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Access within the house

TylerDurden

Well-Known Member
Are your dogs in their crates when you leave the house for longer periods (e.g. work), or do you give them limited or full access to the house? Our EM is going to be 9 months old next week; and he has acess to major parts of the living room during the day (+access to his crate). He does very well, but I don‘t trust him with full access to the house yet. While we are home, there are no issues at all. He doesn‘t destroy anything, but due to his height, he could reach pretty much anything he wants to. Also, he could do a lot of damage due to his weight.
If you limit access, what areas and how do you limit? If full access, when did you start it? Generally, I‘m just looking for different opinions and approaches to the subject.
 

Jarena

Well-Known Member
Lettie was created at all times when we weren’t home until she was about 7 months old. Then she started being Houdini and escaping. Every time she escaped she was a perfect angle. So we decided to start trusting her with almost full access for short periods of time, an hour or less. We closed bedroom and bathroom doors and put objects on the furniture. We pushed things back on the kitchen counters (she’s never shown any interest but didn’t want to risk it). So she had access to the living room, kitchen and hallway. We started trusting her for longer periods of time and she has never been bad, except for occasionally removing objects from the couch to sleep on it. She still sleeps in her crate, she likes to sleep there. We also still crate her while we are at work. We probably don’t need to but we want to keep her used to it, at least for now.
 

Smokeycat

Well-Known Member
I started out creating whenever I couldn't watch him. I think it was about 6 months I started to leave him out for short periods during the day. He did have full access at those times. Kryten has never chewed on things he wasn't supposed to and Jiggers had already made sure that we never leave anything on the counters. I think within a couple weeks he was not created during the day. He didn't get free reign at night until he was 10 months since he wouldn't wake me up if he need to go out and waking up to piles next to the front door was not a great start to my day.
 

Zeela

Well-Known Member
Limit access...kitchen only at first, leave nothing around that he can get into. Zeela has full access, never crated her, didn't need to. You got to trust one another.
 

Jakesmum

Well-Known Member
I crated Jake until he was about 10 months old, then I would gate him in our room with his crate open, we did that until he was around 2, since then he has limited access to the house. I keep him on our main floor with all the doors closed so he is confined to the living room and kitchen area. He is pretty good at not getting into things, but he does "forget" sometimes and will destroy something that isn't his. I still confine him in our bedroom at night, I don't like him roaming the house.
 

April Nicole

Well-Known Member
I'm home during the day so Logan only gets crated if I go somewhere, or if I'm cleaning the floors. And he gets crated at night. I will keep him crated till he's older and I can trust him not to tear up anything, or as Smokeycat said, not leave a pile waiting for me. I crated Buster the same way, and once he matured, I was able to leave the door to his crate open at night. He would make rounds checking the front door, back door, and checking on the kids. I already see Logan doing this. :) I wake up early to fix breakfast for my hubby, so the girls are still asleep at 4:30. I take Logan out and bring him out to potty. Then when he comes back in, he goes in the girls rooms and checks on them. Love it!
 

Pastor Dave

Well-Known Member
My two "woofers" are not crated at all, nor restricted in any way except this: We close bedroom doors and keep the couch covered with a chair and little table. Coal likes to snuggle up on the couch and he leaves a drool spot. We also leave the cellar door open so Coal can escape to the lower domain, and Chev will not descend the cellar steps for whatever reason. Coal sometimes needs some private time, apparently. He has a bump on his one back leg, and I put him in an old pair of my underwear to stop the licking. I made a hole for his tail, and.....good grief.....he looks funny. We got home from a church seminar today about the Holy Spirit, and Coal's underwear was lying on the front porch. My wife laughed with I told her. He sure looks cute in the baby blue underwear !!!2 dogs.jpg