metal crates dangerous?
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/ ... -trap.html I think the "safety" of a crated dog has a lot to do with how well it's crate-trained and whether crate-training started as a puppy. I can imagine a dog like Rudie potentially hurting himself in a crate, but Rudie has also knocked over a fridge which seems to me pretty dangerous too!  |
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| The rescue dog I had as a kid chewed apart the door of a metal crate during the night once when she was a puppy. She didn't hurt herself or anything, but I was pretty amazed by it. |
| Crates need to be geared to the dog. And dogs need to be trained to crates, just like anything or anyone else they come into contact with in their lives. Proper and safe behavior doesn't always happen - in anything; dog, human or any other animal. Trust me, as a trauma nurse in a busy hospital, I saw plenty of odd situations that people got themselves into...and we supposedly have the higher ability to reason....  Plastic crates have their issues, especially if your dog is a chewer, or a really strong scratcher/digger. It is ultimately up to the human to make wise choices for their dog. And still, accidents will happen, as they always do in life.  |
got sheep wrote: Crates need to be geared to the dog. And dogs need to be trained to crates, just like anything or anyone else they come into contact with in their lives. Proper and safe behavior doesn't always happen - in anything; dog, human or any other animal. Trust me, as a trauma nurse in a busy hospital, I saw plenty of odd situations that people got themselves into...and we supposedly have the higher ability to reason.... Plastic crates have their issues, especially if your dog is a chewer, or a really strong scratcher/digger. It is ultimately up to the human to make wise choices for their dog. And still, accidents will happen, as they always do in life. Well yeah exactly! I'm sure given a large enough sample size, you will find the most outlandish things, like a person who hurt themselves accidentally with a wooden spoon or something. This whole article seemed ridiculous to me. |
| When Brick was a pup, in his crate, he let out a blood curdling scream. I ran to the crate and found that he hooked one of his lower canines on the crate & didn't know how to unhook it. He just kept pulling backwards. It didn't take him long to learn NOT to bite the crate. |
| My rescue dog is the epitomy of metal crate presenting a danger. She once managed to put a metal spike through the webbing on one of her paws at training, and I was right there! It was an old crate and not in the best of shape as these public crates often are, but my other dogs had all been crated there while I was working someone else without issue, so... It took three of us to free her. Thank god for all her weird faults she is not a biter, even under severe stress. She's been crated when I'm not home since she came to live with me, mostly for her propensity to try to kill herself in some fashion. If not the crate, there was the time she tried to jump through the kitchen window. Fun things like that. Maybe she and Rudie are remotely related? I've been crating her in a 48" crate which she has bit by bit taken apart, but at least without incurring injury. Some times with some dogs you don't have a lot of choice - they're going to do their best to do themselves in one way or another. I'd hate to see the crates taken off the market because some dogs don't do well in them. Now, the interesting thing: last Saturday I forgot to crate her before I left to run my morning errands. I was gone about 3 hours and came home to find her proudly and calmy (!) hanging out with my other dogs. I thought about it a lot and Monday risked leaving her loose when I went to work. It was...uncomfortable. She's been known to attack my old girls, though she's seemed a lot better about that too, plus I had to trust that Sybil would step in and kick her butt if she crossed the line. Day 3 now of her having been loose and, knock wood (!!!), so far wonderfully good and I don't hate coming home to her hysterionics any more. Can it be...? God I hope so. I've thought she was ready before and been wrong. But she's never been this good for this long.  But, yeah, in her case, a metal crate is a hazard. But then so is a house... kristine |
| The public old crates...yes, we had one of the students dogs go flying into a crate. There is an odd little metal piece that sticks up at the opening. The dogs toenail got caught in that piece. The dog was crying, the guy was freaking out and it was a hectic minute trying to free that toe. Simon was in that crate tonight and I made sure that piece was covered. |
| When my baby was a pup, she got her paw caught between one of the grills. Now I have bumpers along the sides and her paws are too large now to get stuck! |
Good Bloody Grief  As with anything if you combine enough extreme circumstances wire crates can pose a risk to dogs but even if this K-911 service sees a couple of dozen incidents in a year, as traumatizing as they are to the individual dogs and parents involved, it is statistically insignificant in a population which sees hundreds of thousands if not millions of dog-days of crate restraint each year in their own jurisdiction alone. The solution has already being presented here, that being; a. train the dog to accept the crate, and b. ensure that the crate is in good condition. If a person “throws” a dog into a crate and leaves him/her alone to fend for themselves for an entire workday immediately after their arrival in the home without training and supervision, especially if that crate is rusty, has broken wires and lacks a good base then the “parent” has created the conditions for injury, bears sole and complete responsibility for the dog’s injury and should be prevented from ever parenting a dog again. Ultimately one has to weigh the exceedingly minimal risks of a wire crate against the much higher risks involved in allowing a dog to roam the house unattended, risks which can and do result in far more injuries at much higher rates than occur in crates. Older dogs can and often do develop arthritis as well as many nervous and musculature conditions which can severely limit their mobility on ceramic tiles, changing or uneven