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Greyhounds are a deceptive breed. Sure, they’re famous for being almost as fast as lightning – but I’m going to let you into a little secret now. Behind closed doors, the Greyhound is actually a very laid back, relaxed dog. And it likes to sleep – a lot! In fact, the average Greyhound typically likes to sleep for up to 18 hours a day!
The Greyhound likes to visit the land of nod so often that they must have got the perfect place to rest. So if you want to create the coziest, most comfortable environment possible for your Greyhound to sleep, then the best crate for Greyhounds might just be the thing for you.
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What Size Crate do Greyhounds Need?
Getting the right crate is really important. Whether you’re planning to buy a Greyhound puppy or looking to adopt an older retired racing Greyhound, the best advice is always to buy a high quality, heavy-duty crate that can house your Greyhound once it’s fully grown.
But it’s not just your Greyhound that needs to be able to fit in the crate. You’ll want a crate that also has ample space for a dog bed, dog food, and water bowls – and a few play toys and dog chews as well!
Now, Greyhounds are large dogs. According to the American Kennel Club, a male Greyhound will measure between 28 and 30 inches tall when fully grown and will weigh approximately 65 to 70 pounds.
Female Greyhounds, on the other hand, will grow to an average height of between 27 and 28 inches and will weigh around 60 to 65 pounds.
When making the final decision on your dog crate, it’s essential that your Greyhound can stand, sit, lay, and move around easily without a struggle.
Top Tips when Choosing a Crate for your Greyhound
- Suppose you’re planning to adopt an older Greyhound. In that case, chances are you’ll be meeting your new family member before bringing them home. This means you’ll get the opportunity to size up your pooch in advance. If you can, measure your Greyhound’s height (while sitting and standing) to find out their maximum height. While you’re at it, measure the length of your Greyhound as well
- If you’re in the market for a crate for a Greyhound puppy, however, you obviously can’t foresee just how large he or she will eventually grow. This is where your dog breeder comes in. If you can, politely ask your breeder if they would be willing to measure your pup’s parents. After all, just like us humans, dogs also take after their parents. If you can get your hands on the height and length of your pup’s parents, that should give you a pretty good idea as to what size crate to buy for your new puppy
- For the most part, dog crates come in three sizes – small, medium, and large. When you’ve got your Greyhound measurements (or their parents), add a minimum of two to four inches to each of your measurements. Once you’ve done the math, these are the final crate sizes you should be looking at. If you find that your Greyhound’s measurements fall in between two different crate sizes, it’s always a good idea to round up and buy the larger of the two crates. The last thing you want is for your Greyhound to feel cramped or squashed in a crate that isn’t quite big enough
- When it comes to puppies, if you’re buying a crate with the future in mind, pretty much any crate you buy is going to be too big for the first few months of your Greyhound’s life. But don’t worry. There are lots of ways to retrofit your dog crate so that your puppy feels safe and snug in those early days. Dog crate dividers are a great idea, and they come in a range of different sizes, depending on your needs
Best Crate for Greyhounds
There are many great options to choose from for anyone looking to buy a dog crate for their Greyhound. And if you’re unsure of the best dog crate to buy for your Greyhound, our buying guide might be able to help you select the perfect product for your pooch.
Best Wire Crate for Greyhounds
MidWest iCrate Fold & Carry Double Door Collapsible Wire Dog Crate
Available in six different sizes ranging from extra small to extra large, the MidWest iCrate could be the perfect wire crate for your Greyhound. It comes with an innovative fold and carry design fully equipped with carry handles and rubber rolling feet. It’s just as easy to take this crate with you on your travels as it is to move in and around your home. And with fitted slide-bolt latches, you can have complete peace of mind that your Greyhound is safe and secure in its crate.
