Morning everyone, I really need some help from you all please, I am at my wits end with my boy. Oscar is a 16 month old yellow lab and he is still toileting in the house. For a while we put this down to the fact that he was bred as a gun dog and lived with the rest of the litter in a barn until he was 12 weeks old and my theory was that this was why he was difficult to toilet train. There is no pattern to this soiling, I am at home all day so he isn't left for long periods. I can leave him for a couple of hours and come back to no mess but sometimes I go upstairs for 20 minutes and come down and he has messed. I sometimes feel he is doing it as a defiance thing but surely not? This morning as soon as I woke up I went downstairs and let him into the garden - I stood outside with him in the rain for 15 minutes and he just stood and looked at me, as soon as I opened the door he was back in the house and in his bed. I went back upstairs, 15 minutes later he barked once so we rushed downstairs thinking he was asking to go out but when we got there he has already weed and pooed. We have a chocolate lab who is 9 years old and he lives in the hall as the young one is too boisterous for him but they can see each other as the kitchen door is open and a baby gate between them. We have a laminate floor which is now wrecked with his wee, is he soiling because he can smell the old wee, I steam and disinfect the floor every day. Please can someone give me some advice, I am desperate!
Hi @Karen B Must be really distressing. I imagine you have checked with a vet that there is no physical cause behind the problem. You really had the right idea of taking him out and waiting 15 minutes. But he does not come in until he does number 2 and number 1. When he does. give marker word and treat. Give him the highest value treat that valued according to his preferences. Put these behaviours under a cue. Take him to the same spot in the garden. When the behaviour is under cue give the cue when just out the back door and follow him to the spot in the garden. Yes and treat when he behaves according to the cue. You will need to get a UV light and determine whether the urine inside the house has been cleaned up. If not, use an enzyme cleaner. When you are not there to supervise him inside the house, even just to pop upstairs put him in a crate. I'd forget about the defiance thing. Start and continue with obedience training at classes. It will be helpful in getting some leadership and bonding between you two.
Thanks for replying so quickly Michael. I will try the treating and cue, sounds like a good idea as he is a clever dog which is why I am getting so frustrated with him. I have been working with a trainer since he was 6 months old and that is how I know he is clever - he is so easy to train, recall, retrieve work etc. he picks up so quickly to the point where my trainer said he would like to take him shooting. This is why I am frustrated but I didn't know about cue words. I make a big fuss of him when he does toilet outside. Thank you so much for your advice, nice to know there is help and support out there.
I agree with @Michael A Brooks and firstly get your lad checked at the vet. Has he been this way since you obtained him at 12 weeks? If you have checked there is no physical problem, check there isn't an underlying psychological issue. You may need help with this. I would personally start from scratch as if he was a puppy wrt to toilet training. Using a crate, and taking him out every hour on a lead in to the garden for a wee/poo. Praise with a treat. Inside I would be tempted to switch the habitat around a bit, so let the older dog have his freedom, and crate train your younger dog in a different area, as long as they have a good relationship (apart from the usual adolescent boisterousness you have mentioned) How much are you feeding him wrt feed guidelines..the same/more/less. Are the poos formed (as in kickable..) or a bit loose/soft? Has he ever suffered from any GI problems? A mild intolerance for example. Diet would be one thing to look into very carefully. You mention the older dog, are you sure there isn't a problem between these two? Sometimes anxiety expresses itself in very subtle ways. I would also be tempted to consider a canine behaviourist to visit. Sometimes a fresh set of eyes may shed a bit of light on the situation. Good luck, sounds like a very distressing and frustrating situation for you.
Many thanks for taking the time to reply. Oscar has been like this since we got him - I didn't think of their being a physical cause as he can for for 4 or 5 days being clean. I really would struggle to put him in a crate now, would he not think this was a punishment? I have always struggled with using a crate but I did use one for Oscar in the beginning but he would soil in his crate. He gets on with the older dog, he I see just boisterous around him, they do play together in the garden, they play tug which I suppose is a dominance game is it? My older dog is very submissive, he would never complain when he had had enough and I don't want his latter years to be stressed. I tried Michael's advice yesterday, took Oscar outside every half hour, he went from 9am when he peed on his walk until 7pm before he peed again in the garden when I praised him and gave him a piece of chicken. He then sat with us watching TV, went out and did a pee and then we left him in the kitchen for 20 mins (we have a baby gate so he can see what's going on) whilst we did some chores and he peed. Peed in the night and has done it again twice this morning, we were in the house but not in the same room as him. He is a lovely dog, this is the only thing we can't seem to sort out. I go for so long just mopping up but then it gets me down some days as I feel I have failed somewhere along the way.
Hi @Karen B Two things. The suggested training will not fix the problem quickly. You going to need to undo 16 months of self-reinforcing behaviour.. As Beanwood put it so eloquently, you are teaching the dog toileting again. It will take some time to get this behaviour under control. Second, provided you don't use it as such, a crate will not be viewed as punishment by the dog. But to do that you have to teach the dog that going in the crate is a wonderful thing to do. I think there is folder on this site on crate training. I strongly urge you to reconsider not crating your dog. Dogs are reluctant to defecate or urinate on the bedding. The crate is going to help with your toilet training. It will give you some respite. And your dog will not think he is being punished, as long as you do the crating properly.
@Karen B I agree with what others have said here. You need to crate train the dog and treat him like a baby puppy. What has happened, for you, is a good example of what can happen for everyone if they don't use a crate in the first place or if they give up at the first hurdle with crate training a puppy because the puppy makes noise or they can't solve the situation. Never give up. Having said that, a puppy should never be left in a crate distressed to the point that they defecate in there. If that happens, you need to read and learn a lot more about crate training before trying it again... Check out this article I wrote for Pippa: https://thehappypuppysite.com/crate-training-a-puppy/ You don't move away from the crate until the dog is 100% ok in the crate with you next to it...
