Hi
We brought Peggy, 9 week Cockerchon, home on Monday and for the first two nights had her in a box next to my bed at nighttime. She pawed the box when she needed to go to the toilet and I got up twice a night to let her into the garden. Last night we put her downstairs in her bed (she is happy to sleep in the bed in the daytime and goes in without being told) but she woke whining and crying and yelping at 1.30am and 4.30am. We didnt go down to her at all and each time it took an hour of her crying for her to settle herself. When i came down this morning she had done 3 poos and wees (all on the mats or newspaper left by the doors). I am now unsure as to whether I should go down to let her outside when she starts to whine? Is this not reinforcing the fact that I am answering her cries? Or do I allow her to carry on going to the loo on the paper until she is old enough to hold it in til morning? How long will it take for the nightime whining to stop? We have a 20 month old little girl who is being woken by Peggy and am keen to get back into her routine as soon as poss.
Any help much appreciated.
Thanks

Until a pup is fully housetrained you have a choice at night - take it out when it tells you it needs to go, or allow it to soil the floor or its bed. Peggy is far too young to be able to 'hold it' all night. She's whining to tell you she needs to go out - if you ignore this you're delaying her housetraining and will be greeted by a messy floor for longer, which isn't ideal with a toddler in the house.

Puppys that young are unable to hold it through the night.  If you dont answer her cries, she will learn that you arent going to, and it may backfire on you to the point where she wont tell you she needs to go out and just go to washroom in your house without even asking to go out.

You should expect it to be like a new born baby when the pup is that young.  It will be a few months old before it can hold it through the night.  They say that a month to a pups life = an hour they can hold it.  So at nine weeks, you are looking at every two hours or so your pup needs out.

Thanks for the replies. I am happy to go down to her but all the books that I have state that going to them when they cry is teaching them that when they cry I will come which in effect will prolong the crying and not wanting to be alone at night times? Would you suggest that I pre-empt the crying by going down to her at set times (ie. 1am and 4am) so hopefully waking her myself to take out so she doesnt need to cry. That way I would also stop my daughter waking by Peggys cries. Also, would you suggest I give her a treat or praise when she goes in the night or should I be "silent" as some of the books suggest so she doesnt get worked up and want to play?
Thanks so much for the advice - much appreciated!

It would teach them to whine if you continued to do it, respond to EVERY whine, but right now she is whining to let you know she needs to go out.  If you dont listen to it, she may feel that you arent giving her what she needs, in this case to releave her bowels and bladder.

Waking up at a set time might work.  But if you do that, dont try to put her on a schedule, because she will learn that ok at 1 am I get to go out, and then at 4 am.  She will get used to that.  (happened with my latest min puppy, she thought going out was at this time, etc). 

You want lots of praise while she is learning to housetrain.  Treats, etc, when you give her your command to go washroom (spot, hurry up, etc) and it will let her know that outside is where you want her to go, and she can only go if you use the command word. 

At this stage, it is best to go to her cries.  If you have just let her out, and she starts whining, then you can ignore it for a bit (unless she is really persistant), and it will teach her that only certain cries (like the ones where she needs to go out) are listened to, and not the attention getter ones.

I used to go down to my dog in the night to let him off for the toilet but literally did just that. I entered the kitchen (where he slept) went and opened the door, and said "go for a wee". That was it. Didnt speak to him or engage in any play. He knew that i was solely there to let him out to go toilet, it was not an opportunity to play etc. He soon learnt that and would go outside to relieve himself then come straight in and back to bed. Just ignore pup if they start to play up or want to play.
A pup that young wont hold it and its better to let them out than let them soil inside or think its acceptable to do so.

Womblewoo - I agree with the other pieces of advice here, you must go down and let her out.  I've just come out of toilet training my 4 month old girl and she has only been going through the night for the past 3 weeks!  I remember getting my first dog and all of the various breed books advice was that of let them cry, don't go down to them etc.  The result was a dog, in the early hours of the morning covered in its own mess and perfectly miserable.  It only happened the once and I certainly haven't done anything like that with my subsequent puppy - some of the breed books are, to be honest, outdated in their advice!  I agree it really is like having a baby again, however, you're up for a lot less time with a puppy!

I have always gone outside with mine, praised them when they've 'been', but then it has been straight back to bed with very little interaction, they soon pick it up.  Just stick with it and it soon passes but you must be consistent. 

