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I have a 2 month old puppy and I will have to leave her alone while I'm at work, for about 9-10 hours, I don't want to leave her in a crate all that time, even though she is in the crate by the bad while I am sleeping, and doesn't have any accidents at night, she is not yet potty trained. I am thinking of leaving her outside, I have a decent size yard. Or I can keep her in a closed off corner in that house. Heat is also a problem, since it can get up to +30C around here, but the yard has shade all over.

I am trying to find someone who can keep her company for at least an hour.

Update:

I tried putting her in a fenced off corner with toys food and water, and even if I'm sitting near her, she start crying, if I leave the house for 5 minutes and the volume of her cries are enough to upset the neighbors.

I'll take her to work with me tomorrow, I take a smoke break every 2 hours so I might get some potty training.

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  • I would not recommend to let her alone in the garden. If there is walk-by traffic she would start bad behavior fast, because she want ro interact with the people walking by and will bark to get their attention Jan 20, 2021 at 10:32
  • two months is around 8 weeks, and that is the MINIMUM amount of time appropriate for removing a dog from its mother, usually its 12 weeks. Could this be the cause of her separation anxiety? Perhaps Doggie Daycare is a good choice? Sep 15, 2021 at 14:36

3 Answers 3

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Have you considered taking her to a local puppy/dog daycare? Considering she is only 8 weeks old, I am assuming you just recently got her (within a week??). She is likely exhibiting completely normal adjustment behavior to her new home. It's probably not so much the amount of time away right now but rather any time away that is going to upset her. With 9-10 hours away and 6-8 hours asleep, that's a long time being kenneled in a single day. I would be worried long term that you'd start to see negative behavior issues from this situation.

So, my answer would be to get in touch with a local dog daycare or local dog watching/visiting service that can come by and visit your pup every day and play with her for a while. The latter being a better option since she has not had all her immunization shots yet and probably isn't ready for a dog daycare at this age.

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Leaving your dog alone for that long at two months is not recommended. You should only leave your dog alone for their age in months * 1 hour (2 months = 2 hours). Once they are full grown, you should avoid leaving them alone for more than eight hours.

You should definitely get a dog sitter/walker to play with her for an hour at least twice while you are at work. She will likely suffer from major separation anxiety over time if you keep her alone for that long this early in her life. At that age, she need lots of socialization.

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I was in a similar situation with a young puppy at work. If you’re still working on potty training, you might find it helpful to use an app like Wagaruffin to log her activity and then it will predict / notify you before the next time she needs to go out. That might make it a bit easier to focus on work while avoiding accidents.

Disclosure: I helped to build Wagaruffin

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