# When to start leaving him alone in the house out of his crate.



## nickgakis (Jul 6, 2010)

I have a 5 month old german shepherd that is crate trained. i want to start leaving him outside of his crate in the house when im gone. ive tried a couple of times for about an hour and he hasnt completely destroyed the house, but has messed up some things he shouldnt have. how old should a dog be before he should be left alone out of his crate.


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## Elaine (Sep 10, 2006)

Your puppy is way too young to be left loose in the house when you aren't there. In a couple of months, if he's not chewing on anything and completely housebroken when you are home, you can start by letting him loose at night. That way you can hear if he's getting into something and stop him and he sort of knows you are there and that sort of deters things too. After a couple of more months of him being good at night, you can try very short periods of time of him loose while you are gone and then build on that. Do not just go for a long period of time as a puppy can just suddenly decide to eat your couch or remove a wall. Take things slow so you can build on success and not have to stop for failure.


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## NarysDad (Apr 29, 2010)

I agree he is to young to be left alone, The crate protects him from himself and the things that he can get into that could harm him. Our guy's earn our trust being out of their crates while we are at home, but never get left out when we leave at your boy's age


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## Stosh (Jun 26, 2010)

I started leaving Stosh out of his crate at night at 6 mos old, he knows he's not allowed anywhere there's carpet- so he stays in the kitchen and tiled area and he does really well with it. Our bedroom is off of the kitchen so I can hear if he does anything wrong- so far so good. But I still crate him when I leave the house during the day. Even though he's exceptionally well behaved for a young dog, I still think he needs to be put up during the day. If your pup is 'messing things up' he's too young. Maybe try him at night and see if he can be trusted while you're home.


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## LaRen616 (Mar 4, 2010)

My GSD Sinister is 16 months old and he is still not allowed to roam the house while I am gone, he still needs to be in a crate. He has chewed the wall in two different spots, ate some carpet and ruined some blinds. Sometimes they need to be crated until they are 2 or 3 years old.


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## Wolfiesmom (Apr 10, 2010)

When they are left for long periods of time at a young age, they get bored. A bored dog gets into things. When Chief was a year old, we left him alone for 4 hours. He was gated in a small den. I put my vacuum cleaner on the couch so he wouldnt lie on it, left him his toys and a bowl of water. When we got home, we discovered he had eaten the whole front of the couch off. The vacuum was still where I left it, but he had eaten the wheels, the bag, and the cord off of it. He also chewed the windowsill off and dumped his water all over the place. I would never leave a young pup alone again. Wolfie will be in his crate until he is 2 years old. That's when we noticed a marked change in Chief's behavior.


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## GSDAlphaMom (Jul 20, 2010)

Agree with everyone, that's way too young. He will get himself in trouble. It's individual and I test mine between 9 months to a year. Typically a year s safe but still need to be cautious. When you do test, start with small confined areas such as a utility room or the kitchen, one room once he does well there then you can try full run.


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## cshepherd9 (Feb 11, 2010)

My first dog, Kinsey, was an apartment dog and she did well out of the crate at a year. My second dog, Dallas, was off and on until she was 3. Willow is 11 months and I have experimented with her for short times with sucess and then I left her out one week during the work days and I thought she was doing great until I discovered she was tinkling in the house. She is one of those that tinkles when she gets excited and I guess she couldn't hold it while playing with Dallas during the day. So, she is back in the crate while I am gone and we will try again a few months down the road. There is no magic age on when you can release them from the crate. Every dog is different.


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## CaliBoy (Jun 22, 2010)

My experience is odd, I think. I have allowed my LittleGuy to run loose in the house since he was four months old, and hardly had any problems (never goes to the bathroom, ever). However, he's always had the doggie door (he learned to use it at 8 wks. old) and so he gets to go to the backyard whenever he wants. At first, I closed off the bedroom and kitchen doors so he only had limited access in the house, and leave the TV on.

I did have the problem where he would dig in the back yard and bring rocks and pebbles through the doggie door into my bedroom, or pieces of the shrub tree he had broken off. But that tapered off as he recognized my frown and stern question, "what did you do now?" At about one year, I started letting him run free throughout the house with few problems, although I still had to close a bedroom door where guests/relatives were staying because he gets fascinated by new objects (like someone's luggage) that he's never seen before.

When I am gone, he goes up to all the windows of the house to see who's walking by. It is cute, unless people draw too close to the house, in which case his demeanor changes into protection mode.


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## JazzNScout (Aug 2, 2008)

My Jasmine was crated until she was almost 9! 

I've always worked it in levels -- confined to a room, confined to a few rooms, and so on, and started at as little as 15 minutes gone, then 30 minutes, an hour, and so on. 

Normally, by the time a pup was a year, it was safe to leave her loose in the house....except for Jasmine.


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## BlackPuppy (Mar 29, 2007)

18 months. That's what seems to work for me. Though they can be left out for short periods of time. 18 months is when I'm working all day.