flooring and that can result in falls which break bones and dislocate joints. Some dogs react very “energetically” to someone attending the front door and ringing the bell or even the sound of the phone ringing for an extended period without being answered. Some react equally strongly to children or other animals passing by the house especially when noise and commotion accompany their passage. During such responses “highly reactive” dogs can loose track of their surroundings and run into walls, furnishings or other items causing blunt force impact injuries or even severe cuts, muscle wounds or broken bones from hard furnishing or wall corners. What about the happenstance of the local animal control staff responding to a legitimate (or otherwise) nuisance dog complaint. In this case the dog being crated and out of sight can save both the dog and parent a litany of anguish and frustration at the hands of self important and at best questionably motivated people. It takes little effort to come up with many more situations where the crating of a dog during a parents’ absence from the home is far less risky than leaving the dog unrestrained, and in fact is often beneficial to both dog and parent. I have over 70 dog-years of crate use and the only incident I have ever had was when my beloved Punk was left alone in the crate in a room I was renting when I went away to university. The first day I left for a couple of hours Punk (who was well crate trained and was very much at ease in his crate) was assaulted by flees that were unknowingly lurking in the carpets. Clearly he panicked trying to get out of a situation he had never experienced and ended up partially tearing off a nail. Needless to say we left that place within a few days even though I thoroughly and aggressively fumigated the room immediately upon our return from the vet’s. Does that one incident mean I should have gotten rid of his wire crate and never used another for any of my kids? Certainly not! Even changing to a plastic crate was not an option as back then the only way to get a big enough sleeping crate for a Bobtail was to buy a wire crate. When Punk, Tulak and Heather eventually died I donated their crates to the local Humane Society which was severely underfunded by the city and then vowed never to crate a dog again. In spite of that vow when Michele and I started building Risa Kennels one of the first things I did to prepare for our kids’ arrival was go out and get a large wire sleeping crate before each one arrived. With minimal training effort and a brief time acclimation schedule each has accepted their crate quite readily and it is only Brigham Batai, the buggery butt blue character who complains about being in his crate - but then again he complains about everything that is not fawning over his (imagined) needs and wants! Whatever one might think of the circumstances I presented above here is the ONE OVERIDING reason for me to crate my kids no matter what when they are left at home without supervision. One of the fundamental instinctual activities of a dog is to chew. It is how they feed, how they explore the world, how they determine if something is worth eating and it is often part of the way they play and certainly a huge part of how they manifest boredom. No matter how hard we try to “chewproof” our homes there is one item which is almost, if not outright, impossible to eliminate – the electrical power cord. It would take very little time and effort for a dog the size of a Bobtail to chew through the insulation on a lamp cord and short both conductors causing themselves severe burn and spasm injuries if not death. Even those that survive the electrocution often have such severe injuries euthanizing them may well be the only humane treatment option. And as sad as it is parents may not have the financial wherewithal to pay for treatment even if these grievous injuries are survivable and treatable. This risk and these consequences are why after all these years and as well behaved as my kids are I still crate my dogs if they are left alone for anything more than a few minutes. I simply will NOT take that risk with my kids’ lives, not now not ever. They are too important to me to risk their lives for a moment of laziness when the risks of a crate are so low as to be negligible. Add to that as Virgil Tiberius health continues to fail his mobility gets more and more compromised. The risk of him falling on the front entry ceramic tiles and breaking a bone or hitting his head increases. What if he had an unexpected seizure while relaxing at the top of a stairway? A fall down the stairs could easily kill him or worse break his back or cause other grievous injury and pain he would have to endure for the duration of my absence. Do I need to raise other injury or harm scenarios?..... These risks and others are real and relatively high whereas the risk of injury in his crate is minimal so into the crate he and everyone else goes. While some claim that crates are jails and inhumane, in my never humble opinion they are in fact the exact opposite. Crates are a place of refuge and safe haven protecting both the dog and parent from injury and sorrow. They are the dog’s personal space where they can relax with minimal interference or hassle from other dogs or the outside world which can stress them when they are without parental company. Provide a good mat/pillow or blanket that the dog likes and accepts. Ensure that the crate is free of rust, broken wires and sharp edges and most of all train the dog to accept his/her crate and supervise them at first. Build up the amount of time they have to spend in the crate if at all possible instead of expecting them to be able settle for an entire 10 hours of a workday and commuting time after just a couple of one hour sessions on the weekend. If this is done then the risks of crating are so low as to be almost non-existent. My thoughts and experience on the topic for what they are worth. Thanks and Cheers Carl |
| Ours is a new duck run. Georgi used it and it was great. Floor was tiles as it had no bottom. Great roof and a door as well. Sleep area and a area if she had a wee until she was house trained. It's on the patio at the mo and the funny thing she just goes in it and nobody tells her and falls asleep. |
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