Housetraining Tips

Housetraining is a universal problem with a simple solution. These tips will help you train your puppy or older dog to eliminate outdoors.

Good Health Is Essential
Make sure your puppy or dog is healthy before undertaking housetraining. Intestinal parasites are the most common cause of inappropriate defecation.

Bladder infections are a frequent cause of inappropriate urination. Have a stool sample checked by your veterinarian. If you suspect a bladder problem, have a urine sample checked as well. Symptoms of bladder infection include frequent urination of small amounts, unproductive straining, or licking of private parts.

Feed your puppy a good quality puppy food. Avoid over feeding or making sudden changes in his diet; both can cause diarrhea. Another common problem arises when a dog has been given steroids to treat a bee sting or allergic reaction. Steroids usually increase the dog’s water intake and urine output.

Scheduling
Feed your puppy on a fairly regular schedule, two or three times a day. Allow 30 minutes for each meal, and remove the leftovers after that time. Maintaining a feeding schedule helps predict output.

Schedule your puppy’s trips outdoors. The average puppy needs frequent opportunities to eliminate. Start first thing in the morning with a trip outside as soon as your puppy awakens. Puppies feel the call of nature about every hour when they are awake and playing. They need to go out soon after eating, and after drinking water. By the age of 10 or 12 weeks, the average healthy puppy can sleep through the night. If your puppy has an accident, examine the schedule and make adjustments to prevent future accidents.

Confinement
One of the most valuable tools in housetraining is the dog crate. Intended to be used like a baby’s playpen or crib, the crate keeps the puppy safely confined when no one is available to supervise her. Crating prevents accidents for the normal puppy, because her instinct to keep her nest clean is very strong. Crating also prevents her from destroying your treasured possessions while she is teething, or injuring herself by chewing on or ingesting something harmful.

Your puppy should be crated at night while you are asleep, and any other time you cannot supervise his activities. This includes times when you are on the phone or in the shower, or doing anything that prevents you from paying full attention to your puppy. He should have an opportunity to go outside every time you let him out of his crate.

Training
Every time you take your puppy outside, give her plenty of cues. As you walk out the door with her, say “Let’s go outside.” Take her to her spot, and repeat your cue phrase as she is about to eliminate. (Be sure to use a phrase that does not come up in every day conversation. Avoid cues such as “hurry up” or “be a good dog” in favor of something more specific, such as “go.”) When she goes, praise her enthusiastically and reward her with a very small food treat, right there on the spot. After several
repetitions of this routine, your puppy will learn to eliminate on cue (very useful in bad weather or strange places) and learn that eliminating outside is more fruitful than eliminating inside. After a week of this, continue to praise the puppy every time she goes outside, but reward with food on a more random basis. In a couple of weeks, you won’t need the food reward at all.

Accidents
If you find an accident, clean it up, and consider adjusting your puppy’s schedule to prevent another accident.

Punishing your puppy only teaches him to be wary of you. If you catch him in the act and punish or correct him, he will learn to eliminate when you aren’t looking, which will defeat your training program. If you should see your puppy circling as if he has to go, gently remind him to “go outside” and help him get to his spot where he can earn praise and a reward.
Accidents happen most frequently in the morning or evening when the puppy is out playing with the family. It is easy to become so involved in an activity that you forget that the puppy hasn’t been outside in an hour. If this is the case, find a way to remind yourself, such as setting a kitchen timer or alarm clock.

Patience
Unrealistic expectations are a frequent cause of problems in housetraining. On average, the bladder/brain connection is not fully formed until the puppy is about 8 months old. If a young puppy does go to the door and “ask to go out,” his need is immediate, he must go out right away. Some dogs never learn to ask to go out, while others learn quickly to go to the door and sit or bark or ring a bell. Some dogs learn to use a dog door easily and go out whenever they feel the urge. The best way to ensure success is to stick to a schedule long enough for the puppy’s body to adapt to it and get in the habit of eliminating at particular times.

Neuter or Spay
If you are not planning to enter your dog in conformation competition, neutering or spaying helps ensure successful housetraining. Neutered males still lift their legs, but are less inclined to mark their territory (including the priceless antique chair legs and the floor-length drapes). They are also less prone to certain cancers and prostate problems that can lead to accidents in older dogs. Unspayed females ovulate twice a year, on average. For several weeks before and during the heat cycle they are more prone to mark territory. They are also more vulnerable to bladder problems that can lead to accidents.

Paper Training Is Not Housetraining
Teaching your puppy to eliminate indoors on newspaper does not lead to success in housetraining. Dogs are place oriented, and once taught to go in a particular place on a particular surface will continue to do so. Careless newspaper readers are liable to reach for a section they left on the floor only to find it has been used by the family dog.
If you must confine your puppy for more than six or eight hours at a time, or if you live in a high-rise apartment with a small dog, consider using a “litter box” for your dog. A plastic under-the-bed storage container, lid removed, filled with bark mulch will serve this purpose very well. The mulch absorbs urine odors, and smells and feels like “outside.” You can confine your puppy in a small room, such as a bathroom, with a baby gate, giving him enough room for a comfy bed, his water dish, and his mulch box.

This approach works well for young puppies and very elderly dogs with health problems, and is less likely to interfere with your efforts to train your dog to eliminate outside.

There are some great books and websites about housetraining. Do a search for them, reject any advice that tells you to rub their nose in their urine, spank, or yell. That will only accomplish your dog becoming frightened of you and they will then sneak off to pee.

first decide out or in out will need your participation and patience

take them all out when one gets that running around where do i go look usually one will the others will sniff and get the idea it takes about a good 2-3 weeks 3-4 x a day if not more once you get them to go outside consistently put them on a schedule you will have to get all the urine spots out of the house so they don’t pick up on it again they sell solutions at your pet supply store I use vinegar and water on carpets/ hard wood and bleach on other hard floors

if you choose in they sell pee pads or you can by incontinence pads same thing whatever cheaper place in a spot out of the way of company view but easy for them to get at when you see one wanting to go place them on the pad get some urine smell on it and let the others check it out when they pick up the scent they should follow suit some need a lil help but it takes less indoor /outdoor participation from you, pads need changed daily so it could be $$ but when you leave them they will have a place to go

i know it seems terrible if you let them graze at random but if you do stop give them a feeding schedule and their potty times will have a schedule too

What we do is set up a potty schedule: for a few days we write down everytime the dog goes to the bathroom: what time and what they did. Then once we figure out their relieving schedule, we start taking them outside before they’re scheduled to ‘go’ so they don’t get a chance to go inside.

While we’re setting up the schedule, we keep the dog at our side at all times, so as soon as the dog starts going indoors, we say “NO!” and pick it up and carry it outside for it to finish. While they finish, we praise them for going outside. This teaches the dog that they’re not supposed to go inside, outside is better.

Another thing we do is teach the dog to go on command. Whenever they start going, we say “Do your business!” and then we praise them. Then we start saying in right before they start going, and once they make the connection that those words means potty, they’ll wait until they hear those words to go to the bathroom.

Hope that advice helps! Obviously it’ll be a little different since you’re training adult dogs, so it might take a little longer, but they should get it. Just make sure to give them plenty of opportunities to go out, so that they’re not forced to go indoors.

And once the male realizes that behavior is not okay, he should stop, too.