By Mary Jane Anderson

“Is your dog comfortable being in the crate in the car?”

This is a common question that is asked by many people. Well, my dogs never complain and are always happy to jump into the crate to take a ride. However, the main purpose to crating your dog is for safety for both you and your dog.

I used to travel with two or three German Shepherds at a time. Two or three dogs can be a problem while you are driving. Dogs are always in competition between each other, the same as small children. If one dog sees something and barks, the others join in to bark a little louder. One day, one of my dogs saw something and jumped from the back seat to the front seat looking out my side window. Luckily, I saw him coming and was able to stop to get control of the situation. But that experience convinced me that I should use a crate.

When a dog is loose in the car you never know when he might dash from side to side looking out the windows or jump back and forth from the back seat to the front seat interfering with your driving. Any unrestrained dog could cause an accident.

You may say that you do not worry about your dog riding free in the car. He just sits in the back seat looking out the window or lies down and sleeps. But, there can always be an exception to the rule. Your dog could cause an accident.

Even though there are disadvantages to restricting the dog with a harness connected to a seatbelt or a crate, the dog is safer than loose in the car. Douglas Fakkema of the Santa Cruz SPCA says, “Unrestrained dogs turn up with a lot of head trauma, lacerations, and bruises if the dog is in the car when it is involved in an accident. The crated or harnessed dog is less likely to suffer injuries.”

That critical statement for crating your dog in the car came to me one beautiful day driving in the country. I was coming to a stop at an intersection when suddenly a small pickup truck sped around the corner; a large metal table flew out of the truck and bounced across the road in my path. The table hit my rear fender with a loud crash. Amy, my German Shepherd, was in the crate and received a good jolt but nothing else. If she had been loose in the car, she could have been thrown around in the back with possible head injuries. Being confined, like we are with our safety belts, she was uninjured.

The worst place for an unrestrained dog is riding in the back of a pickup truck. If the truck is involved in an accident, the dog could easily be thrown out in a crash and be hit by another car or thrown out injured but not seen by the rescue workers. At this time the Humane Society is lobbying in California and Massachusetts Legislature to make it unlawful for dogs to ride in the back of a truck.

There are many car and truck safety devices on the market to restrain your dog for a safe ride. However, if you buy an ordinary harness and run it through the existing car seatbelt, it will work fine. If you decide to crate your dog, the wire crate should be large enough to allow your dog to stand, turn, and lie down. Clip the leash to the outside of the crate; the leash will be in easy reach if you or someone must take your dog out of the crate in an emergency.

Either way, the dog can look out the windows, as well as having good ventilation with the windows completely open. The dog is unable to jump out or have its head out the window, which can cause infection for the eyes, ears, and nose from particles of dust in the air.

If you housetrain your puppy with a crate, the dog will accept the crate as his special place. Putting the crate into the car for traveling will not present any problem; the dog just jumps in without a second thought.