Oh yeah, they'll take advantage of it. Believe me, I know. Nikko was totally taking advantage of it, after having "got it" about two weeks after we first started doing it. It was beginning to drive us completely insane, so we started telling him "no" when he rang it and we knew he had just been out and didn't need to go... well that backfired, and now he doesn't ring it at all ever. He just walks over close to it and looks at us when he wants to go out. Nevertheless, we are still working on bell training - if we don't make him ring it when we go outside, at the very least we ring it ourselves. Hopefully someday it will work.
In my opinion, and this won't be easy, but you should leave the bell accessible. Then, just see to it that she is so busy doing something else or so exhausted from exercise that she doesn't want to ring the bell, for any reason. Then when you take her out, have her ring the bell just before taking her out or putting her leash on to go out. And if she does ring the bell some other time, be sure to take her out - but only for a couple minutes, and never for play. It also helps tremendously to have a door that is a POTTY ONLY door - use a different door in the house for all other reasons to enter and exit the building. Beyond that, I guess it's just up to what PrincessDiana said... hopefully the novelty will wear off at some point. Good luck, I hope it eventually works for all of us who are working at it right now... please post back if you make some progress or learn a helpful hint you can share with the rest of us!
Lauren & Nikko |