I have an 11 month old chocolate lab puppy who is with me most of the time, but when I need to leave home in his crate he urinates in it and rolls around in his own urine. How do I get him to stop urinating in his crate? I don't know if it is the type of crate the I use or that he just gets mad at me because I am leaving him home.

I see many similar questions. It sounds to me like the dog is doing it deliberately to protest being left in the crate or it is stress. That is at odds with the conventional wisdom. However, many dogs don't seem to have read the parts about avoiding fouling their sleeping area.

A wire grid in the bottom of the crate will help keep the puppy up out of urine and to a lessor extent stools. They are available with the crates, but expensive and hard to find. A piece of closely spaced wire closet shelving from a home supply place is cheaper. After the one I used for years fell apart last year, I bought a vegetable bin and drilled holes in the bottom. It worked very well with the few accidents my Holly had in her crate as a 7 week old. Your dog should be large enough to avoid possible problems getting its leg stuck in the grid.

They reduces the mess, making the protest much less effective. The longer haired the puppy, the higher it needs to be. In warmer weather, you can just haul the crate out and hose everything off. When the puppy sees you coping with the situation, and you stand your ground, most of them give up and learn to relax, and that you will return. One more thing that may help is using a smaller crate, or blocking off part of a larger one so the puppy can't foul one spot and retreat.

And of course rolling in it is just a "dog thing"... as my favorite trainer says

You got a dog ? You need to get used to the idea that dogs do gross things. They gack, they roll in smelly things, they just do gross things.

She cracks me up because people get so freaked about really normal, albeit gross by many people's standards, things.

-Beth

My dog has suddenly started doing the same, she is a year old German shepherd, she stopped for about three months but the all of a sudden she has started doing it again! Its really frustrating as we make sure she goes out for half and hour before we go to bed, she does her buisiness, but when we come down in the morning she has done it again!

Take her to the vet to ensure she does not have a UTI.

I have a 10 month boxer who urinates in his place after every time he has a bath but he never barks or cries he just goes. Does anyone have any advice?

Please start your own question thread. Your boxer's problems may or may not match the original question.