I too used to go to our puppy if he woke us in the night. I always accompanied him into the garden - on his lead - so was there to praise for going to the toilet and to prevent him thinking it was playtime. I didn't speak to him at all until he had performed and, if he didn't go but just wanted some company, I still didn't speak just took him back indoors and popped him back in his bed still without saying a word. When he did perform he got lots of praise and a titbit and very quickly learnt that he was out there for one reason only :)

We also kept a chart on the fridge and marked it off if someone had got up to him in the night for a toilet outing. So if someone else heard him have a little moan once he had been put back to bed they would know he wasn't asking to go out again just voicing his disapproval that nobody wanted to indulge in a few middle of the night games. We found this worked really well and he didn't take very long to housetrain at all.

Going out into the garden on a cold, wet and windy night is not always appealing when you would rather be tucked up in a warm, cosy bed but it really is well worth the effort IMHO and, comparatively, it is only for a short time but you reap the rewards for years :)

Hi, I have a 16week old Yorkie who I took up to the bedroom with me in a large crate, bed one end and paper the other. The poo's stopped at about 13 weeks in the night and at 15 weeks held his wee's until 7.00am when I put him straight in the garden, so he's now up-graded to my bed with my Bichon and Yorkie X! I know being in my bed isn't ideal, but i couldn't sleep without them now and we all keep each other warm! My eldest, Yorkie X, I used to get up and let in the garden when she asked but it went on and on for months and I think became a habbit that was extremely difficult to break. My Bichon I was lucky with and he could hold both almost immediately. But with this puppy I didn't want to chance getting into the habbit of going out during the night and luckily it seems to have worked as he's holding both until morning. It'll all sort out in the end and it goes so quickly (although doesn't seem like it at the time!) Good luck X

Have had my pup in our bedroom since the day we brought him home so no whining or crying in the night for mum / company etc. Slept in his bed next to ours for the first 3 weeks and he would wander about and be restless. I would take him out in the night for a wee. On the fourth week (he was 14 wks old ),I don't know why, just felt like cuddling him, put him in our bed and we all fell asleep :) Woke in the morning and realised he hadn't awoke in the night - he's been in our bed ever since :) :) and never wees at night!!
NOT what most would do I guess - but it works for us....

Know exactly what you mean killickchick, same with my three. I can't think of anyone else I would rather share my bed with! I even bought a super king size bed as it was getting a bit crowded, especially when my boyfriend stays at the weekend! lol.

I got Marley at 7 wks, the first 3 wks he slept in his basket by my bed, I put paper by my door and and old sleeping bag covered the carpet as the shell is a little water resistant, when he whined I just put my arm over the side of the bed so he knew I was there and he went straight back to sleep.  He got transfered to the kitchen two wks ago now and is fine, doesnt whine at all and if I get to him before 7am and let him straight out there is no mess, if I sleep later than that he goes on the paper (most the time :-))

ive got a bichon frise puppy and we got her at 9 weeks.  From day one she slept downstairs in her crate with the door closed.  I put a snugglesafe heat pad in with her and a small toy (that she cannot harm herself on) and a small amount of water in a bowl.  i also put a little teddy in there that the fur cant come off which she cuddled up to.

i tired her out before bed and she went in at about midnight.  for the first couple of nights she cried for a little while, well i didnt think such a loud noise could come out of something so small!!as she had just been for a wee i knew that wasnt what she wanted.  for the first few weeks she woke up around 3 or 4am crying so i carried her to her pad and didnt interact or play with her and she weed, i praised her and then put her back.  she cried a little but i ignored it.if she tried to play with me i would not play.  she stopped the crying for attention after a few nights and after about 2 weeks there was no crying at all and she slept through the night and has done this for the last 2 weeks.

it is really hard to ignore the crying but it will make the training much easier.  a few times when i got up at 3am she would then cry at 4am and id go to take her for a wee and she didnt go so i knew it was for attention so stopped this.  good luck!!

