Lock up the dogs?

[Guest jeanvdm2]

Hi Amanda,

 

I hope it is o.k to ask. I read your post about your philosophy of confining a dog. I also looked at your profile on this site as you suggested and was wondering if you could don't mind eleborating a bit on why you prefere confining a dog.

 

I have a yound dog, my first BC and he is wonderful but VERY aware of privliges. If I slip up and baby him a litte(alow him on the bed, or in the kitchen etc.) he can turn into a hot head and do stupid stuff like growling at the little house dog...

 

How do you keep your dogs, in crates or kennel runs or a dog yard. How long per day do you keep them in their kennels/crate/yard?? Do you house them with another dog or alone.

 

Thanks

Jean

[Guest Amanda]

When I had my first Border Collie, we never confined him. He was smart. He drove sheep off the fron lawn for us at seven months, he gathered anywhere. He was a dreadful fetcher. It was making a fool of him. He could have been a nice dog if hadn't hung around developing the hell out of his eye, and generally learning to be independent. Loose dogs get too much eye. and in their own heads, they are working, working on their own, lying around watching stock.

I started confining my dogs when I got serious. Everyone needs to if they plan to be serious. Dogs need the time to concentrate, not develop idle thoughts, and to focus on training.

I crate my dogs individually. I allow youngsters, not yet started, to horse around in a run, together, during the day. Once they start, I stop the communal living--they get working each other too much and that's no good.

Now it's winter. I take them skiing daily and my friend Tom takes them again when he goes. That's several miles per ski. I take them horse back riding. These diversions are nice for them but they are not unsupervised, never unsupervised. When I get back, I put them away. I am training a couple of young ones. They get worked first, while they are fresh, before I ski. Then the dogs go away, in crates until I get back at 4:30. Hopefully Tom will have had them out in the mean time. But he may not have done. The dogs will be OK until I finish work. Now we are getting foot of snow and the training will be stopped by it. They will still get a fair shake of supervised exercise, and I normally bring them in the house for while in the evenings, to visit.

Many a serious hand would think I was keeping dogs in over pet-like circumstances. I do enjoy my dogs' companionship. Lots of hands are tougher than I am about the confinement thing. My amount suits my dogs and me. I surely do not let them run around all day. They would become idiots and I would have been to blame. A waste of good dog.

Amanda

[Guest Bart]

I had the post regarding work ethic. I surmised from your response I gave them too much freedom and for the past few days have confined them. I can see the change already. I was working all the dogs at least once and sometimes twice a day and I thought they would be less intense since they had so much exposure. I noticed the opposite was true and they were becoming harder to command. Confining them has had the opposite effect, they are easire to command.