Abigail is 6 months old now. She's passed from her early puppyhood into adolescence (a period (as with humans) that brings with it a whole new set of challenges!).

Sharing our lives with Abigail has been joyous - partly because of her incredibly sweet personality, but also because this time round we used crate training. Simply put, crate training involves having your new puppy in a crate when you are not with her. Like many people I resisted this method of training because I believed it was cruel to cage up my new puppy. But it works, and it's not cruel. From the first day we brought Abigail home from the shelter, we put her in her crate when we were not around. Her crate soon became her "den", her safe place. Because her ancestors lived in dens, Abigail was comfortable in a small, enclosed space. Being in a crate and feeling safe, Abigail learned how to relax and not to be afraid of being alone. When we leave the house now, she is very comfortable and doesn't experience separation anxiety. 

When choosing a crate, the size is important. Pick a crate that is large enough for your dog to stand up in and stretch out in, but not so big that the back corner can become the "potty". Many people purchase a larger crate and then partition it off - the partition can be removed when the puppy grows bigger.

For the first few nights after Abigail came to our house, we had her in the bed. All our dogs shared our bed as puppies. Abigail kept me awake off and on all night. And no matter how often I took her out to pee, she'd wet the bed.  So after 3 or 4 nights, I took Evelyn's advice, and we started putting her in the crate at night also.  At 8 weeks of age, Abigail should only need to pee once during the night (if we had remembered to keep food and water from her from supper time on!). When I heard her cry midway through the night I would take her out to pee, put her right back into her crate and no matter how much she cried, I wouldn't get her out again until morning. It was tough the first few nights. It was like not picking up a crying baby. But by 10 weeks of age she was sleeping through the night. And not once did she mess in her crate.

When I worked at the shelter in the morning, Abigail would be in her crate. Your puppy can be expected to stay in the crate for 1 hour for each month of age (plus 1 hour), so at 12 weeks, she could be in the crate for 4 hours at a time. When I came home at noon, I would lift her from the crate and carry her out to pee (if I let her walk to the back door, she would pee on the way!). Abigail was completely housetrained at 5 months and I know this success was due to crate training - she learned great bowel and bladder control in her crate.

Because of crate training, damage to the house has been minimal - and only when we have slipped up. Puppies need to chew, so I always kept a sturdy safe chew toy in the crate with her.

Last month we began keeping her out of the crate when we were gone for short periods of time. She's a well-behaved little dog. We 'Abigail-proof" the room she is in to make sure she will be safe. Over the Christmas holidays, with my 2 year old grandson visiting and all the hustle and glitter, we kept her in the crate while she was unattended because there were too many new things in the house that could cause her trouble, but she responded to this confinement with no complaint. When she was spayed at 5 months, and it was important to keep her relatively inactive, it was a blessing to be able to keep her in the crate and know that she was content.

As you can tell, I'm sold on crate training. At the shelter, if you come to adopt a puppy while I'm there, I'll preach to you. It's a proven system that makes puppy training easy and pleasurable for all involved.