To gemma81,

I can't agree on your assessment that your pup's crying for the first nights was down to attention seeking - far more likely to be distress, fear and loneliness at being in a totally strange environment, no mum, siblings, familiar humans which were his entire world before leaving the nest not to mention the usual familiar surroundings, scents, sounds etc that made up his entire world before you, a complete stranger, took him from them :(

I sincerely hope posts on these lines don't show up on search engines as best practice - IMO there is no basis in fact to suggest a pup of a few weeks old cries solely (if at all!) for attention when it has literally only just been removed from everything secure to it in one fell swoop

Whenever I've had a puppy, for the first few nights (right or wrong) I've stayed up late, later than normal. Not in the same room though. When the pup has cried I've given her a few minutes then gone in, made myself busy (made a coffee for instance) but not paying too much attention to her, just checking that she didn't want to go out. Maybe on the second 'visit' I have opened the back door and they would follow me, if they did a wee straight away, they then went back in and I locked up again. If they didn't wee within five minutes say, I would just lead them back in and lock up. My visits got less over the first few nights until I was able to 'sneak' off to bed :) making sure the alarm was set early so I could get up before them - just opening the door again to let them out. Mine have always had a teddy to snuggle up with aswell and the radio on very, very low just so it is not too quiet as I think that leaving their family 'huddle' and sleeping on their own can be quite strange for them.
I probably haven't explained what I did properly, but I can honestly say that within a week I never had any trouble out of them at all. And what's a week of lack of sleep compared to years of plenty?

what on earth is a cockerchon????

Just a mongrel, or the breeder would tell you a "rare breed" LOL and charge an arm and a leg for it.

She is a mixed breed - cocker spaniel and bison frisse....a true little beauty!

>bison frisse

Sorry to laugh, but every time you spell it like that I see herds of bison sweeping across the north American plains!

ah ok another fancy 'named' crossbreed...i have one too, mine is a retreiver x collie, which is exactly what i call him, a retreiver cross collie!!! maybe if i gave him a funny name he would work better!! hmmm let me see a colliever? retricol? doesnt quite have the same ring... ;-) 

> retricol

lol, that sounds like a laxitive or something!

haha, maybe if he had poodle thrown in it wouldve been quite apt!

i can see this going the way of other threads so just in case- womblewoo please don't be annoyed at some of the opinions some of us may end up expressing at the notion of "designer breeds", we have various reasons for not liking the practise (which there are an abundance of threads on). despite this i'm sure that your little girl is lovely and i hope your getting on ok with the toilet training.

Could I please ask that as a goodwill gesture (or just to be polite :) ) we do not ridicule posters on their description of dog? 

Only that, whether we like it or not many of these crosses are quite widely known by this and similar names and the OP has sought advice on a training issue which is of greater importance to the owner's circumstances and puppy's welfare than what it's breeder decided to add as a name....

It's quite a different matter if someone posts on searching boards or similar looking for a cross breed under another name to point out that they may be paying substantially more than they should or any possible health/behavioural issues which may arise from certain crosses etc - I just don't think it's appropriate on this thread and several others that its happened on recently.

regards, Teri

LOL - you type faster than me Astarte :-D

lol, nah, yours was longer!

No worries - I have broad shoulders! Its a lot quicker to call her a Cockerchon than a Cocker Spaniel x Bison Frise (not to mention the fact that I cant pronounce frise!)

LOL - you're a good sport then but call her what you like, I'm sure she's your darling and precious regardless :) :) :)

For the record it's Bichon Frise - a *bison* is like a *buffalo* (old joke, can't wash your hands in a buffalo ..... didn't say it was a funny one!)

To Teri,
what i meant was that she wasn't crying because she needed the toilet.  her crying probably was because of being scared etc but all of the training and books i read suggested to do what i did so if i was being harsh then thousands of other people must be too.  if i would have kept going to her everytime she cried there would have been no point crate training her!

i didnt ignore her crying if i thought she needed the toilet.  the maximum she ever cried was20-30 mins and that was after she had just been to the toilet so i knew she didnt need that!i knew i didnt want her to sleep on my bed for the next 15 years and this is what the breeder had done with the crate at night times (with her siblings and mum) which is why she took so well to it so quickly.  she goes in there herself when she wants a rest and loves her crate.  I was only advising the poster to what i did which has been incredibly successful.