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## Blitz Burgh Steeler (Jun 13, 2010)

*I have an Einstien*

Guess i have a special one , Blitz hasn't been caged since he was 11 weeks old.He was housebroken in 3 weeks He spends all night at the foot of my bed and no accidents on the carpet. He spends his days in my air conditioned shop while i'm at work (8 hrs a day-has doggy door to go outside) is now almost 5 mos old and hasn't touched anything in the shop but his toys and there is plenty of stuff he could get into. Just glad he's not chewing on the Corvette He is the smartest pup i have ever had. When i picked him out of the litter i thought he might be special :wub:


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

Masi has been crate free for about a year now,,in the beginning I had dodge and Jynx loose , Jag has always been crated when I'm not here, (he's a trouble maker). 

Dodge wasn't well towards the end, and I didn't want masi pestering him when I wasn't around,,she's never chewed up anything, good girl and gets along with the aussie just fine,,so she's been out of the crate since she was about a year old


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## Whitedog404 (Mar 25, 2010)

Yes, 5 months old is far too young to be roaming around the house on his own. My guy, about 5.5 months old, just now discovered he can jump on countertops and that's just trouble waiting to happen. And that's with me working from home. If you really think about it, there's so much around your house that can not only get destroyed (and **** quickly), but that can harm your dog. I wouldn't leave Dexter alone for a nanosecond at this point. And he's a pretty good puppy. But, basically, he's a goober without any real common sense right now.


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## LaRen616 (Mar 4, 2010)

Blitz Burgh Steeler said:


> Guess i have a special one , Blitz hasn't been caged since he was 11 weeks old.He was housebroken in 3 weeks He spends all night at the foot of my bed and no accidents on the carpet. He spends his days in my air conditioned shop while i'm at work (8 hrs a day-has doggy door to go outside) *is now almost 5 mos old and hasn't touched anything in the shop but his toys and there is plenty of stuff he could get into.* Just glad he's not chewing on the Corvette He is the smartest pup i have ever had. When i picked him out of the litter i thought he might be special :wub:


My GSD Sinister never chewed a thing as a puppy, not one thing. Until he was 8-9 months old and I left him out of his crate for 4 hours. He ate my carpet and some of my wall. Then he was crated again, he does not chew a thing when I am home, I tried to leave him out alone again when he turned 1 year old and he ate some more of my wall. He is almost 17 months old now and he is still not allowed to roam the house when I am not home. I do not think it is safe for a puppy under the age of 8 months old to roam the house when no one is home. It is a puppy, it will chew something eventually and it could end up severly hurting or killing your puppy. I would not take that chance, ever.


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## VChurch (Jun 14, 2010)

Blitz Burgh Steeler said:


> Guess i have a special one , Blitz hasn't been caged since he was 11 weeks old.He was housebroken in 3 weeks He spends all night at the foot of my bed and no accidents on the carpet. He spends his days in my air conditioned shop while i'm at work (8 hrs a day-has doggy door to go outside) is now almost 5 mos old and hasn't touched anything in the shop but his toys and there is plenty of stuff he could get into. Just glad he's not chewing on the Corvette He is the smartest pup i have ever had. When i picked him out of the litter i thought he might be special :wub:



That's how Sobacca was as a puppy -- although he's not a shepherd. But he hasn't been crated since he was about three months old and we never had a problem with him.
I am pretty positive that Minna will be crated for a long time....not sure how long though. Pretty sure she'll start sleeping in bed with us in another 1.5-2 months. She's already taking a nap a day with us, and she gets up in bed, settles down and sleeps for a couple hours.


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## kiya (May 3, 2010)

Depends on the dog, Apache and Kiya were never destructive, I don't remember when I trusted them but probably about 1 year old. Lakota on the other hand will probably not earn freedom for a long time. Maybe when she stops stealing things.


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## CaliBoy (Jun 22, 2010)

Blitz Burgh Steeler: I had the same experience as you. My LittleGuy does amazingly well without having to be crated. Although in my case, he was actually house broken in one week. I know that sounds unbelievable, but having the doggie door helped, since he has never had the sense of being restricted to the house. Your dog does sound very special.


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## Lola10 (May 5, 2010)

We don't crate Lola at night, but she is blocked to a section in the bedroom (we stopped when she had her e-collar on because it was getting stuck in the crate...didn't want to wake up to anything bad), and she is fine at night...she will wake us up if she needs to go to the bathroom. She hasn't earned the trust to be out when we're not home though, she has a larger crate downstairs for when we are gone. I was thinking about connecting an exercise pen to it, but not sure yet...


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## elisabeth_00117 (May 17, 2009)

This is what happened when Stark was left alone out of his crate at 7 months old.

My bed was at least 5-6 feet away from the wall where it usually resides... 

My sister left him uncrated when she left thinking that an hour alone would be okay (I was at work and came home to this).


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## JazzNScout (Aug 2, 2008)

Blitz Burgh Steeler said:


> Guess i have a special one , Blitz hasn't been caged since he was 11 weeks old.He was housebroken in 3 weeks He spends all night at the foot of my bed and no accidents on the carpet. He spends his days in my air conditioned shop while i'm at work (8 hrs a day-has doggy door to go outside) is now almost 5 mos old and hasn't touched anything in the shop but his toys and there is plenty of stuff he could get into. Just glad he's not chewing on the Corvette He is the smartest pup i have ever had. When i picked him out of the litter i thought he might be special :wub:


Oh my God, my Morgan had those "Santa Claus hat ears." I love them. It must be the ears that made Blitz extra special! lol!


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