I brought a brand new dog house for my chow chow. I put a pillow and his toy in the house. He would not go in. One day it started to rain, so I had to help him go inside the house to keep him safe from the rain. He stayed in there for a few seconds, came out and he never went back in. I felt sorry that he got soaking wet that day. The next thing I tried was putting his food in the house. He stuck his head in the house and pulled his food out. I also sometimes gives him the command, "Go in your house boy." He understands me, but he just goes to its door, looks in for a second, turns around, and comes back to me. I don't know what he is so afraid of. I look inside. I see nothing in there to harm him, and the house is big enough for him to move around in. Am I doing something wrong? What could he be afraid of? What should I do, so the next time it rains, he will go inside his new house for cover? :confused:

He might be not like the confined feeling or the dark lonely feeling?

He may not feel he needs it now. Normally dogs like confined places. Is he still fairly young? Years ago I build a nice dog house one spring, and introduced the dog to it. He was about a year old then. Like yours, he wanted nothing to do with it. All summer he slept out in the rain. He had one spot just behind the house he always laid in. He actually killed the grass there. Finally, one cold, rainy, fall morning we found him in it. As he got older and older, he used the dog house more and more.

As a kid, I always remembered dogs loving their dog houses and was surprised mine didn't. The dogs I knew as a child likely were whelped in a dog house and lived in it until being given their own, which they then expected.

Of course, my dogs sleep in the house now. Again, we give them a crate to be their den. We start them out in the crate as a young puppy. Many of them will take naps in their crate even with the door open. We we aren't home, our dog is safe in its crate, in out of the cold, heat, and rain and snow.

Dogs are more quick to accept new things when they are very young, before 12 weeks. Since you said dog and not puppy, I assume your dog is well past 12 weeks. As the weather gets worse where you are, you dog may decide it needs the house and start using it. Putting its toys and food in it was a good idea. I suggest that to people introducing older dogs to crates.

My dog was like yours when we first got her the dog house. We tried the treats, the toys, anything we could think of and she would avoid it.

At the start of Winter on another freezing night we walked past and saw her sleeping in it. Since then she sleeps in it every night.

By the way this wasn't just a few weeks that she wouldn't sleep in it, it was months...

Keep trying the treats and maybe after a few cold miserable nights your dog should eventually start to like the crate