Advice needed with new pup please

hughm

Hi our new 9 week old Golden Retriever Pup came home yesterday afternoon. She is wonderful. Very gentle and slowly coming around, as this is a very noisy house (lots of kids).


It took her a while to eat or drink anything. She was in the house about 6 hours before she did a wee on newspaper in our downstairs loo. AFter that she was much brighter and had a drink and some food. She even had a nice bath that evening which she enjoyed.

She slept in her own bed in our downstairs loo last night which is quite large and had a tiled floor covered in newspaper. She was as quiet as a mouse, no whimpering or barking. We put newspapers down as she does not want to venture out in to the back garden and just shivers when she is brought out. We brought her outside about 5 times yesterday but she was not into it. She did a few wees yesterday during the day on the newspaper and she did ALL her business during the night again on the newspaper.

This all fine but i don't want to start training her the wrong way. Is newspaper okay for now or is it the wrong direction now that she is in a house?

Where should she sleep whilst house training and does anyone have any solid tips on how to train her to go to the toilet outside ?

Also:
When is she old enough to start using a leash to go for a walk?

Thanks

Sigma Force

She can start going for walkies once all her vaccinations are done, mabey about a week after she's had her final shot is best.
If you move the newspaper close to the door or gradually move it close to the door that sometimes works, mabey she just needs a little bit more time to adjust. Once she starts going for walkies and realises it's not so scary she might start peeing outside more. Be patient with her and make it fun, keep some treats in your hand for her to encourage her to go outside for walks and for pees. Loads of praise when she does. She's still very young so might take some time but the fact that she's peeing on the newspaper is a plus, my brat would pee on the paper and everywhere else lol.

Spit62500

If you can think of a key word to say to the pup when she 'performs' then that might serve as a trigger when you bring her outside. It works like a charm on one of mine and is a complete failure on the other....

The most important thing is not to punish her when there's an accident - keep it positive. Frequent visits outside during the day will eventually reinforce the habit. Nights will take care of themselves as the dog gets older.

hughm

Thanks for the advice. I got her outside the back for 30 mins today for a play etc. She did not do her business though, still using the newspaper. Will work on that over the next few days as she gets more comfortable with her new home.

SuzyS1972

As a matter of interest you ask when she can go out to walk on the lead - did the breeder give you any details on her vaccination history and did he / she not mention she would need a booster shot at 12 weeks and should not venture out until about a week afterwards

Just that I am shocked at the amount of 8 ish week old puppies being walked around my area and all are " bought " dogs - i.e breeds
Worried that people breeding dogs are not even caring enough to go thru the basics with potential buyers.

hughm

Yes and no.

Breeder gave me all the vacc certs, eye test and hip score for the SIRE and Dam, microchip and a 5 genreation pedigree lineage chart, but no real care instructions.

i don't plan to bring her out anywhere yet except to meet our family vet this week.

I was just wondering at what age she would want/need to start going for walks etc. I guess that would be in another 3 weeks or so after final booster from your comments.

She is really relaxed now. Playing loads and gave her first bark during a game.
Although she did a woopsy on our livingroom floor with no warning and unfortunately no Irish Times in sight. Hope that isn't the start of something.

EGAR

Make sure you take her out after you feed her, they usually relief themselves straight after. Pups at this age should be fed several times a day with small portions.

hughm

Okay, things are going the wrong direction. She is now relieving herself on our living room, dining room and sunroom floors, moreso than on the newspaper in her area:eek:

We are being careful to bring her there every 30 to 40 mins etc especially after eating but no god. She is also not eating regularly yet. A bit here and there which makes it harder to plan her toilet trips. But she is just gogin without warning wherever she happens to be at the time. The house is open plan so it is hard to contain her when she is in our company and not in her area.

i was beginning to think we had a super smart pup that knew that newspaper was for toilet and to whimper when she wanted to be brought there, but i guess we got a regular one;)

Have done lots of research and have some good tips.

