Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

On the surface, these look great. But there are two significant dangers that we discovered after using them for a only few days. We have two 10-week old puppies, so we bought two of these so the puppies could play independently with minimal supervision. Let me start by saying you must always be nearby and supervise your dog when in these pens. This is vital because of two design flaws, which requires you react quickly to help your dog if he/she gets caught in one of these flaws. The first danger occurs when one puppy was biting at the steel grid and turned his head sideways pushing his jaw through the grid opening. When he did this, his upper jaw got stuck because his teeth were hooked and he wasn't smart enough to know he needed to turn his head again to get free. He started yelping and pulling. Fortunately I was near by and ran to his rescue and freed him. The second danger occurred when the puppies started standing on their hind-legs putting their front paws on the top rim. At each intersection where the panels are joined, at the top where the edges are slightly rounded, these areas act like a funnel, and the puppies paws slide down with gravity and their pawing. As their paw slides down into this funnel-like junction, there is just enough gap in-between the panels that their paws can squish into the small gap. When this happens, the small gap, combined with the rods that hold the panels together, clamp down on the paws, and the puppies cannot free themselves. The more they pull trying to get free, the worse their paw is trapped. The only way to free them is to lift the puppy and slide their paw up and out. It is impossible for the puppy to free their paw on their own because they are pulling down making the problem worse. In my view, this is the most serious danger. If they are left trapped like this for even a minute, as they squirm and pull trying to get free, they could do serious damage to their leg or paw. To help avoid this problem, I used heavy-duty plastic tie-wraps at the top of every panel joint, so the paws cannot slide down into the gap. This isn't perfect, but helps.