Shilo hates her crate

Wow sweet, that's a tough one! She's a big girl! The only thing you can do is try to train her to sit and stay and then feed her. (Like I'm sure you haven't tried this)lol. Next choice is maybe putting her in another room away from the family instead of the crate where you won't hear her as much. No, that won't work. Maybe there's some kind of obedience training stuff online that you can check out. How long have you had her and how old is she? Crating her is only going to upset her and all of you and risk hurting the family because she's so big and strong and it seems pointless anyway. It's a really tough thing to deal with. I had a dog that did the same thing only he was alot smaller. We'd end up feeding him and he would still keep coming back so that really wasn't an answer to the problem. I think it's pretty much a mute point. I hope there's some way that you can do something about the situation. Like I said, check out the sites online to see if maybe one of the pet sites has any ideas about a problem like this. They probably do.

I read the paragraph on temperament on this page: http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/akita.htm Anything there ring a bell? Handsome dogs, aren't they?

Do you have a room of your house that she won't destroy? Do you have a garage that is not too uncomfortable? If it's just for an hour or so while you are eating, put her into the garage! It will be a lot safer than trying to load her into a little crate (well little when compared to a large door) also, if the garage or room is located away from the eating area, her hours won't be so loud. Also, try looking into obedience school.

You didn't mention if you have a yard. If you do you could put her outside while you are eating. I had a dog years ago that was not allowed in the dining room while we were eating. He would lay at the kitchen door and watch us. It sounds like your dog needs to go to obedience school. Other than that there is no ways that I can think of that would be good to help train her to behave herself at meal times.

Do you go to any obedience classes with her? If not you should really look into positive reward-based training classes. The more training she gets the easier it will be for you to manage her when she is an adult. As you said, she's a big girl. You can't have a 70+ pound dog that will not get off when you say so. As for the crate, forcing her into it is only going to make her hate her crate. You have to make it worthwhile for her to be in it. Feed her in it, play games in and around the crate to get her used to it, and start luring her in and immediately let her out. Eventually you can start closing the door and let her wait a minute before letting her out again (do not let her out unless she is calm and quiet), and then gradually increase the time. There's just a whole lot more to crate training than shutting a dog into it. You gotta make it a fun place to be.