Pottying in the house

k_oller

New Member
Help! I have a seven month old puppy who I have had for almost three months. When I first got her I took her out every two hours to see if she had to go to the bathroom. After a while I started taking her out at longer and longer intervals and she seemed to do fine. We would have the occasional accident in the house but that was to be expected. I never punished her, simply cleaned it up. when she goes outside I praise her and reward her, but sometimes when I take her out she sniffs around and then just sits down at my side. I figure she doesn't have to go so we go back inside. About 10 minutes later I find presents. I have tried to enforce the potty on command by saying go potty whenever she is going but it hasnt seemed to help. I would think that by now she would know where to go to the bathroom and ask to go out. What am I doing wrong? She is also crate trained and will not go in her crate so obviously the instinct is there. Please please help!
 

herb2relax

New Member
Seems as tho you are doing everything correctly. I really like using the command to get them to go. I didnt do it but my trainer said you should keep them on the leash until they go potty to earn the chance to run around outside. He said if you go inside right after pottying they would learn to wait so they could stay outside. Hope I explained it correctly. Keep up the good work, I love that you dont punish for accidents I fought with my whole family on that one.
 

fickla

Experienced Member
your dog is still pretty young and is expected to have some accidents. i also think that not every dog learns to tell their owner they need to go out. My 2.5yr corgi never told me he needed to go out, he just held it, until he was 2 and we got a puppy who did naturally start to tell me as he aged. But even now the corgi most just holds it.

If you really think your dog has to go and she doesn't go right away, I would only give her like 5min to go potty and then take her back inside and either crate her, have her on leash tethered to you, or just watch her like a hawk. Crate/tether/watch for about 10min and then try again. Most dogs learn quickly that if they don't go right away they don't get to play until they do.

hang in there. you're doing a great job with everything!
 
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