Advice on puppy confinement.(update)
I was hoping to get some advice on the best set up for puppy confinement. We now have a pen and crate as per Ian Dunbar's book and it kind of works. Yume is getting to be pretty good in her crate, but we still have a problem with her freaking out if we leave, even into the other room if she is not really tired or sleeping. We will be moving into a 2-floor place soon and even though she is just 11-weeks old we need to start getting her used to be left alone without her freaking out. Our new place is letting us move in on a probationary period because we have a puppy so this is of the utmost importance to us. Any advice on where we should set up the pen or crate, how big the crate should be (even brands since we will need to buy everything again) and most of all how to teach Yume that it is ok for us to be out of sight for a bit without freaking out would be greatly appreciated.
Our current set-up
Our current set-up
Comments
Also, if she's athletic and agile, it's fairly easy for her to scale/climb a 30" pen, you might want to get thin sheets of plywood for the inside.
but yea, just depends on how determined and athletic she is as to if she can get out. It really varies from dog to dog, so just keep an eye on her when she is in the playpen and yall are at home. Some are determined, some don't see the value in putting in that much effort. I could put my male JA in that playpen and he would be stuck. lol
Then we bought a pen and he learned to climb over it. Good thing we had the box and returned it.
Saigo did have separation anxiety but we slowly would leave him alone starting with a few minutes, then worked our way up to 4 hours. We make sure he's empty before leaving him then we give him a bunch of toys to preoccupy himself with. If he does need to pee, he'll use the pads. We're trying to regulate the pooping and with the fixed feeding schedule, it's going pretty good. There are no pee 'accidents', he always gets in on the pad, but he's still not 100% for holding it for outside. He's got it maybe 75% of the time. He's not treat-motivated which sucks, so we're going to try to teach him to use a bell to let us know when he has to go outside.
So Saigo has free rein in the house but we monitor his activities pretty strictly. Since we gave him free rein though, he no longer has separation anxiety. This also lets him get the Zoomies out of his system.
I think all puppies have separation anxiety. I think it does go away when they're older but it's good to slowly wean them.
@mapletwinkie Yume has never pooed in the house but pees in her pen sometimes.
We can't keep pee pads anywhere because she will eat them. We would love to allow her more places in the house but she is a destruction machine and if couldn't get at anything else would surely destroy the carpet. She prefers anything to her toys for some reason. Shigeru now has her sister and says it's the most difficult pup he has ever had!
No, but we are open to anything. When we get to the new place we will make a bomb proof puppy pen and go from there. We are stressed about the move so maybe things will calm down once we arrive. Fingers crossed.
We did manage to put Yume to bed after a long walk and go to the neighborhood Izakaya for 90 minutes without police or fire engines greeting us on our return!!
Any chance you have friends with puppy of similar age? Playing usually tire them out quick
She is at the point now that if we take more than 2 steps from the pen she starts to whine and howl. She needs to learn to play by herself a bit and most of all to be quiet in the house. If we can't teach her this very quickly and someone complains either she has to go or we will have to find a new place to live.
I think the one he's in is a 24" x 36" crate. I have a Petco brand one with two doors and a MidWest brand with two doors. The Petco one is better quality, IMO.
With my extremely anxious dog I had to take things very slow. I made a lot of progress by tethering him, taking one step away and then click and came back. Then two steps. Then three, etc. Then I went out of sight for 1 second, 3 seconds, 5 seconds... I'm sure you get the idea. With separation anxiety, you need to show the dog that you come back, but only if they remain calm. If you get a freak out, go back to the last point at which you were successful and try again.
Fingers crossed for you that it isn't actual separation anxiety and is just puppy rudeness/impulsiveness.
Snf
She lives the bigger place and we have managed for her not to ha e an accident in the house for the past two days. We not let her run around and only crate when she sleeps which she doesn't mind at all. I was so thrilled to take her out this morning when it was -4, but she didn't seem to mind. -4 in April? Really???
The red monster has settled in too and the separation anxiety is wearing off with time. He went to his first off leash park yesterday and wrestled with other pups.