Hi gemma81 :)

>her crying probably was because of being scared etc but all of the training and books i read suggested to do what i did so

As with the majority of members I exchange posts with, I have little or no idea how much ACTUAL experience you have in raising puppies so can only make a guesstimate based on the content of your posts - my apologies if I've misinterpreted your level of experience but the above phrase

(a) admits you accept the puppy was crying through being scared and
(b) advises (or appears to) that this method was decided by you on the basis of books, rather than having trained many puppies over many years :)  

There are far more experienced dog folks on this forum than I am however I can confidently assure you that my advice is based on experience of having trained, successfully and without distress, 6 puppies of my own and a further 7 bred by me and all over an almost 20 year period where I've seen many fads, fashions, opinions splashed about as "the best way" only to be tweaked, revamped or turned on their heads on countless occasions :) 

Books are written by varied individuals with equally varied experience and opinions on best practice - Not ONE, as far as I am concerned, is a definitive bible to be religiously followed in order to achieve the holy grail of puppy perfection ;)  Even some which are extremely useful and informative often contain some bizarre old wive's tales relating to animal husbandry that quite simply shock most experienced owners and breeders - just as recipe books have come and gone in fashion over many decades so too have dog books.  In short, don't believe all that you read simply because it found its way to a bookshelf - after all many writers on animal care relating to dozens of species actually pay for these books to be published themselves LOL and several find little interest for them!

> if i would have kept going to her everytime she cried there would have been no point crate training her!

the point of crate training a puppy is not IME or opinion anything to do with preventing a puppy from being distressed but of ensuring a safe environent for a puppy to protect it from injuring itself by chewing inappropriate items (particularly electrical cables for eg) for SAFETY purposes when not directly supervised :)  Puppies have for centuries been successfully and kindly trained to cope with leaving their dam and siblings before crates were ever invented - it's just a tool to help towards making the transition easier and should not be mistaken for a tool to "put up and shut up" a new family addition when at its most vulnerable and insecure!

>the maximum she ever cried was20-30 mins and that was after she had just been to the toilet so i knew she didnt need that!

so that could quite easily be read as you knowingly leaving her to be distressed and relying on her tiring herself out to prevent the possibility of your sleep being disturbed ....

>i knew i didnt want her to sleep on my bed for the next 15 years

FYI, attending to a puppies most fundamental emotional and physical needs in it's early days within a totally alien environment does not go hand in hand with adopting it as your sleeping partner for the rest of its natural life :)  That's when appropriate, patient and kind training comes in!

>I was only advising the poster to what i did which has been incredibly successful

But based on how many puppies, over how many different approaches to make comparisons with?  And who is to say had you employed a more sympathetic method to the puppy you would not have found "incredible success" with that also?

regards, Teri

Yes this is my first puppy but i put a lot of posts on this forum asking for advice and on other dog forums along with books and articles on the internet to decide on this method.  yes as i said she was crying becuase she was scared (and so wanted attention) not because she needed the toilet.

yes i agree crate training is a place to keep the puppy safe (at night times too) and should never be used as punishment.i never ever force her to go in there. her crate is her bed with the door open normally and only shut when unsupervised (for very short intervals).you can see she likes it as now around 10pm she goes in there herself when im getting her heat pad ready.  if i was worried about her disturbing my sleep i would have shut all the doors and slept well rather than keeping all of the doors open and keeping listening out for her and not got up at 3am for a while to let her out for a wee!

im not going to write anymore on this post as im actually quite offended and upset at what you've written.  i love my puppy to pieces and would never ever do anything if i thought it wouldnt benefit her. sorry to the womblewoo for this going on your post, i was just trying to give advice on how i trained my puppy because i wanted all of the advice i could get when i got her.

We spend most of our dogs life training them against thier natural instincts. Thier instict to bite in play, to chase small animals (prey), to fight amongst one another in defense, to defend thier territory, thier instict to eat whatever they come accross. Dogs are, by nature an instictive animal, we train/condition them out of thier instinctual behaviour.

A puppy has the instict to cry, when seperated from the litter. An instict that will aid it being found. It is not an emotional response.  Nobdy ever gets slated for trying to stop thier puppy from biting, most of the recomendations for this is to ignore the behaviour. This is never seen as cruel, or seen as us trying to stop the pup from having fun, it is seen as us trying to stop an instinctual, unwanted behaviour. A puppies crys, an instinctual reaction to call the pack back is also an unwanted behaviour. As long as the puppy is safe, warm, fed & watered, been to the loo, I can see no harm in ignoring the crys. In fact I would feel cruel getting a puppy used to me being at it's beck & call and then stopping. I think that consistency from day 1 is a lot kinder in that it leaves no room to confuse the pup.

>she was crying becuase she was scared (and so wanted attention)

Surely the best way to stop her crying through being scared is to prevent it happening in the first place - to teach her that being alone isn't scary, not just abandon her to deal with it in any way she can?

