out we put him in the kitchen so he had space to move, but once he turned 1 he had the run of the house.
I would start leaving him out for 10 mins whilst you pop out and see how he gets on. I used to have a webcam which I could access through my phone so I could see how she was. It reassured me that she preferred being out of the crate. Build the time up slowly, don’t just suddenly leave him for 3-4 hours.
With a previous Lab(my current lab is 5.25 months old), I was driven by 2 things: a. no accidents in the house. b. no chewing of the furniture I have found that until the permanent teeth are in at about 7 months, the poor dog simply cannot stop chewing anything that comes to mind. Currently he can handle 10 hours without needing a potty break if he's in his crate. So when the wild chewing of everything stops, then we will being to try leaving him in the house by himself. But it won't happen until at least 6-7 months.
OK...easy to misinterpret your post when the title of the thread was regarding decrating a puppy during the day. No need to S...P...E...L...L.... out your post, most of us can read perfectly well!
