[badogg88]

I tried dropping treats in to Freddies crate yesterday every few seconds so that he knew that good things happened in the crate. He went in (left his backpaws on the carpet), and then I'd praise him when he went in. He finally went ALL the way in, and I praised him like he just found the cure for cancer. The only problem is, he doesn't STAY in his crate. I'll go and try to praise him while he's in there, but as soon as I move he comes running out of the crate. Any suggestions?

Also, is it bad to force him into the crate? At night time, I try to throw his rawhide in there, and generally he goes in and gets it and I close the door behind him, and praise him. But during the day when I need to go and do something outside of the house, I can't get him to go in there without picking him up and putting him in there. I'd assume that's bad...but what else can I do? I tried blocking him in the kitchen, but when we got home last night he had jumped over the blockade and managed to get upstairs...

[briteday]

I often carry my dogs to the crate to put them in, little guys though. I don't see anything wrong with it. When they are tired at night I just have to say "go crate" and they run right for the crate. But during the day they would rather be out running around. Sometimes that's just not possible. However, if they have been crated for more than a couple of hours during the day I make sure to take them for a nice long walk when I get home. I have never made any attempt to make the crate a "nice" place other than to have a soft towel in there for them to lay on. It's always just been a fact of life in our house. We have put them in a crate as soon as in the car for the ride home when adopting them. Then they always go into a crate to sleep the first night. I just bait the crate with a yummy, crate time only treat and put them in. Initially I usually keep the crate in my bedroom at night. But if they are noisy sleepers then I move them to the other end of the house.