House-training Guidelines
The concept is the same for both adults and puppies. Where oh where do you want Fido to go? Pick a place, or have Fido pick a spot, and stick to it. Make it the "potty spot". Easier for the dog to remember and easier for pick-up duty. It will smell like a toilet to him, so that is where he/she will go. If the dog has previously been reprimanded for going potty somewhere he/she may now be afraid to go in front of you,. This makes it difficult to reward, but you can take the dog out "on a long leash" let him find a spot and while he is going you can slowly approach, speaking with a yummy treat in your hand. Supervise or barricade from unwanted areas. If the dog is already going inside the house in undesireable places then withhold access to that area. The dog has already determined that that area is a toilet area, so already has the "habit" of going there. He is not being bad, or spiteful, or any of that. He is going to the bathroom where he/she believes the bathroom is. Think of it like suddently everytime you go to elimiate in the bathroom, you come out and get into trouble. You would either wait until it is "safe" and noone is home, or you would sneak in and try to sneak out, and not get caught. You would not dream of suddenly going to the bathroom on the kitchen table, instead. So there you need to "lock the bathroom door" by keeping the dog away from that area. The dog will find the second chice area, and use that. Make it worth the dog's while. Dog's do what is rewarding to them. By giving them a treat or praise or whatever THEY like to receive, they will do it again, and again, or when convenient. If the dog is afraid of doing potty in front of you then you miss some good chances of rewarding it when done properly, outside. What difference to the dog is it if he goes outside or in the basement? If the dog goes outside he gets a treat. If the dog goes in the basement he doesn't. And going in the basement might be better in the dog's viewpoint if it is raining outside and he doesn't like rain. But, a treat might make it worth getting wet. And if the door to the basement is CLOSED he has to make the right choice. You need to go outside and treat him WHILE or right after he eliminates. If you let him in the house and into the kitchne for his treat he will not realte the two. You need to go outside with him. Dogs generallly do not like to go in their DEN. This den can be a crate, or your bedroom. HOw often do I hear that the dog is fine all nite, and sleeps in the bedroom, yet went to the bathroom in the son's room on his bed. This is not because the son refused to play ball with him, or the dog was mad becasue the son was gone for two weeks or anything of that sort. It is because the son's room is not the DEN, and happened to be available at the time. What is like to do is let the dogs sleep in each of the bedrooms for a certain length of time, to establish all of them as a DEN. Same with the living room area. How many dogs are barred from certain rooms because they may go potty in them? They would be less likely to go potty in them if they had LOTS of access to the room, and it became part of the DEN. Dogs have and develope substance preference. Most dogs will potty where it is on a substance that is easily absorbed. This is so the smell will stay there to remind where the tiolet is, and also to let other dogs know that they have been around. That being said, if the pup or dog has not been able to distinguish where he/she goes, then they develope a preference through habit of where they prefer to go potty on certain materials, like concrete, grass, carpeting, straw. Keep that in mind as you may be undoing some prior preference at the same time as teaching where an appropriate place is. This will take more patience and training, and is often why pet store pups may be difficult to house-training. They have lived and eliminated in their own waste, so it is nothign to them to sleep in it. Or a shelter dog may have been on concrete for months, and now will go on the ceramic tiles instead of the grass outside. Make it easy on the dog and start with what he/she is used to and gradually make the move to where you want it done. For example, if he goes on the door carpet inside the house all the time, then move the carpet to outside the house and then gradually cut it up smaller and smaller. Supervise. supervise, supervise. A dog that goes potty 5 times in a day, and only gets rewarded once, will take forever to train. Those other 4 times could have been outside alone, so not rewarded, alone in the basement unknown to the owner, in the living room and got yelled at, and maybe outside at the dog park, and not noticed. What has the dog learned? Don't go potty in front of the owner, but anywhere else is "safe". Put it on CUE Find a word to use, and use it, wherefver you are. When traing use the