It must keep the dog contained without injury. Metal is better than wood. It does not have to be permanent.
The dog must be protected from the elements. A good dog house is a must.
The dog run is a very useful tool for allowing humans and dogs to share a suburban lifestyle. Most dog owners go through a painful period of adjustment when they bring a new dog home. If the dog is left to his own devices during the day, much damage can be done to the backyard landscape, furniture, tools, and toys. There is no telling which dogs will wreck the things we hold so dear, but the industrious working breeds and terriers are very likely to enjoy the large play area we have created in the backyard.
Note: The first idea we have to understand is dogs are not being destructive. Dogs and babies wreck things by playing with them and not understanding what their purpose is. We choose to put a dog in the backyard or house alone and expect it to understand which things it can play with and which it can't. This is absurd.
The best analogy for the dog owner to understand the correct use of a dog run is to compare it to a child's playpen. While parents may use a playpen for a variety of purposes, one purpose can be to teach a child which things are okay to play with. Children who are confined to a playpen can only interact with toys they are allowed to play with. When they are outside the playpen, they are being watched, hopefully, and taught which things they can hold, chew on, and throw. This use of a dog run is no different.
We teach dogs and children the same way for many things. Up until they learn to understand language, children learn basically the same way as dogs. Children and dogs are both corrected or stopped from doing incorrect behavior and shown the correct behavior (hopefully) and then praised for that behavior. This method can only be effective when the parent or dog owner is observing the behavior.
One difficulty we have when dealing with dogs is there physical ability. Children develop physically much more slowly than dogs. Babies don't have the physical strength to do as much damage as a six month old puppy, let alone the tools (teeth) to do so. Dog owners need to recognize these differences and deal with them in a manner that makes sense.
A dog run needs to have certain features:
It must keep the dog contained without injury. Metal is better than wood.
It does not have to be permanent.
The dog must be protected from the elements. A good dog house
is a must.
The dog must have room to move and relieve himself.
The run should be more square than long and skinny. Long runs encourage pacing.
It should be located in a private place, preferably on a hard surface.
Populate the dog run with about four toys. These should be different toys
with different purposes. Too many toys, as with children, encourage short
attention spans and lack of imagination. Toys might include:
- large ball (the size of a volleyball) that can be carried but not torn
up. Good for nosing and throwing.
- small ball (the size of a tennis ball) that can't be broken or torn up.
Good for chewing and throwing.
- pull toy that can be hung on the fence and can't be chewed and
swallowed. Good for exercise.
- rubber or nylon chew toys that can't be broken up and swallowed. Good
for chewing and exercising jaws.
The role of the run is to contain the dog whenever no one is home. The dog should be taken out of the run and be with the owner, either in the house or outside, as soon as possible after coming home. Have similar toys in the house for the dog to play with. Keep the toys in a box so the dog learns where the toys are. It doesn't take long for a dog to learn which things are his if he is shown the same toys each time he chews on the wrong thing.
The run can also be used when there are social gatherings at the house and it would not be practical to have the dog interact with the people. An example might be a wedding rehearsal dinner. There might be many people there that don't like dogs and have never been around this dog. The owner might be doing the cooking. There might be children that have no "dog manners" and will frighten the dog. In this type of situation, depending on the dog and it's social skills, it would be better to have the dog in a familiar place away from the crowd.