Hi, It's my first post here. I'm Dana from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. I have a beautiful 12 week old male Border Collie/Samoyed named Koda. My husband (Mike) and I are going to Vancouver, BC in just over 1 week and, of course, we are bringing Koda with us. We have a kennel for him, which he sleeps and eats in already. I have been using the Leerburg method to crate train him, it seems to be going ok. Not great, but ok. He's a stubborn puppy!

So in just over one week we have a 12 hour drive ahead of us. It will probably take 15 or 16 hours with the dog (stopping every 2-3 hours). Ever since we have gotten Koda (4 weeks ago) we have been taking him for car rides at least 2 times a week. We thought that maybe he would get used to the car. Well he hasn't. He hates it. He screams from the minute we leave the house until the minute we get back. He is fine beside the car, and walking around the car. He is even fine sitting and playing in the car. but once it starts moving, he starts yelping! Mike and I have come to the conclusion that we are just going to have to hear him scream for 15 hours! My question is.... is car training like crate training? Do we have to just let him cry and he will EVENTUALLY stop? Or should we comfort him once in a while? I think we should only acknowledge Koda when he is back there and quiet, telling him he is a good puppy, petting him and giving him a treat. On the other hand, Mike thinks it's best to try and pet and console him the whole time. Does anyone have any advice? It would be GREATLY appreciated!

I dont know what the "proper technique" for this would be, but if it were my own dog, I'd try to find something "fun" to associate the car with - I wouldn't pet the dog n console him because, to me, that is telling the dog that his behavior of fearing the car is the correct behavior. But I would let him "find" his favorite toy in the car, "find" a hotdog between the seats, anything the dog enjoys, he thinks "oh cool the car, if I look around I'll find my toys", ofcourse - my dog gets very excited about looking for stuff which is why I would do it that way. Also if your dog is whining - handing a piece of hotdog over at the wrong time will just re-inforce the behavior, I think letting the dog find it himself won't associate the toy with the action, but I could be wrong.

Ofcourse, if he's like my dog, he will ignore toys once the car is moving, I can shove pieces of hotdog in my dogs mouth while we're in the car n he'll just spit it out, but the second we stop and he's out of the car he's harassing me for his hotdog, go figure.

I'd be interested in seeing how other people would handle this situation.