your opinions on kennels please..and advice

[karenjj]

How many of you keep your dogs in kennels and runs outside?
I have a yellow lab who is 2 and a jack russel who is 7 months. They are on their own for about 6-7 hours a day although at the moment I pay a dog walker to come and take them for a run midday. They get a walk before I go to work/ at lunch the days the dog walker comes and then again in the evening. At the weekends they go to the woods/beach.
They are destroying the hall that I leave them in! They have pulled all the lino up and ripped it, chewed all the door frames, chewed the telephone cable and now they have dug through the wooden base for the lino and made a hole! I leave them with a chew stick in the morning and they always seem relaxed, I just don't know what to do? Someone recommended getting them a kennel and run outdoor for just in the day but I'm worried about them being stolen (they aren't anything special but I always worry about things like that!) and worried that they'll be upset in a kennel and even escape. Any ideas? Is it ok to keep them in a kennel in the day? They don't chew anything at nighttime.

 

[FinnishLapphund]

I don't have anything against well managed kennels, if it is built correctly it should be escape-proof and you could always get a padlock to it. However, a good and safe kennel can be expensive to obtain and there is the risk that you exchange one problem for another.

Personally I would wait with spending money on a kennel and begin with trying to make their brains more tired, after all, no matter how tired their bodies are from walking, if their brains isn't tired enough, they will still have the energy to do mischief. What do you do during the walks? Do you ask them to jump/climb up on stones or rocks, go zigzag between trees/benches/parked cars, search for some goodies that you throw out on the ground, bring a toy in your pocket that you can throw or hide etc?


Then there is also my usual advice, that if you feed dry feed, don't always feed in a bowl without throw it out over the floor and let them search for it (if they do it one by one, it is good training for the other dog to sit or lay and wait on its turn, otherwise, throw some food out in one end of the room for one dog and in the another end of the room for the other dog).

If you have Kongs, fill two with something like carrot purée or yoghurt, perhaps mixed with a little liver pate etc, put them in the freezer and give them to your dogs frozen. To increase the difficulty level when you're at home while they get the Kongs, don't just give the Kongs to them, without put them somewhere in the room where the dogs can't see them at once, so that they first must search to find "their" Kong and then they can begin to work with getting the frozen good stuff out of the Kong.

If you want some brain-exercising toys (boredom breakers) that you can hide treats or dry food inside, I have some of Nina Ottosson's, my dogs favourite is Dog Tornado Wood. They are sold in the UK, e.g. swellpets, petplanet and mutleyandmog .
As I recall, Prose's Stella enjoys this boredom breaker Boston-terrier-challenge .

Good luck.

 

[teddybearhaffy]

Well....do you have neighbours? as there's nothing so irritating & distressing as having neighbours dogs barking all day!! I have 3 dogs next door & they're left out in their kennel & you wouldn't believe the racket they make!

 

[Nickijem]

My Springer spaniel pup has just started using her kennel during the day. We bought a 10ft x 4ft kennel and run from Duchy Farm Kennels (google it or check it out on ebay). It cost £330 and £50 delivery.
We spent about a week getting her used to it by leaving her in the kennel with a chew/bone/kong etc for about 20mins to start with then building up to an hour. We would put her in there after a walk and with her dinner so she would be quite settled. She now takes herself in there voluntarily and she is in it for most of the day.
I would be happier if she had another dog for company but that will happen when she is a bit older - I don't want 2 puppies!!
As long as the dogs have plenty of exercise, love and attention, they will be happy to have their own space in the kennel. Dogs that bark in kennels are often ones that are worried that their owners aren't coming back - therefore build up the time in the kennel gradually and try let your dogs out before they start barking to come out!

 

[CAYLA]

As it sounds like they are getting a good amount of exercise, I would introduce crates and crate train them, this gets them into a routine of being in a smaller area whereby they cannot destroy anything and can only focus on what they are left within the crate, like kongs, butchers bone and other long lasting treats.
You can gradually phase the crates out, but for now they need a smaller area to begin, and possibly a Dap diffuser.

You could obs go with the kennel, but if they are noisy and play fight u may get neigbours complaining, and I def think it would have to be all metal, as I think they would chew it to bits

I have kenneled dogs, they are very quiet laid back dogs and my garden is not accesible at all to thieves (if it where, I would not even think about it), and my akita is one of the dogs kenneled, I doubt they would get near her kennel
Mine are not kenneled for destruction reasons, they can all live in and out, but I have alot of dogs and a not so massive house