We often mis-interpret instinctual behaviour. I doubt the pup was scared. The pup was more likely crying because it was alone, and instint will drive it to cry untill it is found/re-united. The pup wasn't abandoned and it doesn't have the emotional & mental capacity to think that. It knew it was alone, instict told it to cry.

Apologies gemma81 that you've been upset by my reply - it wasn't my intention to hurt your feelings or imply that you would purposely do anything bad to her.  Perhaps I could have phrased it better.....

I admit this is one of those "hot topics" which sets me off as having successfully trained and raised plenty of pups without the need to have them left crying/howling it gets to me when I read it as a recommended method :)

regards, Teri

To mastifflover

Whelps instinctively cry when abandoned because they are instinctively fearful of being so and, as you rightly comment, do so to be found/re-united :)  This, IMO, therefore compounds the fact that it is important for the mental wellbeing of the puppy to not "feel" as though it is "abandoned" at all and this is best served by methods which don't involve bringing it home, away from its dam and siblings,  into unfamiliar territory and immediately at day's end shutting it away on it's own for the first time in it's short but company-intense life .....

I don't think a week or two out of our lives to ensure the physical and psychological comfort of a puppy is much of a sacrifice to make for a dog which hopefully bring us an all too short 10 or 12 years of devotion and companionship.

regards, Teri

This is only from my experience but I have moved away from the leaving pup in the kitchen to cry, all pups are now crate trained and sleep down the side of my bed for the first few weeks, this means I am on hand to take them out during the night and also they have the security of knowing that someone is close by.  The more independent the pup is in the ensuing weeks dictates how far away pup is, i.e. the crate is moved across the floor at a time and distance that suits the pup.  Also this time I hope to be able to give the breeder some fleecy blanket to place in with the pups for a week or so so when she comes home she will have something that smells familiar. 

I would not leave a puppy that was distressed, in the same way I would not leave a baby that was distressed. But there is a difference between an instinctual attention seeking cry and distress. I believe that by comforting/tending a puppy that is merely crying for attention (not in distress) it serves to prolong it's instinct to cry. For a puppy to 'feel' like it was 'abandoned' (rather than reacting to being alone) suggests that the puppy has a complex emotional thought process, which science proves otherwise (the part of the brain that deals with this is very small in a dog).

For those of us that adopt the policy of ingnoring a pupppies attention seeking cry, we do it for the psychological comfort of the pup (physical comfort is already met and not an issue here) not for our own ease. I would much rather my pup learn ( for his own sake, not mine), within a night or 2 that nothing bad happens to it when it's on it's own rather than it taking a couple of weeks to learn this and risk teaching it that crying gets attention.

I fully respect the fact that people have different ways of doing things and everybody is entitled to agree/disagree with any body else, but I resent the implication that this method is used by those that are not willing to put thier selfs out for the well being of thier puppies/dogs. This method is used by many, advocated by many behaviourist & trainers and produces great results with a happy puppy/dog that learns quickly being left is not an issue, as does other methods.

I would never shut my puppy in a crate, I believe it is far too restrictive and I would not be happy confining a pup to such a small space, but I would not imply that the people who use this method are cruel and/or lazy. I can understand that the people who use crates have thier own reasons for doing so and I'm sure they do it in the pups best interests, not because they can't be bothered to put in the effort.

Most of the differences in training/behavior methods are as a result of personal interpretation into the dogs emotional/instinctual responses and personal experience with what works for that individual. Very little is based on actual fact.

To dvnbiker.

My post that mentioned crate training was no intended to have a go at you. You posted before I  finished typing!!. It was just giving an example of a method I wouldn't like to use, but works very well for the people who do use it :)  I respect other peoples methods no matter how much or little experience they have and weather it is a method I would personally use or not.

it sounds like you are about to get a new puppy, how exiting :) The blanket for scent sounds like a good idea :)

No offence taken, although my pup is not in a small crate but one where she will have plenty of room, it is for her protection and nothing more.

Another thought, because it's what happened to us.

Your house probably won't be so warm during the night so your pup might be finding it harder to sleep comfortably and will wake more, especially if it's been used to the warmth of its mum and other pups.
We wrapped a hot water bottle in an old t-shirt and put it under our pups blanket. It worked straight away and he slept more soundly.

Hot water bottle & teddy was what i left in the crate for my pup. My mum suggested using one of the "ticking hearts" you get at maternity hospitals - it makes a thud thud noise to mimick the mums heartbeat. Never used it though but good idea