Kennel Pacing -- need help - Page 1

Hello all,

I have a 2 year old Showline.  She is a pet.  I have two others that I train and will occassionally show.  Most of the time, all three are in the house.  Hollie is moderately dysplastic.  I have a small kennel building with indoor/outdoor runs and sometimes it is necessary to place her out there.  She immediately stresses out and begins to pace the fence line.  The outdoor runs are 5'x15'.  She zones out and whines and will pace for hours.  She is much too soft to put a correction collar on her, and I would not do that anyway, so I need other suggestions please.  I will not put up isolation panels either, because that would prevent me from seeing her from the house.  Verbal corrections work, but only if I am standing at the fencing.  She is driving the other two nuts.  Even if I am outside in the yard, I will leave her kennel door open, she runs back into the kennel and begins pacing.  Any suggestions???

Many showline bloodline gsd do the pacing habit. YOu can not kennel them. Sorry , you have her , you have her problem . It is a known problem

Put her inside in a shut down kennel , large wire  crate with a hoof or a large raw bone and keep her with you and take her every day to some kind of activitiy off property..Get her into akc agility and sorry, but that is what you bought or chose, so now you have to deal with it.

I have an Arminius, Timo de la Serena male who does the same thing.  HAVE TO KEEP HIM IN CRATES AND OUT WITH ME OR RUNNING FREE.  Even in the crate he does the turn around and can raise a lot of chaos. Part of the showline frenzy of some lines. If I work him or exhaust him doing lots of duties on my property, he will sleep and finally relax/  busy you female...exhaust her every day with agility and chores.  Teach her to fetch logs, bushes, rocks or anything you need outside and keep her very busy/

Then quiet time comes, and she will sleep more

I have a female the exact same way, she will pace and everytime she paces she ends up going faster into a full run, she is no longer kenneled ever. She goes with me everywhere now and when she needs to have quiet time, i give her her kong with frozen peanut butter in it or a nice knukle bone. Keeps her occupied for a little while so i can do something without her in my pocket.  My female would pace and turn her feet raw and her tip of her tail from hitting the fence corners would be bloody cause she was so insistent on it.  Please quit kenneling your dog you are harming her and ruining her natural mentality. Please crate  her if you have to seperate her from you. My female goes everywhere with me and yes it sometimes is a pain but I chose to have her and will do what is best for her which is not kenneling.  I only have one kennel now and have 8 dogs the only dog kenneled is my stud and he is only kenneled during the day when I am not outside to keep an eye on him, he likes to lie in my flower beds and chew on my chokecherry bushes only when i am not looking. I put my dogs in their crates(metal) on the balcony when i need a time out from them or someone needs a timeout. otherwise they are lounging in the yard or in the house.  I learned from experience Kenneling is not the way to go, it ruins them.

I have to agree with the others.  Our old girl kept me up all night the first night we brought her home at 1.5 years.  She paced the kennel all night and I couldn't stand it.  We sold the kennel and brought her into our home.  It's a pain in the butt sometimes but she did ok home alone as long as she was in the house.  It may be part of the pack mentality and she wants to be with you.  Bring her in, crate her when necessary, try the kong with the peanut butter, works wonders.  Be patient with her, she will reward you with her companionship for years.  Just consider her your little shadow and live with it.  Good luck!

Try rethinking the kenneling,once you moved from trainer handler,you and family became her pack,she has decided her job is to watch over you. She is not going to put up with the kennel  she is heart sick. Think jail. Maybe a new job, a puppy , kid or change the way you kennel use yard with seperation fencing,so she is still free but confined. I have my yard seperated by gates sort of ike private runs, so they can see and be with each other, results in alot of so called fence running. great exersize and still out  from under you. They  just need to be with you or other dogs. Just try a different way of doing the same thing.

Since a person can't always have the dog with them a sometimes does need to kennel, maybe get her some toys.  I've noticed mine pace when they see me watching.  I've also caught them most often not pacing if they don't see me.

While it can be an inconvenience, some dogs are simply not suited to kennel life.

Some also develop kennel related habits that come to be triggered whenever placed in a kennel.

I would try out different environments: car, crate, house, larger yard area, etc until you find a place where she can be kept comfortably.

Jonah

     I won't put mine in a kennel run. I have a couple of rescue dogs that run circles. THE REASON IS THEY ARE BORED!!!

    I have dogs that were kenneled, locked up Tooooo much in their lives that now, even though they have open access to unlimited exercise, if stressed, will circle the coffee table. Round after round, EVEN THO THEY HAVE A CHOICE.

    Exercice and Activity,,the ONLY SOLUTION.

That's just me, I'm sure SEVERAL will disagree...Tomatoe-Tamoto!.............

YR, very interesting, I didn't know about that connection between pacing and showlines! We have an open floor plan and at certain times of the day, or especially if he didn't get a lot of exercise, my dog will start to pace, round and round the inner house. His nose is usually to the floor so we figure he's smelling mice in the cellar. We just look at each other and say, there's his OCD acting up again. We can redirect him with verbal commands, but the tendency is always there. Good thing to know that it's okay he's my shadow, and thrives having freedom of the yard, thanks to Invisible Fence.

And one note about fetching "rocks", that nbspis a big NO NO here! He is so ball crazy he goes after round rocks if we let him, and that habit started to wear down his canines! I worry I'll have to get them capped.

I think the rock thing comes from "showlines" that have been bred to work, AND CAN WORK"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    It isn't OCD, it's dog's that were bred to do a job, but no job for them.