Dog Bed

Dogs are honest about beds. They use a good one every night and quietly stop using a bad one, and the thing that turns the first into the second is almost always the middle going flat.

Polyester packs down where your dog lies and stays packed. The foam under it dents where the weight sits. We fill this bed with wool or with tree-tapped latex. Wool is crimped along its whole length, so it compresses under a dog and comes up around the shoulder and the hip. Latex is shredded from rubber that was poured slowly in small batches. Either way the fill is loose rather than bonded, which means the bed opens and you can add to it, and no dog bed that opens is ever finished.

The cover comes off and goes in the machine. That matters more than anything else on this page, because dogs are wet, shedding animals, and a bed you cannot wash becomes a bed you throw out. The waterproof cover stops a spill at the surface so it never reaches the material underneath.

Six sizes run from a cat-sized 21 by 14 up to 54 by 36, which takes a Great Dane. Measure your dog nose to the base of the tail and add six inches. Made by hand in a New Jersey workshop that has been making bedding since 1981.

Wool wraps. Latex lifts.

Wool takes the shape of the dog on it. Your dog sinks in and the material comes up around the shoulder and the hip. That is the whole mechanism behind pressure relief. The weight spreads across the side of the dog instead of resting on the two or three bony points that touch first. So wool is the one for a thin dog, an old dog, or a dog with sharp hips. It is fine merino. It handles damp better than cotton or polyester, and independent testing has it developing less odour than either over four weeks.

Latex is the firmer of the two in the hand, and it is the one for a dog who flops down hard and wants something solid under them rather than something that gives. It is also the one for a house that keeps no animal fibre, because it is tapped from living rubber trees and there is no wool in it. It is shredded from rubber poured slowly in small batches, then washed after vulcanising to take out residual proteins, soaps and curing agents.

Skip the latex if your dog chews bedding. The pieces are already the size a dog can swallow, and rubber will not show up on an X-ray.

Neither of these is a cooling bed. Both materials insulate. That is what you want for most of the year, and it is not what a dog wants in August. A dog who gets up to lie on the tile is doing the sensible thing.

The size is the part people get wrong.

Measure before you order. Take your dog from the tip of the nose to the base of the tail, then add six inches. A dog who curls into a comma can go down a size. A dog who sleeps flat out on one side with the legs extended should go up. The three largest sizes are built six inches thick rather than four. A big dog on four inches reaches the floor through it, and the depth is what lets your dog sink in without getting there.

Small 21x14x4 fits a dog up to 15 inches, roughly 12 lb, in an 18 to 24 inch crate. Chihuahua, Yorkie, Pomeranian, Maltese, Toy Poodle, cats, any puppy.
Medium 28x21x4 fits up to 22 inches, 12 to 30 lb, 30 inch crate. French Bulldog, Boston Terrier, Pug, Cavalier, Mini Schnauzer, Jack Russell, Dachshund.
Large 36x24x4 fits up to 30 inches, 30 to 55 lb, 36 inch crate. Beagle, Cocker Spaniel, English Bulldog, Corgi, Shiba Inu, Cattle Dog, Springer.
X-Large 40x27x6 fits up to 34 inches, 55 to 80 lb, 42 inch crate. Labrador, Golden Retriever, Australian Shepherd, Border Collie, Boxer, Standard Poodle, Husky.
XX-Large 48x30x6 fits up to 42 inches, 80 to 110 lb, 48 inch crate. German Shepherd, Rottweiler, Doberman, Bernese, Malamute, Great Pyrenees.
Giant 54x36x6 fits up to 48 inches, 110 lb and up, 54 inch crate. Great Dane, Mastiff, Newfoundland, Saint Bernard, Irish Wolfhound, Cane Corso.

If your dog is bigger than the Giant, write to us. We will build it to their measurements.

The cover is the whole hygiene system.

Neither wool nor latex belongs in a washing machine. Agitation tears shredded latex apart and heat degrades the rubber. Wool felts into a mat you cannot undo.

So the cover does the work. It unzips along the short end and comes off in one piece. Wash it cold, and put it back on damp, which is far easier than dry. Keep a second cover and you never lose a night to laundry.