Nothing major, but could have been. Caution to those who use fold-down wire crates....

Came home today, had left LJ in crate about 5 hours. He behaves wonderfully in the crate, goes in willingly, sleeps in it when door is open, eats in it, and -- I thought -- never tried to get out. WRONG.

As I turned the key to the front door I heard LJ barking on the other side. He was out of his crate. Somehow, he had pushed, pulled, scratched and tugged at the back of his crate until he got enough room to squeeze through. It's a fold-down crate with hooks of sorts to keep the back straight up and in place. It now has plastic ties on it as well, three on each corner, to keep it in place.

I found two poop piles and a bit of pee, but that's it. Nothing destroyed, thank goodness. Have no idea how long he was out, but it could have been much, much worse!

You were very lucky 2 x poops, so he must have been out for quite a few hours, probably escaped just after you left.

All that time and nothing missing or wrecked, how old is he?

Probably exhausted after the stress of the escape.

Guessing about 13 wks old now, he's a rescue. Had him 7 wks or so. He has spent a lot of time out of the crate, but tethered, or loose after exercise when he is tired. Fortunately, the baby gate was up in the hallway to keep him from going into the kids' rooms, or there probably would have been more surprises. His bucket of toys was pulled off the chair where it stays and was overturned, his stuff was scattered, but that's it. I must point out, he is a bit on the lazy side, too.

Needless to say, we have reinforced the crate.

Max has done that several times to his crate. We now can't keep him in it no matter how we tie the corners. He seems to be able to get out through the smallest space and obviously thrashes around enough to move the whole thing about.

Instead we have a spare room that has become his 'crate'. He doesn't go to the toilet in the house so it's safe, and there's nothing to destroy except carpet and walls. Fingers crossed he doesn't decide they're yummy. We just use his crate as a place to feed him now.

It seems to work for him much better than being in the crate.

My foster that I ended up keeping did the same thing. He now has the back zip tied. My other dog has figured out how to slide open the bottom latch and squeeze out and has decided to make it a regular affair in the morning when he's ready to get up and come out. Jerk! We now have a series of zip ties and snaps.

Try one of the plastic airline crates. My dog made short work of her wire crate and left the floor tray in a million pieces (she actually pulled all the wires apart). In the plastic ones there's nothing for them to really pry at because the sides are mostly smooth. The doors are usually more heavy duty also.

I can't help but wonder if he did this because he really, really needed to potty??

Barbara, he did do it just because of that, I'm certain. When I examined his very thick pad, he had pottied on it, and it was runny poop, NOT normal. Two of the piles (we found one more later) in the house were runny, but the third was normal. Don't know what he got into that upset his tummy, but he was desperate, poor thing!

I replaced the pad with an old afghan since I've got to wash the pad, and yesterday the afghan was arranged so I could tell he hadn't scratched and clawed at the crate as I was afraid he would. He was only in it about two hours yesterday. He still sleeps very well in the crate, and goes to it at bedtime.

Our hallway has vinyl flooring and is extra wide, pretty long. I'm planning to use that as a confinement area later, just close the bedroom/bathroom doors and he'll have much more room.

The other posts have made me question the safety of the wire crates. I was using a plastic airline crate but just thought the more openness would be better. But for long stays in the crate, the plastic may just be safer.

I always have had trouble with the wire ones. I have had dogs pull things in through the wires, things that seemed impossibly far and out of reach.

I have had dogs open the latch. (my sis knew someone who had to padlock their pointer in and TAKE THE KEY OUT OF THE LOCK or he would escape)

I have had dogs shake them apart....especially our Bullmastiff bitch Lunk....she was like an earthquake!

Then there is the whole issue that the wire ones are harder to make into end tables.......

LOL the part about the end table... actually, we did. My dad cut a piece of formica countertop to extend about a half inch beyond the edges, and I covered with a cheap summertime tablecloth cut to just hang over the edge -- as you said, the dogs can pull amazing things into the crate!

I haven't thought about the shaking the crate part, we have some cute things sitting on top that would break.

I *think* our escapee was just desperate, and maybe this will be a one-time event. I've never seen him try to escape, and he doesn't fuss, so we'll see.

Thanks for the hint about the shaking crate!