Frisco Heavy Duty Fold & Carry Single Door Collapsible Wire Dog Crate
Also available in six size options ranging from extra small to extra large, the Frisco Heavy Duty Dog Crate could be the ideal option for your Greyhound. The thicker wiring and secure dual latch door lock are the newest security features for this Frisco Heavy Duty model, but with its easily collapsible design, this crate is quick and easy to assemble at home and just as simple to disassemble when you need to pack it up and take it with you on your travels.
Best Furniture Crate for Greyhounds
Merry Products Double Door Furniture Style Dog Crate
If you’re looking for a modern dog crate where your Greyhound can sleep in style, then the Merry Furniture Style Dog Crate is the one for you. With a stunning mahogany wooden frame and available in four different sizes, this crate serves perfectly as both a safe and secure sanctuary for your Greyhound and a really classy coffee table.
Best Soft Sided Crate for Greyhounds
MidWest Canine Camper Single Door Collapsible Soft-Sided Dog Crate
Available in four sizes, the MidWest Canine Camper Sportable Tent Dog Crate is perfect for families and dogs who love the great outdoors. With an innovative tent-like steel frame design that comes fully equipped with a super comfy sheepskin bed pad, this really is the perfect crate for the adventurous pooch!
Best Exercise Crate for Greyhounds
Bundle: Frisco Heavy Duty Fold & Carry Double Door Collapsible Wire Dog Crate, 48-in + Wire Exercise Pen with Step-Through Door, Black
If you’re in the market for a product that gives your dog the best of both worlds, then look no further than the Frisco Heavy Duty Dog Crate and Step-Through Exercise Pen Bundle. And coming complete with metal anchors, this is an excellent option if you want to spend time with your Greyhound outdoors.
Do Greyhounds like Crates?
Every dog is different. They have their own individual personality, and what one dog might like, another might not. And the same rule applies to Greyhounds.
So while it’s impossible to say for sure whether or not every Greyhound likes a crate, a better question to ask might be: how can I make sure my Greyhound likes its crate?
That’s an entirely different question, and the good news is that there are many things you can personally do to make sure your Greyhound falls in love with its new crate.
You may be wondering if Greyhounds are good pets or not. Why not have a read and find out?
Here are a few tried and tested techniques that you might find helpful:
Don’t Force Them
When it comes to crate training any dog breed, the biggest mistake you can make is trying to rush. If you try to force a crate on a Greyhound without proper and gradual training, it won’t end well.
The entire process has to be done in bite-sized chunks and at a pace, that’s comfortable for your Greyhound. You must allow your dog to become familiar with its crate and give it the time needed to make those all-important positive associations. The best approach you can take towards crate training is to be patient with your dog. Trust me, your patience will be paid off in the long run.
Make it a Reward, Not a Punishment
Your dog must make a positive association with its crate from day one. That means helping your dog to recognize early on that this is their very own space, and it’s safe, secure, calm, and comfortable.
As you gradually introduce your Greyhound to its new den, make sure you have plenty of treats and fun toys to hand. This is so that you can reward your dog and praise them as they start to investigate and explore their new space.
Remember that you Can Have too Much of a Good Thing
With lots of positive reinforcement, your Greyhound will come to accept their new crate as their refuge. And that’s great. But don’t fall into the trap of defaulting to the crate at every given opportunity.
As much as your dog will love regular opportunities to sneak off for a quiet snooze in its den, they should never feel like a caged animal. Whenever it’s safe to do so, always leave the crate door open. That way, your Greyhound can come and go freely as they please. Unless there’s a genuine need to close the crate door, it should be kept open at all times.
Make sure your Greyhound is Never out of Sight, out of Mind
Dogs are, above all else, social animals. In particular, the Greyhound is an incredibly soft dog who loves nothing more than to be with its pack.
But a Greyhound that is confined to its crate for hours on end, without regular contact with its humans, will not be a happy dog. Such treatment, in fact, would likely result in a very anxious dog.
Your Greyhound should never feel trapped in their crate or like they are being separated from the rest of the family. By placing your dog’s crate in, or close to, the main living area of your home, your Greyhound will have the best of both worlds.
