Hi everyone, This is my first post. I have a 10 month old black lab called Millie. Millie sleeps in a crate overnight. Unfortunately she is regularly pooing in her crate during the night. She has never quite got to the stage where she is consistently holding it overnight, however over the last month she has got considerably worse, and it's now a nightly thing. We've tried many things to stop it: Using a smaller crate as she won't want to poo where she sleeps. Feeding her in her crate as she won't want to poo where she eats. Using different blankets in her crate Cleaning the crate with special pet cleaner to neutralise odours Letting her out before bed obviously Getting up in the middle of the night to let her out. She will still poo in her crate a couple of hours later Check for health issues with the Vet Moving her crate to a different location Giving her lots of praise etc when she does poo outside We're now at a loss as to what to do next to try and break this habit. If anyone has any advice over something else we can try, please share it. Many thanks Shaun
How often does she poo ? Meg is on a good quality dry food and goes about once a day. If you have food with lots of fillers in they have bulkier poos and go more often, and is more difficult to hold in. Just a thought anyhow, have you looked at the quality of food ? Also the meat probably won’t be helping and not needed as the kibble should be a complete feed ?
When Luna was on kibble she only went twice a day, morning and tea time. We have moved her onto raw and is going a lot more just now but think she will get there.
Shaun, unfortunately once dogs have gotten used to toileting in their crate (regularly), their natural desire to be clean in there is worn away and they simply don't care one way or the other if they poop in there or not. (You don't say if she whines or barks before or after she toilets in there, so I'm assuming she is just silently going in there and then sleeping next to it...). So, as you correctly say, the habit needs to be broken and her feelings about the crate, changed. Dog-proof the rest of the room which the crate is in. Clean the crate thoroughly by wiping it over entirely with laundry detergent watered down, and then letting it dry completely. Laundry detergent should contain enzymes which will break down the smell of the poop so it no longer smells like a toilet to her. Purchase a comfy and soft bed and put it in the crate. LEAVE THE DOOR OF THE CRATE OPEN AT NIGHT, so she can choose to come out the crate and toilet on the floor. Yes, your floor is going to get poop on it - but this is the only way to help her learn not to go in the crate and to establish a different habit so think of it as a stage to go through. I don't recommend putting newspaper or toilet pads down because most Lab pups are just going to shred or eat those. Hopefully she will consistently come out of the crate and toilet on the floor outside. At which point, you can start to close the door but GET UP after 3 hours and take her out. Then make it 30mins later each night, until she is going through the night.
Hi. Thanks for your reply. In answer to your question about the dry food, Millie is on ProPlan Sensitive Digest, and has been so since she was born. We also mix in about a third of a tin of Butchers Tripe mix, just to add some moisture. We have now removed this from her diet to see if it makes a difference. Fingers crossed!
Hi Jo. Many thanks for your detailed reply. This is also really useful stuff for us to try. Just an update - about a week ago we tried putting Millie in her smaller crate overnight. This is the crate she used when she was a small pup and we normally only use it for when she's Travelling in the car (it pretty much fills the boot on my estate car, so it's not a tiny travel crate). The good news is that so far, she hasn't had a single "accident" in it. My theory is that because the crate is smaller, she doesn't want to poo in there. Or perhaps it's simply because she's never gotten into the habit of pooing in that particular crate. The downside, of course, is that the crate is really too small for her now. Although she can just about turn around in there, she can't fully stretch out and can't fully stand up without butting her head. She seems happy to go in there and doesn't cry overnight, however, I don't see this as a long-term solution as it's just not big enough and I would be concerned about any physical effects of her sleeping for 8 hours in there long-term. I mentioned in my original post that we'd already tried putting her in a smaller crate. In actual fact, what we'd done is reduce the size of her 'adult' crate (it came with a handy divider!). That never worked - perhaps because she still associated the crate with toileting. My plan now is 1/ Clean her adult crate along the lines that you've suggested. 2/ Put in the divider to reduce it's size, probably to about the same size of her puppy crate (or slightly bigger), but with the extra headroom. 3/ Start Millie in the adult create again. 4/ Cross-fingers! Ideally I'd like to stick with using her puppy crate for another week to help ensure the habit is broken, but as I said, I'm concerned about any long term physical effect. Let me know if you have anything to add to this. Again, thanks for your advice
It may be as you say, that she associates that crate with toileting - it may also be that she can smell it's a toilet place still.... So you could start with a thorough cleaning of it, but if that doesn't work, it might be an idea to buy a different type of crate - for example - if she currently has a wire crate, you could buy a solid airline type of crate - in the hope of changing those associations she has with it.
We add plain roast chicken (I bulk roast it, chop up and bag up then freeze) or a can of tuna to the ProPlan Sensitive Digest, which makes it more interesting compared to plain dry, but also keeps their tummies fairly uncomplicated. Our two easily get tummy problems, which can result in soiled crates if and when they eat anything too rich, or that they shouldn't, which can be hard to police. At 9 months the crate accidents now only happen when they have dodgy tummies, but I feel your pain, as it used to happen a lot. We also used a pro-biotic recommended by the vet if they were showing signs of diarrhoea.
Thanks for your help everyone. She's not had an accident for a couple of weeks and is back in her full-size crate. Fingers crossed x.
Did you change her lifestyle such as feeding before bedtime? Normally, a 10-months puppy can basically build the regular pooty habit-holding its pee about 6 hours and holding the poo overnight, as long as you insist on the right training program. For example, feed your pup regularly (at least 3 hours ahead of bedtime ) and walk for a long time to empty her belly and consume her energy at night. Also, some people say we can reinforce the potty training by positive reinforcement. For example, reward the pup with treats if it works well. You could prepare some treats when walking her outside and encourage her to do potty in the right spot. This may take you some time and patience to practice, but anything is worth it if your pup shapes this habit.
Unfortunately she is back to having accidents. Thank you to everyone for your advice so far. It feels to me like she is doing it in order to get us up out of bed (we're up at 06:00 on a weekday anyway!). Not really sure where we can go next. I think the only thing we haven't tried is a brand new crate. We can also try giving her a longer walk at night, however in the past she has poo'd on the walk but still poo'd overnight - I've no idea how she does it! She has her last meal about 16:30, so by about 21:00 she should be ready to poo, and then there should be nothing left! Sadly, this is having a really negative impact on our relationship with Millie
Did you put new bedding in her old larger crate? I would think that most bedding would hold odors so well that you could not really get them out even with enzyme cleaners. Our dogs have always had a dog door to the back yard, so after 4 or 5 months they weren't crated, but had access to the yard any time. Seems to be more common in the USA than in the UK.
Hi, We put new bedding in a couple of nights ago. We've also moved her crate position. So far no accidents so fingers crossed.
