Morning all,
We’ve just got a new addition to the house, an 18 month old pug that we adopted. She’s very well trained, no accidents in the home, very friendly, a little overexcitable, but generally a happy, personable little ball of fluff.

There’s a bit of a busy spell coming up, though, with both me and the other half having to work in the office 5 days a week (as opposed to working from home), and we’re struggling to know what to do with the pug. She gets anxious when we’re away, and so far two attempts to leave her free run of the house haven’t been great – the first time she peed on the sofa; the second time she jumped the baby gate we used to keep her in the mudroom area, and ran rampant through the house.

So, any thoughts on how we can gradually get her to calm down while we’re out, and just do normal doggy things like sleeping, sitting on the sofa and playing with toys?!

(longer term, we’re going to be able to work from home 4 or 5 half days a week, which should make it easier)

Can you crate her? I leave my Vizsla in her cage for a couple of hours at a time, although hoping to extend this a bit as soon as I can. She now associates the cage with sleeping, so just curls up in a ball as soon as she gets in there.

How long are you out?
Generally 4hrs is the max but i do leave my dogs longer but having 3 seems to help as they are not “alone” as such.

I would look into dog walker/neighbour as it showing classic anxiety signs

no chance of taking her to work i guess? (i do that too!)

Personally not a fan of crating dogs, yes they have their uses for convalescing etc, but to keep a healthy dog penned in for more than a few hours is criminal imo.
Can you get a taller gate for the mudroom?

Separation might need to be built up over time, i appreciate you might not be able to do that.

Friendly neighbour might be the ticket. “Auntie Helen” keeps an eye on mine some afternoons after ive taken her out for her lunchtime walk and toilet activity, they both get the good out of it.

Higher gate + leave a radio or something on
Even better if you could record yourselves talking and loop that

Got any local dog walkers or bored retired neighbours? Get to know one (so you can trust them with your keys) and get them to walk it midday-ish?

I’ll say it before someone else does…

Separation Anxiety

The main reason for separation anxiety is usually due the owners. When coming home you should never greet the dog straight away.. You should wait for the dog to calm down, then when you are ready you can greet the dog. This gets the dog out of the frame of mind of “When are they back, I want cuddles n stuff”. This is usually about 10 minutes, and the hardest 10 minutes ever for the owner.

Another thing you can do, is buy yourself a crate and train the dog to like it, don’t put it in the crate if its been naughty, treat it as a happy place, DAP spray will also help calm down the dog.

Take the dog for a walk in the morning to tire it out slightly, have a neighbour take the dog/check on the dog every now and again. Same thing goes for everyone, not just you, they must ignore the dog for 10 minutes.

A lot of dog training is not training the dog, its training the owners.

i like how crating is criminal, but securing the mudroom is fine

Take the pug to the office? It’ll fit in a desk drawer easy enough. We have always had two dogs at a time, never had separation anxiety problems.

We have a crate for our dog, but don’t use strictly for crate training. We use the crate as a place the dog can go to feel safe and call her own. The door to it is always open.

It might be worthwhile creating an area for the pug, if you haven’t already, where she feels safe and it’s somewhere she can go when you’re out of the house.

I don’t let the dog in the living room or any of the bedrooms when we’re out of the house. Just the room with her crate, the upstairs and downstairs landings.

How long are you going to be away from the house when your both out. I wouldn’t leave any dog for more than 4-5 hours. As above comments, maybe arrange for someone to come in and let her out for a wee or take her for a walk.

Thanks guys and girls, really appreciate the input. I think a taller gate is in order, as it gives her space in the mudroom to play with her toys, go in and out of her crate and so on. And we’re getting a dogwalker next week; probably every day for the next couple of weeks til we get settled into a routine with work.

Crating is fair enough, and she’s OK in there, but as you point out, it’s not somewhere we want to put her for more than a few hours.

And separation anxiety – absolutely agree on that. It’s not too tricky to ignore her when she goes nuts as we come in, and she does calm down, but is that of itself enough to get her over separation anxiety?

If I could, I’d bring her to work because she’d be great and v quiet, but our office doesn’t allow it 🙁

We had a Boxer after we first got married, I was working shifts so was home in the daytime and when I wasn’t the wife would pop home from work lunchtimes and check on him. He used to have a lovely time opening the cupboards and fridge going round the house collecting stuff and taking it up to our bed (10 litre tins of paint, bottle of Domestos etc.) he ripped the headboard off the bed and ripped up the kitchen carpet and made a big nest in the middle of the kitchen floor.
We spoke to his breeder and she said get a cage, it sounded cruel but he soon adjusted when he spotted us getting ready to go out he would go in there on his bed and settle down.
When the kids came along he had a haven to get away from the kids.

Have no experience with older dogs, but getting our Lurcher used to being on her own was tough to start with. Everytime we leave a kong filled with her favourite things (dried tripe she loves just keep it in a sealed container). She now knows the kong and tripe mean she’s being left, but she gets tripe so doesnt seem to mind. Set up a routine and stick to it, start with 1/2 an hour and build up on that, leave the treats and go straight out without hesitation or stress on your behalf.

Its criminal in my opinion because owners often use them rather than address the problem. Like i say just my opinion.
I’m assuming that a room is bigger than a 56″ cage, or whatever is available, if the crate is already in it.

Mine is not destructive so why not give her the run of the house if she needs to be kept in. She has a safe den in another room if she fancies getting away from the noise of the tv, washing machine or whatever.

Lots of info of google on crating if you care to look for it.
http://north-attleboro.ma.us/shelter/crate.html

We crated our pug and boxer from the first day we had them (9 weeks), dogs do not like soiling near there beds and it helps when your toilet training! Stopped using the crates when about 12 months old and never had any problems at all, mind you winnie (pug) likes to sit on the top of the sofa looking out of the window watching the world go by if we do go out!

Pugs love company, human or canine, thinking about getting another pug now we don’t have our boxer anymore!

<shakes head and leaves in disbelief>

Outside kennel and run?

We really want a pet – lets get one we can’t leave for 8 hours while at work and will annoy the hell out of the neighbours… 😀 good plan!

<sorry, pet hate of mine – too many stupid neighbours with barky dogs that get left all day and go mental at every passing car/person/leaf>

Is your house detached? If not, how do you know the dog won’t bark all day and piss off the neighbours?