Multiple "Dens"?

[Wasseem Sidhom]

I've been reading a lot of discussions in this group and have to admit at how helpful they have been.  We're slated to pick up our puppy next weekend, and still struggling about where to set up his crate.

Let me give you an idea of our living situation.  We're in a 2 story + basement house. 95% of the time, we use the basement as our enter and exit routes. The main floor is the typical living space where we spend most of our time, and the 2nd floor is our bedrooms.

So for the sake of crate training and the typical crating during the day, we thought of putting his crate close to an exit on the main living floor for ease of taking him in and out. However we were thinking of letting him sleep on the floor of the bedrooms level (maybe even in the bedroom itself) in a crate.

Logistically, it's not practical to keep moving the crate every morning and every evening. so my question is...is it ok for him to have two crates? one for sleeping at night and one for hanging out and napping during the day? Are we confusing the heck out of him by doing this, or have others tried this approach and were successful.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Stephanie and Ragley]

Two crates will make your life so much easier and he will be fine! Check out chewy.com for great prices on crates! And geez louise- he sure is adorable! Then again, I'm a sucker for red doodles :)

[Yvette & Emma]

I have always used 2 crates for all my pups one upstairs and one downstairs never caused any confusion :)

[Elaine Allen]

I agree....we have used 1 crate by the bed, one for car, and we got a pen for the living area so he coudnt get lost in the house or we would get lost i should say looking for him,,,,,he is doing his potty stuff in there now his pad there too which is nice.......no hidden surprises.......lol.......ours is 9 wks old and a busy bee.............and fun fun fun.............

[Linda And Loo]

Two crates make life much easier! With 2 dogs we have 4 crates! We have crates upstairs and down stairs! Good luck and enjoy your puppy!

[Bonnie and Kona]

2 crates work great. You have a good plan. You may want to try to have him in the bedroom where you can reach down to comfort him if he's crying at night. Puppies need to feel the presence of their "pack". Your pup will have to face so many changes that having you close at night might help the adjustment.

[John Wang]

Your living situation is EXACTLY like ours. We have a basement/garage, main floor (with entrance we never use) and 2nd floor for bedrooms. We are usually always on the main floor, and always exit from the garage with Boomer.

What we did was start out with one crate, and have him stay in the kitchen. This would let him know that a good place is the kitchen (and also he would be comfortable hanging out there by himself during the day in a play pen.) Make sure you crate train him well and let him be comfortable in the crate. It should be his 'den', and never used for punishment. Always make it a positive aspect.

Back on subject though, we always have to carry Boomer down the stairs, but he can easily come up them. Going down, they are too steep for him right now, so we practice every other day for him to go down 2-3 steps. We leave a bell near the entry-way to the stairs so he can signal if he has to go potty. (He hasn't learned yet)

Moving the crates is a PIA, honestly. We have to do this to load the crate into the car whenever we go out to the vet, pet parties and to visit family. Buying a second crate didn't solve the issue, but it did let us eventually move up into the bedroom. I would NOT move him into the bedroom until he's able to sleep comfortably throughout the night downstairs. We were told that the dog should 'earn' his way up into the bedroom, and not feel like he was given and entitled the right to go in. Even now that he's able to sleep with us, he's only allowed to go straight to the crate at night, and doesn't come upstairs during the day (he's not fully potty trained, and the main floor is all hardwood, and his play pen has vinyl flooring added to protect the hardwood itself).

To avoid confusion between two crates, we put in a few of his well-used toys into the crate so he would smell the familiarity. We had no issues with getting him to go into the second one, though for the first day or two he definitely knew it was different. But now he sleeps like none other.

Check early on to see what type of pee-er your pup is. Some dogs will keep peeing once they stop, which means you can't rush them outside, but rather have to put them on a pee pad ASAP. Boomer is good in that once you startle him, he'll stop peeing immediately, and you have time to carry him outside to his proper area. If your dog keeps peeing even after startled, you'll want to either exit out the main floor (if possible) for his regular potty use, or use a pee-pad in his play pen.

Let me know if you have any questions, we've just had Boomer for about 4 weeks, and your situation is just like ours, though my SO works from home so she's able to watch over Boomer fairly regularly.

[Malenie Piscetelli]

I use one crate and she is doing great. Everyone has different opinion. Just leave in one area

[Erin & Maizey]

I used two crates with maizey which worked for a little while but she was just never a good sleeper when the crate was in the bedroom and refused to settle down.  I finally just started having her sleep in her living room crate with a white noise machine and that worked a lot better for all parties.  She would definitely bark when she needed to go out in the middle of the night.  I would take her out around 3-4 am and then it was back into the crate until she would get up at 6-630 am.

I don't think she was ever confused, but if she saw me in bed she refused to go to sleep.  Having her sleep downstairs worked a lot better with respect to getting her to settle down.   I will say she never, ever, liked any of her crates...  

[Jolene, Sassparilla & Josie]

We started with two crates. We have the large wire crate downstairs then we had a soft collapsible one upstairs in my room until I could trust the girls overnight. now Josie sleeps on my bed and Sassparilla sleeps on a dog bed on the floor (her choice). The soft portable one we take with us anytime we go somewhere mostly for looks!

[Debbie & Gibbs]

Your puppy is sooo cute, good luck.

[Wasseem Sidhom]

You guys have been fantastic in your responses and suggestions.

I just hope one day I can be as useful as you guys have been to me.

[Debb, Lucy & Oscar]

We used 2 crates, one in our bedroom and one in the kitchen/nook area downstairs. However, since we didn't plan on having them sleep in our room as puppies, we only used the bedroom crate for a few nights before transitioning them to downstairs. The upstairs crate was only used those first few nights to try and ease them into a new living situation (our home!). It worked out perfectly for us. Now that they're grown they do sleep with us :)