How do I prepare my dog for a dog sitter?

The short answer: ask the sitter what they need you to bring. If you’re going to be having your dog sat in dog sitter’s home, you will need to check with them on what they are set up to accommodate but in general this is what I request from dog sitting clients with some additional notes so you know what not to do:

Required Items:
1) Medications and application instructions if any are needed.
2) Food with feeding instructions. Do not stop by a random convenience store and grab any dog food. A lot of clients do this and don’t seem to realize how bad the digestive consequences are when they accidentally switch the food type. Please bring the food your dog is used to.
3) Leash and collar.

Optional items:
1) Blanket for them have at night or to put in their “spot” during the day for them to hang out on.
2) Treats.

Preferably Do Not Bring Items:
1) Bowls. I keep a ton of bowls on hand and it is easier to just use and wash the same bowls between uses as opposed to keeping tracking of many sets of bowls from many clients.
2) Crates. Most high volume sitters will have either crates or a setup for dogs that doesn’t involve you lugging large crates across town. Of course you’ll need to make sure they don’t need the crate since some of the casual sitters who do one off bookings may not have crates.
3) Beds. I allow beds but don’t recommend them. I sit so many dogs at once that having a dozen dog beds just isn’t space efficient.
4) Toys. If you’re ok with toys getting lost then feel free to bring but otherwise please leave them at home.

Conclusion
Make things easy on your sitter by not packing everything you can think of that your dog might use. Less is definitely more when it comes to packing for your dog. On the sitter’s side, it is a pain to keep track of so many difference items. For example, best practice as the sitter is to take all the dogs stuff that they came with including the leash, mark it, and set it aside and just use in home items to care for the dog.