We had a plan. We bought a lab puppy we had always wanted with the intention for me to pick him up in 2 weeks and take him to our new house as the family moved out of our current home. Then NZ went on 4 weeks level 4 isolation lockdown due to COVID 19. We had to pick Sam up early and bring him to our current house. The issue is our current house has open plan living, dining and kitchen with a mix of carpet and artificial tile. The new owners obviously bought a house with no pets and have a 1 year old child. When we got Sam home we tried to introduce him to the crate before bed but he didn't really take to it. He also slept in it over night and messed it. During the following 2 days he was allowed in the living area and taken out regularly. However his accidents became more frequent and when it started raining he refused to go outside and instead waited until he was back in the house. As my wife had to work in an essential service and I was having to work from home and couldn't follow him around for 12 hours, we resorted to putting him in his crate in the living area during the day. I take him out every hour for 10 minutes to stretch his legs and eliminate. in addition to this I take him out for 20 minutes in the morning and twice more for a play and training throughout the day. He whines when he is put back in his crate but settles eventually. Tonight I plan on waking with him more times to prevent him having accidents in the night. My question is; is this bad for him? If so is there a better way bearing in mind he can't ruin any part of the house, and I can't get any play pens or other supplies due to lockdown?
Search for treads on crate training. It will solve all your problems. Pippa also has a whole how to on her web page. good luck
Hi Dave, it's a great plan to get up in the night to prevent accidents. You really do need to create some kind of puppy zone area in your home on a washable surface though. It isn't really okay to keep a puppy in a crate day and night, and just let it out for ten minutes at a time. Are pet stores not selling puppy supplies online in NZ? Or can you borrow or make some kind of temporary barricade to section off an area for the puppy.
So I stayed with him in the living room and slept on the sofa last night; I woke up more than he did every time I heard a sound! he probably would have made the whole night through to 0600 if I hadn't needed to go to the toilet myself at 0400. Took him out and he defecated and urinated then went to sleep for the rest of the time. A bit of a win there so will do the same again tonight; not sure how long it will take to get back to my own bed though.... Unfortunately the announcement was made last Monday that as of Wednesday the country was on lockdown so not much time to plan; we had to borrow a crate from the pet store as the one we ordered online for use in 2 weeks time hadn't arrived. There is no access to any kind of puppy plan pens or even building materials to fashion one; I exhaustively looked the other day. We tried to makeshift one from household materials but looks like Sam might be a contender for puppy high jump olympics. It is only 10 minutes a time every hour for toilet; in addition to that we got him outside training for 2 x 20 minute sessions and about another 1 1/2 - 2 hours for play and I carried him out to see a new environment as well. Compounding the issue of not being able to damage the house; I am still working from home in an essential service, and my wife is at work as an essential care worker. The original plan was going to see her take a break from work for at least 6 months after moving house. I feel that he hate the crate now, I have watched and read a lot about crate training which all seem to require the space for him outside of the crate in order to get him to choose to go in; I realise there is not a short cut for this, I have started feeding him his meals in there; but I still feel he hates it and feels like its a punishment going in....
When you put him into the crate maybe give him a frozen kong so that he associates the crate with good things. Why dont you move the crate into your bedroom and slowly start to move it to where you would like Sam to sleep. When you are working why dont you set up a little bed area for him next to you, that way he isn't in the crate and you can still keep an eye on him. Just make sure you take him out and have a wee play first so that he is tired.
