I have been trying to toilet train my puppy for some time, about 4 months and he is not getting it.

I have tried confining him to an area then slowly expanding it, but once I reach a certain area, he got all messed up and I had to start from scratch. When I let him out, and he does it, I will shout and carry him back to the papers. Tried giving him treats when he does it right but he does not seem to understand. Then I tried crating him. He would simply pee and poo inside and then lie on them. :(

My puppy left his mother at about 6 weeks in a state of neglect. Stinks and had sores. We adopted him and has been trying to teach him what is cleaniness but he does not seem bothered. Sigh... Any thing I can try? I am tearing my hair out with this...

He has also been caught howling a few time when no one is home and the little bugger is very loud! He does not make much noise when we are home cos he knows we are strict on the noise issue. I tried making leaving the home a calm affair, put on the radio, put my adult dog's play pen next to him, gave him a kong to play with, give him some specials toys for when I am not around...

I am fostering another puppy, a mongrel about 9 months. She is usually well behaved but I don't know why she has started chewing the furniture when we are sleeping.

I am also fostering a 5 year old dog currently. She has been abandoned in a toilet and now, at my home awaiting for adoption.

What I want to ask is how to train a puppy and not let it be distracted? Caring for 3 dogs are not the big problem but training my own puppy is especially when he is becoming a monster. Please give any advice you can. He is now 5 months and is a cross Japanese Splitz.

Hi :)
He sounds like a very confused and stressed out puppy. He's had a bad start in life and now he's having to share with 2 others who as foster dogs are probably feeling stressed too (perhaps that's why the other pup is chewing). Is it an option to give up the others and concentrate on your pup so he's not distracted until he feels more secure and settled? :)

When I trained my pup I never shouted at all for any "deeds" in wrong places, only praising when she got it right. I think it just confuses them more to be told off for doing what is a natural function. At five months he should be doing all is stuff outside so I would abandon the papers altogether and take him out more frequently so there is less chance of soiling inside. Every time he does a wee or poo outside give him a command (I use "do a wee") so that he associates that one phrase or word with the action of toileting. Eventually he'll get the idea when you give the command that you want him to produce. :)

Good luck. :)

Kath.

I agree, the pup is confused.

PUps don't see things as we do - by using paper, and encouraging him to go on it, you are basically saying in his eyes "yes it's fine, go in the house".

If you shout you may scare him so that he learns to hide behind the sofa, or worse becomes too scared to poo/wee in your presence so may revert to messing n the house when you have gone!!!

I would go back to basics - take him out yourself every hour, maybe more if he needs it. After sleep, play, eating, last thing at night, and early morning. If possible, consider getting up at night to take him out as this will make things progress faster.

Use a word for weeing, i use "Quickie" and reward with a tasty treat - sausage, cheese, chicken etc. as this will again help him to learn more quickly that this is the good thing to do :)

Lindsay

I never shouted at my dog, it wouldn't understand my major rants anyway.
If you don't catch it doing it then just clean it up without saying anything, if you do then shoo it outside immediately and wait till it has done it's business and praise it to the lord when it does.
Personally i took the paper away straight away as i think it makes more work (Having to re-train it to go outside).
It worked for me, she even rings a bell on the back door now to go out!!! :D

As for the other one is it not going through the teenage stage? (mine is at 9months) or it may be unsettled with the pup?

Sarah.
(Often seen in her nightie, shouting "WEE WEE" at 7am)

our pup's not a rescue so we had luck on our side but she is just getting clean at 5 months.

we found crating her at night & when unsupervised (only short periods at first, ie no more than 45 mins/1 hr) helped - (at least it stopped mess smells getting elsewhere & is easier to clean up without a fuss!) ALthough she did go through a mini-phase of running to go in there inside if we were reading her signals wrong, erg. Also we got a big crate realising that she was going to pee/poo in there at first, but we controlled the location by using a puppy pad (only when unsupervised - took them out any time that crate was open for her to go in/rest in freely, which she does) She's only just getting the physical control now to enable her to last through the night. I got stressed about her messing in her cage for a hwile but the best piece of advice i had was not to expect too much young - and i guess you're on a much slower time scale than us given the traumatic early weeks your pup had.

if you are going to ultimately take them outside i think it helps them understand better to do it straight away than interim papertraining - but i guess we had the luxury of the indian summer to help us with this as we took her out loads in her first few weeks.

again using a command by association really helps keep pup's mind focussed on the job (ha!) in hand - our's gets SO darn distracted.

also in terms of correction we've never punished for toilets inside - if she's caught in the act she gets a firm "no" and i have picked her up and carried her out, so she at least finishes in the right spot. mind you no one in the else wanted to risk getting wee on their hands but i think its worth it - think it really helped get the message through the once or twice i had to do it and its much easier to wash the wee off your hands those few times than to keep having to clean the carpets!

Good luck! :)

With the chewing, I found that smearing Vicks vaporub mixed with pepper onto the wood furniture helped a lot. Or you could try a spray like bitter apple.

Hi guys, just a thought,
I bought a large crate for my lab pup, large enough to use when he's fully grown. I got Kester at 6 1/2 weeks and straight away put a piece of turf in his crate for him to wee/poo on. I put paper under it, then turf on one side and his bed/toys on the other. I found that this really helped and he caught on to 'going' outside extremely quickly. He only ever had 3 accidents in the house and was fully house trained at about 10 weeks, learning to 'ask' to go outside when he needed to 'go'. The turf came from a garden centre and cost about £1.50 for a piece about a foot square.
As far as the chewing goes. I use 'olbas' oil and this seems to work pretty well.
Let us know how you get on.
Ali :)