Why yorkies?
 

I am new to your site and this is my first Yorkie but I have had many different dogs throughout my life and I have never failed to house train ANY dog. Judging from the attention given to the subject on this site it would seem that I am not the only one having problems. I am not going to ask for advice on how to house train a Yorkie but it might help to understand why this breed is so difficult to train.I have had 2 Bull Mastiffs,2 German Shepherds, a Doberman, 2 Irish Setters, 2 German Wire Haired Pointers, a German Short haired Pointer, a Heinz 57, a Brittany, a Springer Spaniel, an English Setter, a Lab, I currently have a Rottweiler and a Boxer. All of the animals were house trained at a very early age thanks in no small part to my wife's diligence. We also have a Yorkie that is 4 mo's old and doesn't have a clue that he should be going outside. My Boxer is 7 mo's and was completely housebroken by age 3 mo's as was my Rottweiler who is also 4 mo's right now. We let him out immediately after he wakes up, after he eats, after a rowdy play session with the other puppies, and numerous times in between. I just don't get it. It is not like we are not paying attention or we don't know what to do, none of it works on this little fart. There are many times ,after he has been outside for half an hour to an hour, he will come in and pee right away???
Why are Yorkies so hard to house train, is it because there blatter is so tiny? I have run out of ideas. I am retired, so my wife and myself are home all day and he is supervised constantly but he still manages to pee when no one is looking. You can't keep your eyes on him constantly!

Haha, I'm in the same boat. Wow it was so easy training my mastiff pup and my Doberman to go outside, while my 4 month old yorkie Cookie always manages to sneak a pee or two a day inside (and on bad days 3 or 4). :(

I guess it's because Cookies's only 4-5 lbs though. My adult yorkie Minnie was so good about going out (until late in life when she couldn't control her bladder well while sleeping), though she was 11-12 lbs.

The answer is in their breed name....YORKSHIRE TERRIER!!!!! You have to be more stubborn and resolute than the puppy is, or he will win the battle of wills! You MUST be consistant and persistant in your training method....you can not let him win, dont let him get away with being inconsistant.....there are different methods of housebreaking your puppy...whatever you decide to do, you can do it one day, and let it slid the next....you have to do it every minute of the day. For starters, you can not let him run all over the house....he can not be out of your site, because you have to watch him constantly, and when you see the behavior that indicates he is about to pee/poop, you have to catch him and either take him outside or put him on his pee pad. So, restrict his area....I would suggest an x-pen, so that shen you are busy and can not have your eyes glued to him, you can put him in the x-pen, with the bottom covered in pee pads.....some people tether the pup to them....actually put a leash on the pup and fasten it to you, so he is never out of your site....you have to catch him before he pees, take him outside and command, "TT" or whatever you use, and when he does, you act like a giddy idiot, and reward him immediately with his favorite treat! I used a specific treat only used for potty training....

Alright is he peeing or marking? Are all your other animals neutered or spayed?

Here is what I had to do to housebreak my Yorkie. I was an abysmal failure at the peepad thing, as like you I had only owned large dogs before. And I freely admit I did not supervise as closely as I should have.

For one week solid, beyond what you did and do, outside to pee/poo, after every meal, waking up, play sessions yada yada.

I tethered him to my waist. And that worked to help me to catch him in action so to speak. Also of course you do know about enzymatic cleanser; also get a black light to highlight those spots of urine you might have missed.

He is crated at night, and when-ever I need freedom to clean or what-ever.

I am not sure Why Yorkies are so hard to housebreak, this is my first Yorkie. They do have small bladders for sure, but Razzle when he wants to and needs to holds if for at least 8hours as a full grown male.

But if you have other full males and or females in the house it will be very difficult.

Hi and Welcome to YT! Treats really help.

I had to laugh when reading your post. They are the worst at housebreaking I agree. The advice given so far is very good. Leashing them to you really helps and confining them to a small area is very helpful. My Zoey is three years old and every time she poos on her pad she runs to me very hyper and I get loud and tell her what a good girl she is. This makes her very happy and me too. Hang in there and be consistent and your little one will reward you with so much love and joy. Just a word of caution - be careful with the bigger dogs playing rough with your yorkie. Their bones break very easily.

I did the same thing. Tethering helped me learn their potty signals quickly, and gave me the opportunity to grab & go. I also took them out every 45 minutes to an hour at first & slowly increased the time between potty breaks over time. Good luck!!

Oh my . . I love you. You are too funny.

Hello and welcome to YT. I was reading you thread and I had to laugh. I am working on potty training outside. Like Yorkiemom1 said, consistency and persistence is the only way. It is a hard road. I am using crate with xpen and giving him treats and cheer when he does his business. Everybody thinks I am nuts but if it works that is all that matters.

I trained Tibbe for a year but he is totally clean in the house.

