Why do dogs who sleep approximately 23 hours and 50 minutes a day need crate rest?????? :thinik: Or conversely, why do dogs who sleep 23 hours and 50 minutes a day HATE crate rest???? :thinik: After all the problems with Champ and watching him sleep last night I was just thinking........
Just want to restate that we have Champ in the crate and when he is out it is usually because he is on my lap with a heat wrap around his neck. When he is on my lap he just sleeps. Before his neck episode you had to prod him to get him excited about anything except for food, otherwise the closest sunbeam was his best friend while he would sleep on the floor. He only moved when the sun moved too much!!!
This echos my response to Cesar Millan, the Dog Whisperer (who I now love!).
He says: Dogs crave exercise and need at least 45 minutes every morning and a half hour every evening.
My dachshunds say: 23 hours, 50 minutes to sleep; 4 minutes to eat; three 2-minute potty breaks.
I rest my case!
Karen :heart:
Well, it's true, when Loki doesn't get enough exercise she is a real pain in the *** in the evening. I swear that dog needs a job.
But seriously, remember that crate rest confines your dog. It prevents them from runnin' pell mell around the house when the UPS man comes, or they see a skirrel in the yard, or hear you open a crinkly bag of food, or there is a fly in the house, or another dawg has a stuffie toy, or heaven forbid your neighbor's C-A-T should sit and have a wash RIGHT outside the kitchen door!
What I never understand is that a dog who sleeps 23 and half hours a day still has enough muscle tone to actually do all the above mentioned running around.
Willy and Alex spend their days in their 4' x 8' pen that is set up in our entry hall. They have their beds, water and potty station. When I get home, they get a cookie, then get to go out in the backyard to check things out. After about 15 minutes of sniffing around, they are ready for their walk, so we leash up and off we go. When we return, its time for a frozen yogurt-stuffed marrow bone to keep them occupied while I do after-work-stuff. They sleep with Dan and me on the big bed. I don't make them stay in their pen at night......all day is enough. I like them with me at night, and they deserve it. But they do sleep all night.
When I have a day off, the boys still like to sleep in their beds in the pen......usually until noon. Then they are ready to start their day. The pen is real useful when I want the boys to be contained and quiet, but I give them as much freedom as I can when I am home. I rarely take them anywhere in the car, unless we are going to the cabin. I worry so much about them being stolen that I cannot leave them in the car while I grocery shop and stuff like that, so I never do it.
Anyway, thats my take on crates.
Depending on the reason for crating and the size of the wiener, wouldn't a harness/sling work to keep the dog with you? If I had to crate Guinness, the yipping would drive ME to drink!
Karen :heart:
Champ is having IVDD issues with his neck not his back. Although if I did keep his neck in a sling.....???????? :thinik: Just joking, Champ's problem is with his neck and he needs the crate rest to keep quiet. After about two weeks (felt like 2 years) he got better about the yipping but he still gets agitated with us if we are home and he does not have a full run of the house. And again for the record we do have him in the crate except for the potty breaks, dinner, and the neck heat wrap time on the couch. He is doing much better and we are now at the stage of half the dose of steroid every other day and he seems to be doing well next step is no steroids. Again for the record he still has three and on half weeks of crate rest to go if he keeps progressing and we are keeping him crated!!!! I don't get why he gets so agitated in the crate because all he does is sleep when he is out of the crate.
He probably wants to be with you or his other people. That's how mine are at least. They want to sleep but they seem to hate being ostracized from the rest of the pack (aka the people). If they are free, they can have access to us even if they don't want to be in our laps (A very rare thing honestly). They just don't like being separated from the pack as if they've done something wrong or whatever.
I know that Champ just wants to be with us but it just seems so funny that all he does is sleep but yet he still hates the crate. He was never one to like the crate but we still use it anyway. I think it is just a habit for him now to dislike the crate. Smokey on the other hand does not need crate rest but wants to be in his own crate when we have Champ crated. He feels "left out" :rolleyes: (pun intended) when Champ is crated and he is not. He will lay in his crate with the door open and will not come out till Champ is let out. Like I said in the nickname thread, Smokey is not the brightest bulb in the fixture. He is attached to Champ and was so lost when Champ was at the vets. So we have the dog who needs to be crated hating the crate and the dog who doesn't need to be crated loving the crate!!! :rolleyes: Go figure??
The only time Champ is happy alone is when he is under the pillows on our big bed. We have one of those elevated beds so it is not an option to leave him there although that is the one place where we have to take him out of because he will not leave on his own. He would like to sleep in the big bed but I do not let him. (the husband lets Champ sleep in the big bed when I go out of town. I know this because of the black fur left on my side of the bed when I get home) :BangHead: