# At what age can goldens have free run of the house?



## Blondie

Just wondering at what age do you wean the golden from the crate to having the freedom to be in the whole house all day? Or a larger portion of the house? I'm thinking it's a gradual process right? Like you could leave the house just to walk to the mailbox and see how the dog does, followed by longer periods of time etc. Our puppy is due to be born around November 13th and since I've never crate trained a dog before, but I will be now, I'm just wondering how long on average this process is or takes. I know every dog is different, but I'm curious about bladder maturity at what age etc, as I don't want to keep the dog in the crate too long during the day or too confined for too many months. I understand that the dogs come to like the crate and will go in on it's own leaving the door open, I'm just wondering about when to leave the dog with more freedom in the house? I still might have a couple of rooms with carpeting gated off initially until we build up enough trust. But that will come later.
Thanks in advance,
Blondie


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## Maggies mom

Every dog is different... Mine are still crated at ages 4,4,3,2. I actually could leave 2 out of the 4 out, but dont think its fair, so I dont.


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## AquaClaraCanines

Depends on the dog. Some at a few months, some never. Only my 12 year old Whippet has full run of my house when I'm gone, and when I am home, there is a gate keeping all but him (he can jump it with ease) out of the living room because they step on the baby (six months, crawling stage) and chew up his toys lol. This still gives them the big back bedroom where I sleep, the spacious game room, the hall, kitchen, etc, and they can watch us. Of course when baby is asleep for the night I take the gate down and they can play with daddy and whatever until I go to bed.


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## Merlins mom

Yep, it just depends on the dog. Merlin was crated at night until about 7 months old, but during the day I think it was around 11- 12 months at least before I really felt I could trust him. And I still baby-gated rooms off for a while. 

You have plenty of time to think about that once you get your puppy! Don't feel bad about crating. It helps with potty training and keeps them safe too, from getting into things they shouldn't and eating things they shouldn't. 

Good Luck and looking forward to pictures!


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## mdoats

Rookie is 2-1/2 and he still doesn't have free run of the house. He's only allowed upstairs very rarely and only when he's with me. At night, or if I'm not home, he is gated in the kitchen. He's probably ready for a bit more freedom, but I'm reluctant to mess with success.


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## Minnesota Rosie

Rosie is about 4 1/2 months old. She is mainly kept in the kitchen and family room. We only let her upstairs or in the basement if we are with her and able to watch her closely. If I'm going to be upstairs for more than a few minutes, I always put her in the crate. I'm not worried about her peeing on the floor...I'm mostly worried that she might chew or eat something that she shouldn't. She's a pretty good girl, though, and I feel like there will come a day that I can trust her to run free in the house. I'm not sure when that day will be here, but I think it'll happen sometime! That being said, I believe she truly enjoys her crate time. I never had to put her in the crate today, since we were all hanging out at home, watching football games. Still, she wandered in there for a couple naps. We left the crate door open, so she was free to leave whenever she wanted, but she stayed in there sleeping for an hour or so.


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## LizShort

All of my dogs, up till now, were never crate trained and had full run of the house from a very early age. Jake is crated. He has been left out of his crate for 20 minutes while I went to the store once. When I got back he was staring at the door with this look of abject horror on his face. Since then I haven't left him alone outside of his crate because, even though he fights going in, I have a feeling that he feels more secure in there. 

As for night time... he's a bed bug. He never ventures from the bed though. He also never leaves the same room I'm in when I'm home either. Could be a very big part of it


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## jwemt81

Like everyone else has said, it all depends on the dog and how much confidence you have that the dog will be fine outside of the crate. Tucker is 14 months old and he only recently starting sleeping outside of the crate at night. I work from home, so he has free access to the house all day. We used baby gates when he was younger. The only time he is really crated now is when we leave the house and don't take him with us. I'm not at all worried about him having accidents since he hasn't had a single accident in the house in almost a year, but he is a very curious dog and we don't feel 100% confident that he won't get into something that he's not supposed to when we're not home. It's for his own safety. Crate training is very, very effective. I couldn't imagine raising a puppy without it.


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## gammacara

My dog Winslow is 10 months and is crate trained. We are just now leaving him out of the crate (downstairs only) on short spurts. 1 hour was the longest. He did great. We are thining about leaving him all night but keep the crate door open if he wants to sleep in there.


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## Dreammom

All of my dogs have had free run of the house by 9 months. Layla is our challenge, she is 10 1/2 months and not at all trustworthy yet, she is by far the most destructive pup I have ever had... I think she may be in her crate forever LOL.
She is only crated at night, and when we are not home, otherwise she does have free run of the first floor.

The good news is she provides tons of comic relief around here, and we love her so much.


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## cinnamonteal

Caleb's about 1.5 and he has full run of the house when we're home. (Except sometimes we close the bedroom door because he likes to steal pillows off the bed.  I think around a year we let him have full access to the house. At night he sleeps in his crate with the door open. When we leave, he goes in the crate because he gets anxious when left home alone. He does fine in his crate and will usually just fall asleep.


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## fostermom

Jasper never could be crated. He actually injured himself trying to get out and that was the last time I tried to crate him.

Jasmine was crated until she was 1 1/2 or 2.

Danny finally graduated from the crate when he was 1 1/2. It was a slow process and I believe he was sleeping out of the crate at night for about 6 months prior to that. But he would eat the window sills, baseboards and chairs if he was left out when he was younger. Heck, he did it when we were home!


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## NuttinButGoldens

It depends on the dog.

Rusty was 5 years old when I bought my house, so he was ready to go.

Nikita took a Golden-Average 2.5 years.

Comet was quick. 2 years.

Dakota was my problem child. He took almost 4 years.

Gilmour - ????? He's only 9 months old, but from what I'm seeing he's going to be somewhere between Comet and Dakota. Possibly leaning more towards Dakota only due to his voracious appetite for chewing things.

I have a dog door, so the potty part isn't an issue. All of mine are based on chewing/destruction of household items.

And I must say, while he didn't work out here for other reasons, Rip, the Rescue I had for almost a month, had the absolute best house manners of any dog I've ever seen. He was only about 1.5 years old.


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## Kelli

Emma Rose is almost 8 months old and we have just started leaving her out of her crate for a few hours at a time when we aren't home. Fortuntately for us, she has never chewed on anything she isn't supposed to except her sleeping bed. 

We keep all bedroom and bathroom doors shut so really she only has access to the kitchen, hallway and the den.

Usually when I walk in the house she is curled up on the couch fast asleep.


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## little dakota

hi, i have a 4 month old golden named Dakota. we got him at about 7 weeks and for a while we didn't have a cage at all. Because of this he got very good without the cage early, but it was difficult too get him too like the cage once we started using one. 

Even now though i let him sleep outside of his cage and he does fine. While people are not home though he is a little stupid and will get into things he shouldn't such as shoes or the toilet paper roll. Ive already started trying too ween him off of the cage during the day though, while i shower i let him roam and he is usually very good(although i hear him and my 9 year old dog penny barking back and forth sometimes.).
At night though he is very good and will sleep till about 9 and when he gets up he wakes me up so it works out perfect.


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## Nicole74

Bailey has free run of the upstairs and she is 5 1/2 months. I only crate her if I leave somewhere during the day. Otherwise, if I don't crate her, she will go downstairs and eat the all cat food and most likely cat poop.

We just recently started let her sleep out of the crate at night. She is doing very well and she always tells us when she needs to relieve herself outside. She doesn't really destroy anything either. Maybe a toy here and there, especially if there are feathers attached to the toy.


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## iluvlucy

i would say 9 m also we felt lucy was trustworthy. when we come home now she is lounging on the bed wagging -such a rough life...... dogs are so funny & cute! : )


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## Mighty Casey and Samson's Mom

Casey is 2 1/2 and we use the "big crate" when we are at work during the day (baby gates, closed doors to the rooms where we do not want him to be.) He is fine in this area (kitchen, halls), but I would be hesitant to give him more freedom right now--when we have tried "trial runs" he has not passed!! Boys generally take longer than girls. Our female was OK at one. He is a good boy usually (Obedience trained, CD, RE guy) but does not like to be left alone. Whenever we are here, at night or holidays, he is fine. They are all different. Train the dog you have!


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## slip_kid

our guy is 6 months this saturday and only crated at night and when we leave work until 12pm when his grandma comes to feed and take him out. when she leaves, she puts up a large baby gate to keep him confined to our kitchen/dining room combo. today is the first day we told her to remove the big baby gate and let him have the small family room in back also (carpeted). he's done really welly the last 2 months with virtualy no accidents so we'll test him.

at night he can only come into the living room or upstairs with us. since he's not allowed on the couch in that room, he usually bails on us when we watch TV and goes back to his family room to nap on that couch.

came home last friday and didn't see him in the kitchen, i look into the family room and i can see a tail wagging over the back of the couch. homie then comes squeezeing back through the gate to say hi to me in the kitchen. he also got into the buffet and tore up some tissue papers from teh boxes in there, knocked over apotted plant on the table while trying to reach a new toy we put up there. so him finding a way to sneak into the family room isn't much of a surprise. funny stuff.


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## pine

Hi everyone. This is my first time on the forum, and this is the topic I wanted to discuss. Our puppy Lucia will be one year old next month. For the last two months, she's been allowed to spend the night outside of the crate, in our bedroom. That has been no problem (she's sleepy by then, plus the bedroom is pretty spartan; not much to chew on). 

However, we have yet to leave her free in a room/area of the house while we're away, and there are items in the other rooms that, at one time or another, she has chewed on or pulled down from their place. Sometimes she does it out of frustration (like if she wants a toy that she knocked out of reach under the couch, she bites the couch). Other times, she's doing it for my attention (and I've been learning how to correct her with the minimum attention or physical touch so that it isn't gratifying). 

The closest we've come to leaving her unattended in the house is taking a shower without crating her, and I've been pleasantly surprised that when I emerge from the bathroom, I find her laying in the living room, chilling out.

I'm thinking about slowly transitioning to leaving her in a living room/hallway area while we are away. It's not that I'm in a big hurry to do it, but I'm a little worried that if we wait too long, there'll come a point where, instead of just a natural transition, it will cause an unwarranted sense of temptation to get into trouble. The best comparison I can think of is if you have a teenager who is so tightly supervised and so forbidden from drinking that when he turns 21, he goes wild for a couple of years, whereas had he not felt like he was being controlled so heavily, he might not have desired it quite so much; it wouldn't be so tempting. So, first question: does that idea even make any sense? Do dogs do better handling more freedom if it happens gradually, naturally, and while they're still youngish? Will doing it younger increase the chances that she doesn't realize all the trouble she could be getting into, and just accepts it as down time?

Next question: Should I wait until I haven't seen her try to chew on or take anything she should't have when we're home before I even start the process of leaving her uncrated (which might not be for a while)? Or could it be that some of her naughty behavior, aimed at getting my attention, will not even come up when I'm not home because she knows she won't get attention for it?

Finally, when the time is finally right, what suggestions do you have for transitioning her? How long to start with? What precautions should we take? To what extent should we chew-proof that space (beyond what we've already done)? 

Sorry for such a long post, and thanks if you're still reading!!


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## Ranger

I was spoiled by my 2 childhood dogs never needing crates so when I got Ranger I didn't even think of him needing one. His foster mom even said he was so calm she was just crating him so he wasn't out unsupervised with her dog while she was away. So I brought ranger home and we hung out for 2 days before I had to leave him alone for 2 hours. I happily bid him goodbye and left...only to return 2 hours later to a destroyed house.

I was still in the process of moving into my new place and Ranger had destroyed all the cardboard boxes that I thought were out of reach. Tore through my swiffer cloths that were on the table and made it look like it had snowed. Tried pulling the table cloth off the kitchen table (luckily I had a picture leaning against the wall, so when he pulled it the picture fell and he stopped). His new dog bed dragged across the floor, couch cushions removed from the couches (but not damaged) and the weirdest - every insole of my shoes removed. Shoes were completely undamaged, except the insoles were gone. He had hid them all under the couch.

Next morning I ran out and bought a crate and that's where he's stayed ever since. I really thought he'd be fine without it since he never shows interest in ANYTHING when I'm there. I've never had to warn him once! But apparently all the rules are out the window when I'm gone.

I've gradually built up time and length of being away and him uncrated (but with a frozen kong). Yesterday though, i was at my parents' house and left him there by himself with nothing to occupy his mind/teeth. Came back an hour later and he hadn't done anything! Huge progress made in 8 months!

*Ranger was approx 9 months when he first went ballistic unsupervised in my house so I'd say I can pretty much trust him at 17 months. I'm jealous of my brother - he's been able to leave his puppy in the house unsupervised since he was 4 months!


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## pine

Wow, that does sound like huge progress - congrats! Thanks for your input. I'll try the frozen kong idea!


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## Sam Adams

Sam Adams had free run of the house around nine months. He went through a brief period of "digging up" the carpet and chewed my wallet and cash once. We used a spray on the carpet, I got smart where I left my wallet and Sam fears the white kitchen garbage bags. I couldn't imagine him not having free run of the house. I think he sleeps a lot when we're not home.


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## Goldylover2

Every dog is different. Some get into everything and some don't. My last golden was the best. We could leave her out in the house alone for hours before she turned a year old. My current golden is 17 months old and he is still crated. I put him in the spare bedroom for a couple of hours and he doesn't chew on anything. But he can't be trusted roaming the house while we are at work. It's not safe for him and he could destroy something that he shouldn't.


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## Sam Adams

As I read through some of the thread it did cross my mind "we got lucky" with Sam.


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## BuddyinFrance

I think I got reaaally lucky with Buddy too. He never had a crate. He slept in my room from the beginning. When he was younger we left him in the entrance hall when we went out and gradually left him run of the house. He is 10 months now and I can honestly say he has only ever torn up 1 thing and that was his wicker toy basket.
And I figured that that was my fault because he clearly thought it was part of his toys!! And he does have the odd crafty nibble on a flip flop now and again. But other than that he sticks to his own stuff. I once filmed him whilst I was out just out of curiousity! He was very boring.. he looked out the window for a while then just lay down and slept!!! I must say that he is only home alone for a couple of hours at a time, I have never tested him for an entire day! Good luck.

Just as a PS... He tends to have different toys in different rooms so when he wanders in he is happy to find his favourite "stuff"!


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## Rilelen

Abby is almost 8 months and she's had the run of the house since about 6 months, when her housetraining was really firm. Although everything goes in her mouth, she's not a big chewer - the one thing I don't trust her with is the kitty litter boxes, which are actually in a utility room that isn't accessible from the main part of the house. She will totally go to town on those given half a chance!

That said, if I'm going to be gone more than 4 hours, I usually hedge my bets - there's a hallway door that will close off the living room. I separate the cats into the back of the house, and Abby in the front if I think I'm going to be gone that long. So far, so good!


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## Anele

My guy is about to turn 9 months. He absolutely does not have the run of the house, even when we are home. The cats are too exciting, children's toys are meant to be destroyed, etc. He was not very destructive (with his own things) until recently. 

At night, he is crated because he likes to play Bother the Cat (cat sleeps on our bed) otherwise. If it weren't for the cat, he would have our bedroom. During the day when he can't be supervised, he gets the living room. When we are gone, we use an opened-up ex-pen as a gate and he gets the sunroom. (Has windows, a love seat, etc.) We have a camera set up so that we can check in with him while we are gone (and even talk to him if needed) but so far he just sleeps.


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## Susan: w/ Summit we climb

At 10 months, Jet is still crated when we're not around. At night, he's free and doesn't do any harm, but the daytime is another story. He's taking a long time to mature.


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## Brads035

My dog was around 5-6 months when I gave him full access to the kitchen and living room. Before that, I never crated him, but left him in the bathroom with a towel, lots of toys and things to chew (frozen stuffed Kong/bully stick/deer antler) during the day when I was out and at night. When I was home he was out in the rest of the apt with me. He got used to chewing 'his' things ~ which tasted better than my things, and one day I tested him over a weekend for a few hours in the living/room by himself, he did great, and I never looked back. I also started letting him sleep in the bed [he became a lot more affectionate after this and his nipping turned to mouthing and licks, and he is a real cuddle bug] and he's been free range ever since. Now he is 4 years old and I never worry about him making a mess, chewing my things, or having an accident. I just close the bedroom and bathroom door, give him a new treat/chewie each morning, and head to work. The dog walker comes at 1pm to take him to the park for 2 hours, and I get home around dinner to take him again to the park or a long walk. I think the trick is to keep them confined until they develop a habit of chewing appropriate things - the desire to chew doesn't really go away, so just make sure you give tasty chewies that they CAN have.


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