Why Should You Crate Train a Greyhound?
There are lots of good reasons why you should crate train your Greyhound. The best way to summarise those reasons is by putting them into three main categories:
REASON 1 – It’s Practical
As you slowly introduce your Greyhound to its new crate, it won’t be long until it starts to make positive associations that this is a safe space. Your Greyhound will quickly realize that this is a comfortable and quiet space where it can sleep, eat, or relax.
And that’s a significant factor when it comes to the matter of toilet training your Greyhound. You see, a dog is a clean, domesticated animal. And one thing your dog certainly won’t want – if they can help it – is to do its business in its sleeping space.
If you use the crate as part of your house training routine, it not only helps to limit the number of accidents your Greyhound might have during those early days and weeks. But it also helps your Greyhound learn that when it’s inside the home, that’s not the time or place to toilet.
Another significant practicality of crate training is that it limits or minimizes the potential for destructive behavior. It doesn’t matter whether you’re introducing a puppy or a more mature Greyhound into your home. There is always a chance that your dog might chew or destroy shoes, sofas, or other household items as it learns to settle in its new environment.
And that’s where a dog crate comes in. Destructive behavior can occur due to your dog ‘testing the water’ while it learns the house rules. It can also be a sign of separation anxiety.
Either way, crate training can be an absolute godsend in both scenarios. If done slowly and positive, crate training will help to keep your Greyhound calm and help to reduce any feelings of anxiety. And when your dog is calm and relaxed, it’ll have no desire to chew, bite or destroy.
REASON 2 – It’s Safe
Have you ever met a dog that didn’t love human food? I thought not. Whenever food is being cooked, a dog will always follow its nose until it finds where the delicious smells are coming from.
In the home, that’s inevitably going to mean that your Greyhound ends up in the kitchen and under your feet as you try to cook. Needless to say, that could be dangerous for both you and your dog. But with a crate, you don’t have to worry because it provides you with a safe solution for you and your dog.
But it’s not just food that a dog is particularly good at locating. While you might think you’ve dog-proofed your house and made it as safe as possible in preparation for the new arrival, a dog will always be able to find and cause mischief if given the opportunity.
A crate helps to avoid that by removing the opportunity altogether. That means if you need to turn your back for a few minutes – say, to go to the bathroom, for example – you can do so safe in the knowledge that your pup is safe from harm while your back is turned.
The last major safety benefit of crate training your dog relates to travel. Many owners travel with their pets, and a crate can be ideal for traveling – assuming it fits in your vehicle, that is!
Crating your greyhound while you’re on the move provides that extra safety measure for your pup. It can also be a great way to keep your dog calm if it’s not the biggest fan of traveling. Your dog’s crate is its sanctuary. The familiarity of a crate can help ease your dog’s nerves and help them settle on those longer journeys.
REASON 3 – It’s natural
If you’ve owned dogs in the past – or visited family or friends with dogs – you might have noticed something about where they chose to sleep. For example, have you ever seen a dog sleeping under the kitchen table? Perhaps a dog you know likes to catch forty winks under the desk in your home office. Or maybe you’ve witnessed a pup nodding off underneath a floor-length curtain.
Does any of this sound familiar? This isn’t strange or quirky behavior, far from it. As it happens, it’s a display of perfectly natural behavior. And it all stems back to those days, hundreds of years ago when dogs were wild.
Dogs not only had to live in the wild – they had to survive in the wild. When it came to sleeping, wild dogs would seek out the safest place they could find. And more often than not, that place would be a den – or something that looked and felt a lot like a den.
But why a den?
Think about it for a second. A den has one entrance and one exit. That means there’s only one way to get in and one way to get out. For a dog, a den was by far the safest and secure place to sleep.
Even though the modern dog has evolved a great deal since its wild ancestors’ days, seeking out a safe place to sleep is just part of a dog’s natural behavior. An instinct, if you like.