Sigma Force

Be patient, if things go a bit haywire, start again from scratch. Some pups bladders don't mature for up to 8 months.
Pups generally tend to eat less if they are due a poo so feed after a poo rather than before (works with kids too lol).
Keep her in an area where you can wash the floors, she's still very young it will take time. Mabey crate training is the way to go, because she sounds like she is doing her best bless her.
All else fails no harm in contacting a dog behaviourist or taking her to puppy classes once she's had all her shots, great way to get one on one help and to mix with other puppies. If there's one in your area.
You can get puppy pens or an alternative is to modify a play pen or if you have a door way a baby gate.
For crate training you need a crate big enough for her to move around in but not big enough for her to do her poops in.
Leave it open during the day, let her go in and out of it freely, put in some toys and treats or a cosy blanket. Let it be her safe place, close the door for short periods at a time e.g. 5 mins to start with to get her used to it.

hughm

Thanks for the encouragement. The one message i got loud and clear from the research is not to be cross with her if she gets it wrong. We just say 'No' and carry her to the newspaper area. (she never finishes the job there if she is interrupted) We even go and give out to her mess (with her watching) and bring it over to the newspaper area and then tell it how good it is once it is in the right place (with her watching).

She has only done 1 wee outside for which she got big praise and a treat but I can't get her to repeat it. She just wants to go back inside and could go to the loo within a couple of mins of being let in. We even put her soiled newspaper outside to encourage her to go there but no joy yet.

Time and consistency is what we need.

I am confused now as to whether to concentrate on getting her back going to the loo on her newspaper in the house or keep pushing the outside. I was planning to do a bit of both and praise her either way but only reward her with a treat for outside loo. Any suggestions. I don't want to confuse her but I need a workable plan for my wife who is doing most of this during the day whilst running around after kids etc etc etc. It's not practical for my wife to spend 20 mins out of every hour outside waiting for the puppy to do her potty.

peasant

Have you had a look outside recently? It's cold, dark and wet.
Not exactly an inviting place to settle down and do your business. In addition to that, the pup is only there a few days and the outside is unfamiliar and frightening. Add to that x amount of people hanging about, impatiently waiting for her to "do it" so that they can get back in again and the whole outside thing gets a very negative vibe altogether ...to the pup anyway.

Training her to do it inside on newspaper is counterproductive ...given a chance she will always use the more comfortable, convenient and familiar option. Giving out to the pile of poo is just funny

Whether it is "practical" or not ...the only way to get her to do her business outside is:

a) familiarise her with outdoors, make it a fun and relaxed place for her, play with her outside, let her walk about and familiarise herself

b) praise her for any business she does outside, ignore any inside jobs

c) get to know her bahaviour and watch her with eagle eyes, so that eventually you can coax her outside before she has to go and then things will start to fall into place.

Lastly ...be patient, don't expect any miracles ...she's only a baby

hughm

Thanks, I did feel like a plonker giving out to poo, but I was just following the advice of others.....Might give that one a miss from now on.

peasant

The "secret" is to just convey one message, not several different ones at the same time.

That means you want her to understand that outside is the place to do it, not inside. Trying to train her to do it on the newspaper if, for whatever reason she doesn't make it outside, just confuses her and the issue.

Telling her "no" while she is in the middle of doing her business isn't helpful either. She will not associate the "no" with the wrong location, but with the act itself.
While she may be aware that she is currently peeing on the carpet, telling her "no" at that moment to her will NOT mean "it's not ok to pee on the carpet, please do it outside" but rather "when I pee, i get shouted at" ... hence she doesn't pee until she just simply can't hold it any longer. That's the reason why currently she is doing it everywhere ...she just holds it in until she literally bursts ...wherever she may be at that moment.

The trick is to praise her while peeing in the correct location and she will then (after a few repetitions) begin to associate one with the other.

Stop telling her "no" and stop confusing her with newspaper ...and be patient.

hughm

Don't get me wrong, she never gets shouted at. When we say 'No' it is just that we say 'No'. It is said calmly and she is removed Outside of this morning to where she peed before.

She does not seem to be in any way scared to pee nor does she appear to be holding it until she bursts. She can have a full pee on the floor without being noticed, so no interuption and no 'No' said to her, and then she can do it again as little as 10 mins later.

We are removing the newspaper. This will only go down at night beside her bed. We will try and progress with the great outdoors and encourage her to play and explore and hopefully do her business there more and more out there.

Our 4 kids were a sinch to toilet train in comparison.....Putting a big nappy on her is becoming very tempting:D

peasant

I didn't say (or at least mean to say:D ) that you were shouting at her, just wanted to point out that saying "no" while she is doing her business might lead to the wrong association in her little head.

