Save me from the flood...

fend

Does anyone know of any good dog trainers in Galway city? Got a puppy 2 weeks ago, and to avoid a flood every morning when I wake, was looking for help to house train her....

Apparently my techniques arn't working so ANY form of help would be appreciated

biko

See this old thread from Animals & Pet Issues.

Beth

2 weeks isnt a very long time to give a puppy to learn how to hold it. Their bladder is very small and they have to learn control too. A puppy is only a baby so wont be able to hold it for very long at all. A puppy cant learn 100% in 2 weeks what it takes kids to learn in 2-3 years

Some dogs aren't fully toilet trained until they're 8-12 months old.

Are you doing the "outside every hour, outside after play, after sleep, after food" thing?

Take her outside, let her go to the loo, then praise and give a treat. She wont be long copping on that puddles=yummy stuff.

When she gets into the habit, you can introduce a command to it.

You can reduce the frequency of the outside trips then as well to every 2 hours.

Dont forget they need to go out at night too so setting an alarm clock and taking her out at night will speed up the process.

If you've tried the above technique and its not working, look into crate training. The crates dont look great (and some people say they look cruel) but its like an indoor kennel to them. A den, a safehouse, somewhere to sleep - and they will try their best to keep their sleeping area clean. A bit of reading on crate training. There's loads of stuff out on the internet about crate training a dog, the right size crate, how to introduce it etc.

DTI's online shop mentions that they send crate training notes out with their new crates, so depending on price, the notes could be worth it if there's a difference in prices from other shops - if you dont have a crate already, that is.

spurscormac

We brought our little fella to Tara.
She's involved in the rescue madra.ie based in Camus out in Connemara, but runs the courses in Westside.
Check the above website to contact her - don't want to post her phone details here.

Its all positive reward based training, and definitely opened our eyes to how our human nature was unknowingly teaching him bad things.

As for the peeing stuff - I say go with a crate from the start. They get to know it as a den, won't soil it, and will learn to hold it from a younger age.

sorella

When we took in a 4 yr old collie who had lived always outdoors, it was a amazing how naturally clean she was.

The only time she soiled indoors was when her stomach was upset once.

And she "tidied" any bits of twig etc that got into her area - the back porch - into a corner under her blanket.