re: Pet owners question: crate training and leaving dog out to roam

I'd never let a puppy / young dog have free reign to my house while I'm not there. They chew on everything and will destroy things. Crate training is essential.

I did not crate train mine, he started sleeping in the bed at 6 weeks old.

We have a pretty good size backyard and a doggy door.

But he still suffers from separation anxiety so bad he has to take pills at times, if I have to leave he will sit in the front window staring at the driveway until I return.

It's a pain to deal with but he is part of the family

Once housebroken and trustworthy alone, they are no longer crated. If anything is destroyed, it’s my fault for leaving it available. If my dog were untrustworthy, I’d have no issue crating when I’m gone for its safety.

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leaving dog out to roam

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I have one dog that I can leave in the house all day and not worry about him. My little dog freaks the $^#*( out when my wife leaves the house.

When we did it with our blue heeler puppy, we did stages.

Stage 1 - Crate with crate door closed and let out at lunch time during the day to use bathroom.

Stage 2 - Once potty trained, baby gate in hallway with bedroom doors closed with open crate at end of hallway.

Stage 3 - Hallway and one bedroom open for more space.

Stage 4 - Free range of entire house

There will be some casualties along the way. Lost some floor boards and a few phone chargers throughout the process.

We crate trained our dogs and crate them daily. They are 100% happy & healthy.

We leave our two dogs (female lab and male cur) inside roaming for about 10 hours a day. They do fine but we kind of worked our way up to it. When they were pups we made sure they knew what they were and weren't allowed to mess with. I think the only thing they've destroyed was a horse hair boot brush I left sitting on the coffee table. I think the lab is smart enough to know she will get in trouble and the cur is too dumb to figure out how to get in to trouble.

We have cameras in the house and both of them spend most of the day sleeping in their crates. They only get up to bark at the Fedex guy or to get some water.

The frickers both sleep 20 hours a day even when they are outside.


Crate training is one of the best things you can do. I can bring my dog anywhere and I know she is just going to chill and not make racket in her box if I'm traveling. I bring her hunting with me and she sleeps in her crate in the truck in case she needs to find a deer for me.

I wfh. Most of the day, my GR just lays around. He may switch spots a couple times but seems like little change.

Seems like your dog would be fine with a decent sized area, assuming not some high energy type.

I have 2 Australian Shepherds. When mine were puppies until about 1 year old, they stayed in my laundry room with the door shut while i was gone or asleep. They had plenty of chew toys to keep them occupied along with food/water/puppy pads, and i made sure that they couldnt reach anything they could potentially destroy. After that, I gradually increased the time they were allowed to roam freely in my house. I started with 1 hour, then gradually increased it over a few months. Luckily, they never had a chewing problem, they only liked to steal socks, and after they turned 2, I had no worries about them being free in the house for hours at a time while I was gone. Zero problems since and they are 5 and 6 by now.

Every dog is different though, so take my experience with a grain of salt.