I fretted a lot about Ben's potty training - but ultimately because he was paper trained he knew better than me - we didn't have to keep him crated. He used his crate mostly when we were away and had to keep him out of harm. Maybe we were lucky but he knew from his breeder that newspaper was where he peed, he moved to the puppy pads easily enough. For at least the first month he is going to wee in the house a lot!
I worked on sit/stay/come/down/leave it/off/in your bed quite early on and he got the idea that he could get treats by working behaviours quite quickly. I think this helped him learn that taking a wee or a poo is also a behaviour. He started to do a poo and then run for the reward (a bit of a nuisance when he was still mid jobby) - we rewarded enthusiastically when he used the right place and ignored the wrong places. Now we don't bother so much with the reward - just reinforcing the command word and the intermittent treat.
We make a few mistakes - not watching him closely enough so he's telling us he needs to go and can't get to the place - if we miss this then we really have to kick ourselves. This probably sets back his training but we reward the toilet in the right place and ignore the wrong place accidents. He did seem to learn that a wee on the floor brings the mop out (and he loves to chase it) so we had to tone down any fussing and clean up out of his site. Also we mopped at other times to break the link between wee and the mop. We were cleaning his poo up quickly because he wanted to eat it he started to go for it and run. We had to use leave it to get out of that problem. Now he can have a sniff but he's not obsessed with it.
He was initially very frightened of the cold and dark outdoors but now he's not fussed by it. He just had to learn that dark/cold were not life threatening. (we have to be careful with the dark - he'll take twigs and stones if we let him).
He's learnt the command words for wee and poo and that saves a lot of time for both Ben and us ; fussing about in the freezing garden. Because puppies wee a lot he got the command word quickly. Poo took a few weeks longer. Often he looks at us as if we're crazy - "but why? I don't need a wee!". Sometime we try hard to empty him before bedtime and he won't go. Even so, he can hold it until we get up. We started getting up at 5am to make sure we beat him to it. Now he's not so keen on the early starts and he can wait longer - so we have been able to back off. I'm having to wake him up at about 7am now.
He's just started to bark to get our attention to open the door if we are not watching him closely enough.
He gets plenty of garden time so he doesn't see wee/poo as an opportunity to get more garden time. The cold weather probably helps here - he enjoys being in as much as out.
We have had a small number of "No! not there, come Ben, weewee" events where we have to stop him and then lead him to the pad and get him to go again. Usually he's lost the moment when we stop him but it seemed that the very specific immediate correction and explanation helped him learn the significance of the puppy pad.
I think allowing him to roam parts of the house with us taught him that it's his den too - and that's part of the reason he doesn't wee/poo inside. I'm probably making that up.
I like to let him sit on me but I always make sure he knows he's invited. He hasn't got this concept yet and he will whine to come up - I don't give into that. If he's near me and I want him up then I'll ask him to come up. Then he lets me lift him up. He has learnt to jump onto me, or to run up my legs - I just calmly place him back on the floor if he does that.
So, my advice would be relax a bit - the dog is not a computer but it's also not stupid, it will want to please and join in with the rules of the house if you treat it fairly.
I can see the crate having to be used if the dog has no good habits - e.g. you have no idea when it needs to pee - so keep it crated so that you wait until it needs to pee and then lead it to the correct place. |