Housebreaking Problem

[Aonir]

My puppy has gotten the urinating outside part almost complete... But she NEVER poops outside! Anyone have advice or ideas?

[Mary's Mama]

If you catch her in the act of poo'ing in the house, give her a "ah ah ah", pick it up and take it outside where you want her to go, put it on the ground and praise her like crazy as if she did right. That will let her know inside is a no no but outside is GOOD!! It usually works pretty well as long as you are consistent. Also remember that they are more likely to poo soon after they are feed. Try to keep track of when she is going and get an idea of her schedule and then try to make sure she is outside when she normally has to go.

[atghylin]

Aonir, is there a particular spot she likes to go (i.e. the carpet of a certain room). If there is then get rid of the scent. When Felix has an accident (usually after a bath because I won't let him out of the house until he's completely dry) I reprimand him, clean it up, spray the area with some watered down simple green, scrub as much of it out as possible, then spray a bit of Fabreeze extra strength over the spot. He never uses the same spot twice because he find it again.

Good luck!

Amanda

[ferky1]

Are you crate training or using any other type of confinement? This really helps. Placing them in an environment where they don't want to poop really helps them learn where they should poop.

[Aonir]

No, I hadn't really crate training since someone was home all day.. But now I'm gone cause of college now, I've been putting her in the crate now. She hates it though! She loves playing in it, as long as the door isn't where she can push it open. Now she's ben the bar thing to where I CANT close it! Smart puppy... She goes in the same spots through-out the house.. We have a puppy pad on the most used spot, but that just made her pick a new one...

After I let her out of her crate, she goes for a nice walk (or run...) but she still hasn't pooed outside during this period. We don't really catch her in the act.. She's sneaky. If we're upstairs, she'll go downstairs and vice versa... :o So now fiance makes me call her everytime she even leaves the room ... Now she won't even come when I call her! It's hectic

[ferky1]

Your problems are well beyond my knowledge base, but I do see one thing that I find interesting: you don't catch her in the act.

If she is an un-housetrained pup, then how does she have enough freedom of movement to consistently sneak away and poop outside of your view? I am not trying to sound like an expert and I know that everyone uses different techniques, but before Miles was housetrained he was ALWAYS supervised. If there weren't at least 2 eyes on him, then he was in his crate. Period. When Miles would try to leave the room, he would be called back. He didn't always want to come back but I'm the boss so tough sh*t. Your dominance is reinforced by making the pup come to you even when she doesn't want to. If she thinks that she's the boss then she will ignore your calls. (sorry if I'm siding with your fiance :oops: ). You reduce the chance she will go without you catching her if she doesn't have free reign of the house (you also reduce the chances of her getting into dangerous situations).

Catching the pup in the act and correcting her is very important. Even more important is knowing when it is going to happen (body language, hints, time of day) and getting her outside. When she does go outside, you praise her like she just found the cure for cancer.

It sounds to me like she just doesn't know that inside isn't the place to poop. Your corrections don't mean much because they are after the fact. Additionally, and I know it may be hard, but you should try using the crate as a housetraining tool. It worked so perfectly for me. If she is like most dogs and won't poop in the confined crate, then by all means use that to your advantage. She leaves the crate and immediately goes outside, if she doesn't poop, then it's back into the crate for 20 minutes or so, then back outside. She will go eventually and most likely it won't be in the crate. And because she will be praised so lavishly for going outside, she will begin to get the connection.

I don't mean to sound preachy, but I just went through this and had terrific results.

Good luck

[Aonir]

She stays with me the whole time I'm at home, she doesn't attempt to leave. the problem with me calling her is, now when I call her back in the room, she gets petted to tell her she was good for coming back. But afterwards, she darts back out of the room! This only happens when fiance is home... She runs around like something was after her and plays with the cats, run up and down the stairs... I do want to crate train, but I don't want her crated when someone is home.. Until we get that crate fixed, its a problem right now. The my fiance didn't come home for lunch, so she was in there around 6 hours without being let out! So that is also discouraging me from that. She gets let outside every 3 hours..

She used to have the habbit of urinating 'before' we open the door.. i mean RIGHT before! Then she had the habbit of going as soon as we let her back in. I'm glad that phase is over phew.. She doesn't like rain, so she won't go outside when it rains :roll:

We usse a shampooer to get up her smells and a scent-remover whenever she goes.. But it's kind of hard when you have 2 un-litter trained ferrets (that she loves to chase, but cant catch)

[atghylin]

I forgot about this until this afternoon when Kristopher came home school. He went outside to play and I caught him in the act of recreating The Teenage Mutant Turtles movie. Puppies are very much like toddlers and young children, they mimic everything they see. You might want to litter train those ferrets first. If she sees that they have a specifc place they have to go poop at then she might follow suit. I would carefully watch her just in case she decides that she wants to use the litter boxes too.

Good Luck!

[Queen Bitch]

If your ferrets aren't litter trained why do you let the run all over and make messes? :o

[ellieangel]

We usse a shampooer to get up her smells and a scent-remover whenever she goes.. But it's kind of hard when you have 2 un-litter trained ferrets (that she loves to chase, but cant catch)

I think this is the key Aonir :-?
If she can smell ferret wee she may try to cover it with her own smell or it may just make her think it's ok for her to do it cos the ferrets do.