Crate Training and HOT weather

[Melissa & Porter]

I have had my puppy, Porter, since he was 3 1/2 months old. That is when the housebreaking/crate training began for him--nothing prior. His is five months old today. He can go from about 9 pm to 6/7 am in his crate at night--which is on the ground floor of our house. When out of the crate, he still has some accidents 1-2 a week maybe.

As it gets hotter, I do not want to run an AC on this floor at night, so I was considering moving him to my bedroom at night OUT OF THE CRATE. The reason for this would be so that I could put his crate in the basement for him to stay cool during the day. I am a stay-at-home mom so he is in and out of the crate all day long, but mostly out--we definitely still need it though. And the basement is sooooooo nice in the summer. In fact, he is down there right now.

Do you think that this is too soon, given his potty profile, to uncrate him at night? I would hate to have him start waking earlier to pee, though thankfully there are no rugs in my room. I could move the crate to my bedroom and down to the basement everyday. Or even buy a second one.

What would you do?

Thanks so much for your input.

[nonnie browne]

Melissa,
Our pups are the same age and I had the same dilemma. He gets hot easily. I have a pretty strong feeling honestly, that Buddy would be good uncrated in our bedroom. That said, I am too chicken to test it yet and worry about my bedroom carpeting, so I weighed the difference between the price of a crate and price of stained carpet. I bought a second crate. Sigh. I would still like to get rid of that thing this summer, but just dont have the courage. Buddy is also five months old and has not had a single indoor accident since February, because he uses poochie bells, but I think if he were roaming at night in the bedroom he would ring the bells and expect to go out. In his crate, he knows he must be patient.

[Melissa & Porter]

Nonnie,
Yeah, I think if I had carpet, I would be much more hesitant to try this. I am still hesitant though. I do like have a few minutes to get myself together (pee) before going downstairs to take Porter out of the crate.

Walmart has crates for very cheap...

So, tell me about these poochie bells. I tied a regular bell around my door and tried to make Porter paw at it every time we went out, but neither of us took to it. We NEED a way for him to tell me. Looking out the back door is not enough because there are a lot of birds, bunnies and squirrels that he likes to watch.

-Melissa

[Adina P]

Melissa, if you go to our main forum page and type the word bells into the search box right above the list of discussions...you will find many past discussions and instructions on how to train your dog to ring a bell to signal need for potty.

The key is to 'make' him ring the bell EVERY SINGLE TIME you take him outside via the door you use for potty. EVERY TIME. With repetition he will 'get it'. Also neither of my dogs are very 'paw' oriented...they prefer to touch the bells with their nose...so maybe help him to do that in case pawing them isn't his thing.

[Adina P]

What about running a fan?

[nonnie browne]

Adina is right about the poochie bells, Buddy uses his nose. When I have him confined in my kitchen /hearth room he cannot get to the poochie bells. He goes and sits next to the gate in the doorway, turns around and stares at me. Needless to say it is pretty clear what he wants. I have no other little people at home anymore, so I am very clued into his body "clues". If I am busy (like cooking) and don't notice him, he will come and nudge me with his nose, then go sit over there again. Subtle is not his middle name but hey - I prefer it because I really know what he is "saying" to me. I like the idea of a tether to the bed, I may try that. I do put a fan next to his crate on humid nights, and he sleeps like a baby and doesnt flop around nearly as much. I guess I need to think about getting him clipped soon too, our summers in Missouri are so humid that even with the A/C on, I think he will want a cool place. Good Luck.

[Melissa & Porter]

Thank you Adina, Amanda & Nonnie;

I think I will try tethering him to the bed and make another, more consistent move to use the bells.

When out of the crate, Porter ALWAYS sleeps on the hardest, coldest surface in he can find: I guess having a pillowy thing in his crate in not a nice thing huh? He's never tried to paw it away, but it seems like maybe I should take it out. Do your dogs prefer hard surfaces to sleep on?

[Eileen Ross and Cody]

Cody definately likes cold hard places to sleep on. He will sleep next to his bed but not on it. He seems to favor our stone floor. (although he doesn't quite sleep through the night)

[Melissa & Porter]

It is funny that he sleeps next to the bed :-) I hope he goes thru the night soon for you.

[Nicole Wayne]

Mazie LOVES to sleep on cold, hard surfaces. Has since the day we brought her home at 9 weeks (my gosh, she'll be 2 on May 3rd, where does the time go?) Even if it's not hot outside or in the house, her favorite places to hang out are on the tile floor in the bathrooms, on the kitchen floor under the table, on the hardwood in the living room NEXT TO her bed, not on it, and on her "tray." What tray you ask? It's the plastic tray from the bottom of her old upstairs crate. (We did buy a second crate and crated her in our room at night until she was fully potty trained which was unbelievably quick - she "got" it right away.)

We realized that she prefers hard surfaces because of all her aforementioned favorite places and the fact that she would push aside whatever soft, cuddly blanket or pillow we put in her crate. At night, she sleeps on her plastic tray - no crate, just the tray - in our room. And in the early, early morning, when my better half leaves for work, she'll jump up on the bed to be with me, but after about 5 minutes, she's at the foot of the bed, resting her head and whole upper body on the hope chest with her back end still on the bed. It's the craziest thing! I mean, we have a Tempurpedic mattress (sooooo comfortable) and she STILL prefers the hard surface of the wooden chest at the foot of the bed. We think she's a little nutty! But so loveable!!!!!

[Melissa & Porter]

LOL at Mazie's tray. The only bed I have ever seen Porter seek out is a crib mattress that I threw on the floor last night for my seven-year-old. His top bunk was too hot. The crib mattress has a cool waterproof surface--maybe that will be Porter's bed someday.

[Chris & Boys]

I have had Fozzy uncrated at night since he was about 15 or 16 weeks old. He never had an accident at night, but still had an occassional accident during the day. But each dog is different.

[Melissa & Porter]

We did it! He slept tethered to the bed last night. It was a little weird for both of us but nice too. He gave me a few looks like...is this really what you want? and I'm going to settle down here, okay? When my husband came up to bed at 4 am, I was worried that Porter would have trouble getting back to sleep after the greet&wag, but I guess he is not a toddler (THANK GOD!). I pretty much had to drag him out of sleep to go down to pee at 6:30 because I needed to get going. Cross fingers but I think we are good to go.