According to your last post you seem to be on the right way now ...so keep it up.

hughm

Update for those of you helping me

She did her business last night in the garden twice, a pee after tea and a pee and poop before bed,


Brought her out for about 30 mins on off this morn and got another result about 10 mins after her brekkie, morning pee and poop.

We will try confining her to her bedroom and side passage for more of the day to avoid accidents and only bring her in to the main house (very open plan) for more Supervised play sessions after she has done her business.

Thanks for the advice so far.

racso1975

Good man hugh hav been following your story with interest as i am getting my dawg on Feb 1st so am interested in all the advice i can get.

Our man in Havana

What are you feeding the pup?? Pups are greedy & should eat lots of food. Also you have kids are they giving her food?? She needs 3 meals a day! My puppy rottweiller gets readybreak in the morning as the calcium is FAB of pups & he has bakers complete puppy food for lunch & dinner he is 12 weeks old & is growing well on wednsday he weighed 12.8kilos & has a lovely glossy coat.

damo605

This remind me of when our dog was a puppy and we were trying to train her the WRONG way by giving out to her when she would relieve herself inside (We didn't know any better at the time). I reckon at this point she knew she would get in trouble for 'going' on the carpet so one night, while curled up in front of the fire she must have decided she 'needed to go' so got up and hopped up on the couch and had a good long whiz for herself I've got to admit it was good thinking on her behalf!
Thank god for rented houses, she was fully house trained before we got our own place :cool:

EGAR

Bond007, your advise is not what I would recommend. Pups which are growing too fast due to high protein etc levels in their food are more likely to develop OCD and other ailments as the bones cannot take the rate of growth, this is especially important with large and heavy breeds. Too much calcium in a diet can lead to bone overgrowth which is very hard to correct in an adult dog.

mags16

May I suggest you read a book called "The Dog Listener" for some house training and general training tips. They say that when your puppy does it's business, you use a cross voice to say "no". Then clean it up really well ( they will do it again in the same spot if they can still smell it). Bring the poo or wee to the garden to where you want her to go, bringing her with you. When she sniffs her poo/pee where it is meant to be, lavishly praise her. However, she may be too young to be able to control her bladder or bowels. So don't expect too much too soon.

SuzyS1972

damo605 wrote:

This remind me of when our dog was a puppy and we were trying to train her the WRONG way by giving out to her when she would relieve herself inside (We didn't know any better at the time). I reckon at this point she knew she would get in trouble for 'going' on the carpet so one night, while curled up in front of the fire she must have decided she 'needed to go' so got up and hopped up on the couch and had a good long whiz for herself I've got to admit it was good thinking on her behalf!
Thank god for rented houses, she was fully house trained before we got our own place :cool:

Very funny !
I enjoyed reading that as it perfectly highlights how the dog has NOT got the forward thinking to realise that NO means not on that particular part of the house but just NO ..
My little beagle x terrier took a whole year to crate train after some eejit stuck her nose in her pee ( previous owner ) time and again and she hid her pee all the time as she thought it was wrong to pee full stop.
Glad to say she's grand now - sure what can you do - pick her up and say nothing - guide her towards where she should go - i.e the garden and reward her when she gets it right.

Btw - try not to use any cleaning products with ammonia in them - they smell like wee and will only encourage the dog to go in the freshly cleaned area.
Some washing powder dissolved in hot water or vinegar is a great cleaner.

spfeno

Following this with great interest HughM. We're in the same same boat with our 10 week old "Bailey" (named aftrer my wife's favourite tipple).

She sleeps in the utility room which has papers at the back door at night and does wees there at night. By and large during the day she does it out in the back garden but thats just with constant supervision i.e. watching her when she starts sniffing around and lifting her out every half hour or on the hour. Don't get me wrong, we've had loads of accidents but she's confined to the kitchen (tiled floor thank God ) and will be until this is all sorted.

The real downside is her expensive tast in my young Japanese Maples in our new flower beds - I think I will have to invest in a wireless fence - does anyone have any experience of these ( www.radiofence.ie or the likes of it)

Will try to upload recent photo ...............

Can't seem to manage it - upload keeps failing - file size seems to be OK ?