Oddly enough he doesn't poop in the house,he is good all night to, he just pees whenever and where ever he feels like it. We watch every move he makes mainly because as someone else stated we need to make sure the playtime with the bigger dogs doesn't get too rough, we don't want the Yorkie hurting the Boxer or my Rottweiler. He takes his naps on my shoulder or on the couch but he still manages to get a pee in. It doesn't take but a second and you can barely tell what he is doing you can't keep your eyes on him 100% of the time but we come close.My boxer is spayed but my Rottweiler has all of his equipment and I plan on keeping him intact, The Yorkie to!

morgan was the hardest dog that I have ever had to housebreak// I think that it is a terrier thing

that sounds more like marking than peeing

I was thinking the same thing. OP, since he's not pooping in the house, have you considered that he may be marking?

He is only 4mo's old.He barely has his chi chi beans starting to show. I have never dealt with the marking thing. I just lost the last of my 3 male dogs a few months ago and they lived to be 14 - 15 years old all hunting dogs and all house dogs, there was never a power struggle issue with them so I have no point of reference for "marking" behavior. Today I was watching him (like a hawk as usual) and he started to go into his crate, I though he was getting ready to pee so I was just about to grab him and he walked away from his crate. Then I saw a little half dollar size puddle. He had his front feet in the crate his back legs outside the crate and peed!!! Half in and half out. I couldn't tell he was going and then he was done. This is miserable, as much as I adore him if I had known that it would be this hard to house break him I would not have got him.

Maybe you could think about reforming him to someone with yorkie experience. I once had to find a home for a cute little Maltese I adopted because he peed everywhere. He had been owned by a flight attendant that gave him up because of the peeing problem and yelled at him. I found him a home with an elderly couple who adored him and his problem disappeared. I had a new born baby and just didn't have the time to work with him properly. It was a happy ending for all.

I have 3 and they all have accidents. They know where their suppose to go and go there 80% of the time but the 20 % they don't is a real pain. I confine them when not home and they are fine. When I let them out of the bedroom to go outside or feed them is when they decide they want to go on the wood floors. I have had 8 yorkies and none of them were 100% potty trained. I had 1 pom and she never had an accident. So I don't know if it's me or them!

Getting rid of him is out of the question! I adore him, I hate the problem, but we NEVER get mad at him. I know he is not doing it maliciously, it is just frustrating trying to solve it. I am just saying that if I knew this before hand I would have selected a different breed.I have had dogs that were stubborn and worked thru it but I am not saying he is being stubborn I am saying he doesn't have a clue.

Well you can try the belly band inside the house, you use a sanitary napkin inside of the silk band. You need to change it or at least check it every 4 hours or so.

This way if he lifts his leg to pee or mark, he won't be staining everything around.

When I have a female in heat in our home, I do need to resort to this. Otherwise it is a mess. My large dogs do not mark inside, never have, probably never will.

Mine does the same thing. Pees when I'm not looking. I thought we had this down and then he started to do this in the night in the downstairs hallway. He may have to sleep in his xpen for a while!!!:rolleyes:

I thought if I had him sleep in his xpen with lots of pads, he might remember what the pads are for. I leave pads out for him in the night, but he still goes downstairs to that hallway.

EVERY 4 HOURS??? More like every 20 min.

If he is going e very 20 mins I would take him to a vet in case of a uti or some other urinary problem.

Every 20 mins might be an exaggeration, but every 1-2 hours would be pretty accurate.

I must love hard to train dogs, lol. Dachshunds are also stubborn like the Yorkie, but have found that with them, I put them out anytime I saw them put the nose to the ground and start sniffing or if they started to do the circle. I finally have learned their tells as to when it is time to go out. Bailey will come up to me and do a little "woof" sound and then try to bump my nose. Hope you are able to get him trained soon. They are such great companions

Actually the last few days he has been getting better, or maybe I should say WE are getting better but either way there has only been 1 pee pee incident. It's too late now the little rodent has stolen my heart so we will just have to stay vigilant and hope he eventually gets the message. Non illigitimus carborundum !!

Just an update on this posting. My pup is now 8 mos old and I think he is FINALLY house trained. He hasn't had any accidents for a couple weeks now, so I think we are there. It has never taken this long with any of our other dogs thru the years. Our other dogs were usually house trained within the first couple of weeks after coming home with us. My wife gets the lion's share of the credit she is relentless about getting him out at specific times and it finally paid off. Incidentally we didn't use any tethers,crates, or any other gimmicks just persistence. That is probably why it took so long but nevertheless he made it.

Yay! WooHoo! WTG!

Glad it finally worked out for you. Persistence paid off. Now my Winston is not your typical Yorkie, very unusual as he learned to go potty outside only, the very first day home with us, and he was only 8 weeks old. Never has had a single "accident" in the house, ever. My suggestion only works if you hear it before your bring your pup home. Do not let his paws touch your floors until he has been outside and had done his duty there...from then on he knew where to go and that it made us soooooooooooooooooooooo happy. That's all they really want to do is make us happy.

Sorry to hear that you are having difficulty:( I am no help as my Yorkie came house broken at 9 weeks. He slept through the night from the start as well. I only wish my children had been the same. lol All the best in perservering though. I'm sure it will work with all the 'hawk' attention you are giving.

So glad to hear that it finally worked out for you:)