Crating a pup

Help please, it's been a week since we brought our lurcher pup home from a rescue kennel.

She does not like her crate one little bit and screams and goes bananas in there. It was/is my intention that she is in there at night and when I'm out. The first night I put her in there she screamed and screamed so much I was so concerned for my neighbours I got her out (in a fleeting quiet spell), and put her in my room with me Not where I want her to be, but when my Daxie wouldn't settle this was the advice I got on here. He is now fine in his crate day and night but it took a few weeks, although he was ok with being in there in the day after just a few days.

However she does not seem to be settling in there in the day either. She tips her water everywhere, throws the food around moves her bed..... My neighbours have told me that she did not stop the other day when I popped out for an hour & when they looked through the window she was shaking and going nuts. She is mostly quiet when I get home, but when I let her out she then whinges for about 10 mins . She also whinges if I go upstairs, out of a room or shut her in the garden.

So this evening I walked the other two around the block and shut her in the kitchen, not in her crate which is in the sitting room and she was SCREAMING when I came home.

I am at a loss to know what to do

Maybe these links can help?

http://www.apbc.org.uk/system/files/...oor_kennel.pdf

http://www.apdt.co.uk/documents/CrateTraining_000.pdf
http://ahimsadogtraining.com/blog/cr...-dogs-puppies/
http://www.clickertraining.com/node/3140
http://www.clickersolutions.com/arti...ining_Info.htm
http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2001/crate.htm

Can she remain quietly relaxed in her crate whilst you are IN the room?

If she cannot, then you cannot move forward.

Can you put the crate in your bedroom at night so she is next to you?

Thanks for the links.

No, she can't?

It's a huge crate, so not enough room. A friend is going to lend me fabric one. I'm going to try her in her basket (that goes in the crate) next to my bed tonight.

Then I would suggest after reading the links you take a structured approach and start with her feeling comfy alone whilst you are there, so put her in after she has been fed, been trained, exercised etc.

But you will need to exert some self discipline to pretend she is not there....................

We found covering the crate helped ..

Just to add Kasper hated his crate at first, but it was our fault for not introducing him to it properly...we spent a month or so getting him used to the crate, and now he loves it and, since beginning to use it a year ago, we haven't had any problems with separation anxiety!

We started with leaving treats in there when he was in another room, so he was always going in to see if there were any goodies hiding! If your pup is too scared to go in on her own, throw treats to her when she looks / sniffs / goes anywhere near the crate! One she's comfortable going in, give her an awesome chew / new toy in there and close the door; whilst she's shut in sit right by the crate and feed her treats. Let her out after 30 seconds and, gradually over a period of days, build up the amount of time she's in there.

Once he was happy with that we put him in and moved gradually further away, until we could be in different rooms and Kasper would happily stay in there for 30 mins - an hour. Then we started stepping outside the house, coming back in immediately, praising him and letting him out...then gradually increasing the time he was left in there whilst we were outside

It was a long process but totally worth it, as now we can leave him for up to 5 hours no matter where we are, and we know he is comfortable and happy in his crate

Red

If you can afford it I would really recommend Susan Garrett's DVD of Crate Games

It has lots of applications for later on in life and you can see a short preview on this link.

http://www.positiveanimalsolutions.c...crategames.htm