Instructions please ?

damo605

Radio fences are brilliant - We got ours from http://www.radiofenceireland.com/ - cost 300 euro. A mate bought one off ebay for under 200 and it really seemed crap in comparison.
The most important thing is to follow the training instructions FULLY - I know many people who have them and just ran the wire around, put the collar on the dog and thought that's it but in reality it just serves to give their dog a shock as she takes off :rolleyes:
We followed the training instructions and except for the initial trainging shock and maybe one 'accident' early on she hasn't had one since (Over a year ago) - we even have her trained so that she will pass the boundary with her lead on but not a hope will she go near it otherwise!
It should be seen as a training thing because if it's done correctly there should be no need to use it after a month or two.
I wouldn't recommend a radio fence for unsupervised use, such as containment while at work, becuse if something happens such that the dog does get out they may not be able to get back in.
Highly recommended once used properly

FranknFurter

Rather than spending 300 euro to shock your dog, why not spend 20 euro in B&Q and get a PIR DoorChime.
They are battery powered and put it beside the maple, everytime puppy comes close, puppy will hear a very loud BINGBONG! which wont stop till she moves away, usually enough to distract and they wont want to keep hearing it every 5 seconds!
(Easilly made waterproof with some duck-tape too for our irish weather)

B

spfeno

Thanks guys - will take all advice on board and figure something out - atm she doesn't spend too much time outside because of the weather


I think I've managed the photo upload ............

.........yep thats her - getting bigger by the day on a cocktail of HILLS dog feed and Japanese Maple for dessert !!!!!!!!!!

hughm

Hi all,

we are only feeding her Pedigree Chum Puppy dry food. SOmetimes she likes it dry other times soaked in a bit of warm water.

She also gets puppy treats for going woopsy ouytside.

On that note, we were not getting anywhere in relation to toilet training. She was relieving herself every 15 mins or so. It was nearly impossible to keep her from having accidents when with us in the house and we still had paper down for night. When we put her out to go to the loo she didn't always know why she was out there. So we invested in a crate on Saturday. So far so good. She has spent 2 night with her crate now and she has had 2 dry nights. She is learning to hold it for longer periods. We usually crate her for about an hour then let her out for a loo and a play. We were out yesterday for 2 hours and left her crated with a small drink of water and she was dry when we returned and went straight out for a wee. We have the crate in out family room so she is still around us when she is crated. She is not complaining about going in now. As soon as we take her out she is carried straight to her patio area outside and she goes to the loo within 1-2 mins, sometimes immediately. She gets huge praise and a treat. She is still havig accidents but only if we fail to watch her. Yesterday she went to the back door twice to be let out. Progress.

I didn't like the idea of crating but it works. I hate the sight of it. It is a great pity that you can't seem to find any crates that are designed to be in peoples homes as a piece of furniture. After all we will be looking at this huge cage for another year min. We do have a throw over it but it is still big and ugly. I saw some with on the internet with wicker around the outside and edges and it really took the look off it it but you can't buy them here and we couldn't wait 2 weeks to get one delivered from the USA.

Anyway we'll get over how it looks as long as it does the job and keeps her and us happy.

peasant

btw ...Pedigree Chum is about the worst food ever for a dog, Puppy or otherwise.

It's full of artificial colourants, preservatives, hardeners, softeners, flavours, sweetners. You name it ...it's in there.

After digestion, the "end product" is way too big and stinks to the high heavens.

Try and change to something better. It doesn't have to be puppy food either.
A golden Retriever will be quite a substantial dog in the end and should grow slowly rather than fast and not get too heavy too soon. Otherwise its bones and joints might not be able to cope with the fast growth.

A good quality dry food with a protein content of no more than 20 - 22% will be just fine. Make sure the food has as little artificial crap in it as possible and get something that is generally and conveniently available for you. Some dogs stomachs get quite upset when food changes from one day to the next, so its better to buy something that you can be sure can be got again next time.

Phase out the pedigree slowly, over a few days by mixing ever more of the new food into it as the days go on.

hughm

Thanks Peasant. We bought soem Hill Science puppy food at our last shop. Is that any better in your opinion?

peasant

I have no experience with this food, but according to what I hear from other people it should be a lot better than Pedigree.

Our man in Havana

EGAR wrote:

Bond007, your advise is not what I would recommend. Pups which are growing too fast due to high protein etc levels in their food are more likely to develop OCD and other ailments as the bones cannot take the rate of growth, this is especially important with large and heavy breeds. Too much calcium in a diet can lead to bone overgrowth which is very hard to correct in an adult dog.

Never had a problem with any of the other 10 dogs can you tell me what you would feed??