Hi Guys. Could someone tell me what you guys mean by a crate? Im from Australia so i am unsure of what this means. Thanks

a small cage. It can be plastic or metal. I had a small plastic one when emma was very young and now have a cage. We only use it if we are not home.

So you dont let the bostons have the run of the house?

a lot of people dont let their pets have free roam of the house for potty training reasons. i dont like the idea of putting them in a small jail (crate/cage), just my opinion. it works for a lot of dogs but i have never wanted to do it.

Many dogs benefit from being crated. The crate becomes a den, a place of security. The training idea is that it prevents your dog from learning undesirable behaviors in your absence or when you can't supervise it, like chewing up things etc. It is easier to correct behavior that hasn't been learned. As long as the dog is getting plenty of exercise and attention, your dog might actually like being crated. My Boston, Trogg, has never had a crate, but we used to lock him in the laundry room when he was a pup. Now that he is grown, we just let him outside in the yard when we are gone. He has never learned to jump on the furniture, get in the garbage or steal food off of the table and that keeps my wife happy. Happy wife= happy husband ;-)

I have never locked any of my bostons up and i have never had a problem with behaviour but the saying in our house is our bostons never do anything wrong because they are allowed to do anything they want! lol

Megan: I was initally against a cage. We never had one for our yorkie or chihuahua, they go in my office when we are gone. But Sophie is prone to chewing up things. She is still a puppy at 6 months old. Hubby sd either a cage or she is gone. So cage it is. She now goes into it herself when I tell her to get in the cage. She will curl up in it and go to sleep. I was more upset about her being in one then she ever was.

Max is the first dog we ever crate trained and it worked great. We only put him in it when we couldn't watch him, but he was out the rest of the time. Housebreaking was much easier using this method and after about a year he was able to have free roam of the house. We haven't used the crate since he was a little over a year old and he's now 4.

Crates are not jails. Dogs are den animals. My dogs no matter how old go in the crate when we are not home. They are safe, comfortable, and happy until we get home.

I was really against it as well at 1st, but It was even worse yelling at my dog everyday who suffers from separation anxiety. I got him a crate after months and he loves it. I leave the door open and he chooses to hang out in there. When I leave, he has no problem going in there until i get home. Ultimately, no yelling at him, and when i get home we're both happy.

On a side note, I also have another boston who caused no problems when i was gone, but got jealous of the other dogs crate after a while. ( i initially thought the crated dog would be jealous of the free roamer but i was wrong) so i got him a crate and he required no training with it. Trained himself.