dancairo, you're still not getting it. Crate training is only a fancy name or 'method' for what we've been doing for years, responding to a young dog's liking for enclosed dens.The word 'crate' seems to alarm people like you, as though the pup is in some battery hen cage but worse, but there's really nothing new in the principle
. There's no reason why the owner shouldn't choose a suitable space. If I left my lot to themselves they'd find somewhere in the two hundred acres of farm which might suit them but would be a mite inconvenient for me! House or farm makes no difference. A place convenient to the owner and suited to the dog is just as good as some random place the dog chooses, on a whim, which is inconvenient to the owner.Who makes the decisions about a youngster in a home?The baby? A toddler? Its parents?
My pup is not going under a bed because he's 'afraid' . He's doing it because, like all pups, he likes confined space and he found that one, but he'll just as readily find some other.That one is amusing. He's a daft devil because he hasn't noticed how fast he's growing.He's all right if he can make it past the edge,but he's finding that harder and may get stuck ! Since you ask, I've just the one and he's an Irish wolfhound, the only pup here out of nine adults.. I didn't breed him, though we've bred dozens and dozens of pups ,not wolfhounds, over the last 50 years ( I am beginning to suspect that I'm getting some idea about what pups and dogs like and need, which hasn't changed in my lifetime)
As to leaving a youngster, it does help to leave the radio on so there's an impression of normality, but the key is to take the absences in stages, a bit more at a time, starting with short absences. And act normally when you return, without making an exceptional, big, fuss, so the dog thinks that everything is normal.