Hello! Rocket has been at home for just over 48 hours now and is 8 weeks old. He is a wonderful little guy, playful and loving. He has miraculously slept through his first 2 nights with no trouble. In his playpen he only uses his paper to go on however .... He is now going just anywhere he fancies in the house if we don't spot that he is about to go.... maybe this is normal at this young age? We have been taking him out to the garden for a bit more than 24 hours now. We try and get him out there straight after every sleep, snack, play etc. He loves it and rushes around excitedly or sniffs and mouthes everything. Then he, at some point, does a wee on the grass, and sometimes a poo too. We wanted him to do his business in one specific corner but he doesn't seem to realise that and we don't know how to tell him. We still want to praise him for going on the grass....but ideally on the corner . We would really love some advice here! Thank you in advance. Jen
Hi Jen, I think this is quite normal (unfortunately!) What you might want to do is have a small fenced off area outside, pop him in here, then wait until he has pee'd/poo'd, then let him out to the rest of the garden to play. If you pick the fenced off area to be in the area you want him to use this is ideal, but I guess it may be a bit far to wander out to in rain/snow/sleet/dark....... You could use a small animal run, play pen, or a DIY job? jac
Hi Jen, yes this is very normal for such a young puppy, you just have to be vigilant and keep doing what you doing with putting him outside. Clean up the accidents in the house with a cleaner that removes the urine smell so that he doesn't keep going back to those spots. It is possible to train them to use a certain spot, I've never done it, but @Boogie is your woman, hopefully she'll be along soon How wonderful that he has slept through.
@snowbunny had to make her puppy wee in a certain area of the garden because she was in a temporary rental home. I think it was just a matter of putting up a pen and only letting the puppy out of the pen once they'd performed. This is great if it's right next to your back door - not so great if it's not I've also heard of people having their puppy on a lead so that they're restricted to the "pee" corner, but puppies and leads can be dicey!
If you can, you'll reap the rewards (excuse the pun) my boy will only go on the lawn, avoiding the decking and paving as we encouraged him to do, but I wish we had got him to go in one particular area of the lawn in hindsight. Makes poo picking much easier and less of a lottery when mowing the lawn
I soooooo understand this. When Xena was a wee pup she only had access to concrete and decking, so that's where she'd wee and poo. Once she got access to the back lawn she never toileted on decking or concrete again. They're pretty adaptable.
Slightly off topic, we've just booked holiday cottage with only paving slabs in the courtyard garden. I hope Monty will do his business on the paving, otherwise I'll be wandering round a Cornwall village in my pjs and wild hair looking for a grass verge
Thanks again everyone! It is quite a way from the house to the grass, over the patio and he seems frightened of going out the door on his own. We have to grab him and carry him out there, often in a real rush. This puppy stuff is a steep learning curve for all involved (and even more for us than him I think). I'm sure we'll get there in the end!
He's still very little and just left his Mum and everything he knows. It's funny, but I only have quite a small garden, but my Cassie who is 2 now (I still think she's a puppy !) hardly ever poo's or even wee's in it, preferring to wait until she goes for a walk, I never trained for this (I'm much too lazy). She will of course if she's desperate, but more often than not she will wait.
Are you making a big fuss of him every time he has a wee or poo outside? I found this really useful and she would often squeeze out a dribble just to get an extra treat.
Yes, a bit of a fuss, but we will do more. We weren't decided about fussing him if it wasn't in the 'right' corner.....but garden is do much better than indoors I think we will make a big deal for anywhere in the garden now. Also we haven't used treats to eat yet as initially he had s runny tum. That has settled down now so we start giving a treat too.
You can even use his kibble as treats, it doesn't have to be cheese or chicken or something fun. I remember @Boogie saying that guide dog pups aren't allowed anything other than their kibble, so that's what they're treated with - just take some pieces from his daily ration and throw a ticker-tape parade every time he goes in the garden!
My pups have mainly kibble plus fish cubes for treats. I use cat food pouches for a jackpot on free runs. We have a gravel spending area for the dogs to toilet in - they are not allowed in the garden until they have both ‘been’. This is the spending area and the area outside the back door - it’s fenced in for an easy life. Training pups to use just one spot in the garden would only work using the lead otherwise imo.
My puppy is almost 8 months now (where did the time go?!) and he consistently poops in the same area of lawn each time. We don’t care about where he pees, just didn’t want any hidden bombs all over our large grass area! When he was potty-training, we would carry him from the kitchen out to the back area of grass and wait for him to potty and we would throw a big party and treat when he did. We kept him leashed so he couldn’t leave that area until he went. We did this every time, even in the middle of the night, until he was too heavy to comfortably carry. At that point, we clipped his leash and walked him over to his spot. These days, he will ask to go out and walk himself over to that corner and do his thing. Took a bit of time and commitment, but it’s paid off in the end!
We made a wooden frame and fill t with wood chip. At first it was right near the back door, if he started going round in circles he was taken there immediately (mostly as there were obviously accidents from time to time) Then once he got the idea we gradually moved the frame further away until it was all the way down the side of the house. As soon as he could cock his leg he preferred to pee on the bamboo in the raided beds around our paved garden, but will poop in his toilet although he prefers to poop on walks rather than at home. My brother is potty training my young niece at the moment. After being quite successful for a while she then pooped right next to her potty! She'll also stand over her potty holding it in while attempting to negotiate a treat for peeing in her potty. Her potty training has been going on for about 4 months now and she's still not quite got it. So remember it takes time and patience, for parents of puppies as well as humans.