And that’s where a crate comes in. In every way possible, a crate resembles a den. It has four secure ‘walls’. It has one entrance and one exit. And it’s a relatively small space where your dog can curl up and go to sleep.
Using a dog crate isn’t cruel. In fact, by introducing a crate, you are providing your dog with an environment where it will feel calm, safe, and secure.
As you can see from the list above, there are many good reasons to crate train your Greyhound. There’s always going to be an adjustment period, which could be a matter of days or weeks until your Greyhound is fully settled and confident in its new crate. But once your Greyhound accepts its new crate, it’ll be a match made in heaven.
How Long Can You Crate a Greyhound?
The subject of crating has been the source of much debate and controversy for many years. And when it comes to crating our dogs, there are two general schools of thought. On the one hand, there’s the belief that dog crating is cruel and inhumane. Individuals signing up to this school of thought believe that dogs were put on this earth to roam free – and that includes when they are in the home.
On the other hand, there’s a negative belief that crating dogs actually replicates a dog’s more natural instincts as a den seeking animal. This group also believes that crates play a vital role in building train dogs and keeping them safe from harm.
And if there’s one single dog breed that really fuels the fire around this particular debate, it’s Greyhounds. But why?
Many Greyhounds are bred for the sole purpose of racing. And unfortunately, for many Greyhounds, that means spending the vast majority of their life being locked in a crate in between races.
There’s no doubt that many racing Greyhounds around the world do face mistreatment – and that’s why the sport is well on its way to being completely banned across the United States.
However, I think we can all agree that when we’re talking about a loving and responsible family that’s looking to either raise a Greyhound puppy or adopt a retired racing Greyhound, the potential for mistreatment simply disappears.
With that in mind, the question ‘how long can you crate a Greyhound?’ is one of the practicalities. No responsible dog owner wants their pet to suffer, and that’s why they will ask this very question.
So how long can you crate a Greyhound – or any dog, for that matter?
If – and only if – you Greyhound is properly trained, then you could feasibly leave an adult Greyhound crated for up to a maximum of eight hours. Of course, suppose your Greyhound must be left crated for this length of time. In that case, you must ensure that your dog is properly exercised and fed and has had plenty of opportunities to do their business before they are left to settle in their crate. It’s also vital that in such circumstances, your dog has easy access to water.
Puppies, however, should never be left alone for that length of time. Aside from the fact that it’s just not safe, your puppy just can’t hold their tiny little bladder for that long.
If you need to leave a puppy alone, the generally accepted time period that they can be left in a crate is one hour per month of their age. So, if your puppy is four months old, they could be crated for up to four hours.
All of that said, it’s recommended that wherever possible, your Greyhound isn’t left alone locked in its crate. We know sometimes there’s little choice but to leave your Greyhound alone in its crate – and in those instances, crating your dog is often the safest choice. But if you can avoid having to leave your dog crated for a substantial length of time by finding another practical alternative, that’s always our preferred course of action.
The Verdict
As you can probably tell from our buying guide, there are almost an endless amount of options available on today’s market when it comes to buying that perfect dog crate for your Greyhound. And don’t get me wrong – any of the five dog crates we’ve reviewed would be a great purchase and great value for money.
But it’s decision time…
If you’re looking for a multi-purpose crate, that’s not only safe, secure, and sturdy, but that’s also easily portable while providing a calm, comfortable and cozy haven for your Greyhound. Our winner is the MidWest Canine Camper Single Door Collapsible Soft-Sided Dog Crate.
This dog crate really does give you the best of all worlds. Use it indoors, use it outdoors. Take it with you when you go on vacation. Clean it with ease as and when you need to. But most importantly, create a wonderfully calm and peaceful environment, inside or out, and be safe in the knowledge that your Greyhound is secure, comfortable, and, most importantly, happy.
If you’re wondering how best to look after your Greyhound’s coat, why not read our article on the best shampoo for Greyhounds?
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