word ONLY as is is doing the deed. When Fido is doing his thing say the word "go pee" or "potty" or whatever you want (be consistent) and right before he finishes give him a treat. Use this every time, and it will mean you have to go OUT with him so you can relate the two. ONce he gets used to it you start to put the word in right as he starts to go, then right before he goes. When hubby puts Bosley out for the last pee, I go to bring him inside and Bosley is always sleeping by the outside door. I go outside with him, bring him to the "pee area" and say "go pee" and he lets go a waterfall. Then I know he is empty and came come in. This also helps when we are traveling, and he cannot access his potty place. Eleminate the scent of any accidents. Not with vinegar or any amonia product. It has to be something that breaks down the urine smell like Nature's Miracle or similiar product. These things are great. I large jug may cost $20, but can last a long time and may be the answer. It can be used for other things too, not just doggie pee-pee. All in all, if the dog is crated or supervised to eliminate accidents, goes outside and is rewarded EVERY time, and is taught to go on cue it shoud take an adult dog no longer than 3 weeks to train. Yes, it means constant vigilence, and the whole family needs to be involed, and the crate or barricade is used way too mcuh, but it is short -term. Puppies will take longer, but only because they will have more accidents, so if the accidents can be reduced, the training period will also be reduced. Hope this helps. |
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| Thanks a bunch for your helpful into! |
| Do you think it is better to basically crate a puppy almost all the time while house training? Just let them out to pee, then some playtime and back in they go?
I'm now training Sonny, and I really want to get it right this time. I've always sucked at house training. They get it eventually, but it takes a LONG time. I'm not sure if I'm not consistent enough, or what I'm doing wrong, but I don't want to make the same mistakes with Sonny. He is crated at night, and keeps his crate clean. This morning I took him outside, he did his business, I praised like crazy. We have been up for an hour and a half and I've cleaned up 5 puddles since. LOL It's hard to figure out what kind of routine to stick to, and also difficult to see when he needs to go. He doesn't stop to sniff, or circle, he just stops in mid-walk and pees, no squatting either. LOL I have him barricaded in the same room with me so he is not out of my sight for even an instant. Obviously, at 10 weeks old he is too young to "get it" yet, I understand that and I know it's perfectly normal for him to pee every five minutes LOL I just want to know if there is anything else I should be doing. The routine is this: Get up at 7am, go out to potty. Come in and eat. Go back out to potty. Come in and play. Go back out to potty. Then I'm just letting him have free run of this room, should I maybe crate him again for a bit til lunchtime? Etc...... |
| If he's keeping the crate clean, then I'd definitely use it more. Then, as he does "get it," you can start leaving him out for longer and longer amounts of time. If he's good in there, that's great. On the other end of things, can your other ones help train him? Or do you find them too inconsistent for that? |
The room you have him in may be too big. We kept Izzie gated into the laundry room at first. The open space in the laundry room was basically as wide and deep as the washer and dryer. After she went potty outside then we would play for a few minutes and then back in laundry room. We spent alot of time sitting and reading in front of the gate in the laundry room...to be close to her. She had toys and her food and water in there. She also loved to doze on the air conditioner vent in there...we first got her at the beginning of july 
After the laundry room was good (maybe a couple weeks) we were able to expand her to twice the space. And then a few weeks later she got the whole kitchen. I don't think we have ever spent so much time in the kitchen  During the whole time she got to play in the living room right after going outside.
She at first slept in her crate in my room, and then when she was too big for her baby crate she was gated into my bathroom...which was tile. While we were gone she stayed in her big girl crate near the garage door so we could take her right outside when we got home. |
| Are you keeping your puppy on a leash when you go out for potty? For awhile, only being on a leash and picking one word for potty - "hurry up", stay right there with the puppy, praise "good hurry-Up", and right back in side. Keeping potty time and play time separate has helped Tasha understand what we are going outside for a little clearer. |
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