hi i have a 8 month old cocker span pup she is pretty clever
learned to sit,Stay , lay , roll over , paw , jump, crawl, bye
the time she was 14 weeks old
shes very alert like a cat and uses her paws for everything
including smacking me in the face when she wants attention
hehe , watches tv alot too ,
but the past month we have watched her looking up the walls
thought not too much of it but now she stairs at the floor for
shadows and constanly jumps after them, shes not bored she
has two walks a day the run of our big garden and a zillion toys
and if u want her attention to play she dosent listen anymore she
s fasinated with any shadows shes happy about seeing them as
she wags her tail alot ,
also we cant get her to out to the toilet and its getting a little worring
as shes getting older now ,ive tryed when shes about to go putting her out
and staying out for a long time prasing her when she dose do it , which she hardly dose ,she holds herself to go on the paper at home even if we go
out for 3 hours
please respond the only other thing we are thinking of is a behourist
and hes pretty exspensive
thanks XXXXXXXXXXXX

Perhaps you should try using a particular word for when she goes to the toilet,so that she gets used to the idea that everytime you use that word she must go,just keep repeating the word and she should get used to the idea.
When we started training our CKC we had the idea that we were going to make her go on newspaper,then after she got used to the idea we would start moving the paper further and further towards the back door,until the paper was outside,but we didn't actually get that far as Kia ( our cavalier) adopted a new way of training,she started associating her lead,with going to the toilet so now everytime we pick up her lead,we walk her over to the park and she goes straight away,and if we don't fancy walking far we just tell her the word "bizzy" and she'll go in the garden.
Hope this info helps and sorry I can't help with the shadow thing
Good luck
Lorraine :)

Hi,

With regard to the shadows I would not encourage this. It can be funny to watch but can easily become an obsessive behaviour. Either distract her, or, if you think she likes the attention then try totally ignoring her when she is doing this, no eye contact, nothing. Can you get rid of the shadows if it is particular ones she is playing with?

Has she ever been told off when toileting indoors? This can make dogs reluctant to "go" in front of their owners. Have you tried going right back to the beginning of puppy house training and taking her outside every hour or so?

Christine

Could be that she thinks newspaper is where you do it, when the weather allows try putting some outside weigh it down and see if she will use it and against all normal advice don't clear it up tip it on the ground along side the paper for a few days. If she shows an unhealthy interest in her stools then you will have to collect it. And try to distract her from shadow chasing, move a lamp if you have to. Jackie H
reminds me of my sister who belives that welping on vetbed encourages the pups to think that vetbeds are toilets - I tell her that is because she has a brain dead breed mine would never be that stupid.

have you had her eyes examined? A pet crossbred dog I had as a child started this behaviour - shadow watching and when she saw something out of the corner of her eye would look for it in the wrong direction - and eventually went blind at the age of about 3 years, cant remember he cause was. Dont want to frighten you, but it might be worth a trip to the vet/eye specialist.

Isn't it strange how we approach problems based on our past experiences - I have seen "shadow chasing" problems become a real behavioural problem after the owners kept egging the dog on and WestieLover approaches it as a problem with eyes. Both logical but totally different - just shows how useful boards like this are for pooling experiences :)

Chrsitine

I have no prior experience with dogs but Barney kept jumping at shadows when we put him out to toilet train him on these dark nights. He jumped and yelled everytime he saw a shadow from the security lights and I got upset and worried about him. So we have stopped him being scared by making as many shadows as we could with our own "shadows" by standing near the lights and actiing as if they were something that should be there and at the same time playing with him so he now thinks they are just part and parcel of night time "pooing time" and ignores them. He doesnt seem bothered now. Hope this makes sense very difficult to put in words. Gina

Reminds me of one of my bitches who when she was younger used to jump over the lines painted on sports hall floors and run around or jump over pools of light reflected on the shiny floors. Made showing her difficult, luckly most judges found it amusing. she did grow out of it with experence, but it is a difficult thing to set up for training. Jackie H