Help house training a 4 months old Shih Tzu

fawkese1

awesome! like i said, i'm sure he'll get the hang of it

Tine2105

Update: well, we had only one pee on the floor in two days and two poopies. Not bad at all. He did pee on the floor while he was leashed to me however... I was sitting at the computer and he peed behind the chair. I suppose I have to be just as vigilant when he is tied to me... He seems to get that I will open the door when he scratches on it, but he never does it to go potty, just because he either sees the cat inside and wants to go play or because I'm inside and he's outside or vice/versa... Still, I'm sure he'll get that too eventually!

Tine2105

Well, we now have another little problem... I'd been noticing strong smelly pee odours at night, well, turns out he pees in his crate! I take him out before bedtime and then really early in the morning (the cat always wakes me up around 5, so I take the dog out at the same time) then again when I properly get up around 8...

The crate is very small, the smallest I could buy. I don't get it, aren't they supposed to never pee where they sleep??

Should I set the alarm every 2 hours and take him out? Seems like a bad habit to form... Good thing I'm not working at the moment lol

fawkese1

has he been checked for a UTI? most of the time, the dogs absolutely do not want to soil the crate (unless it is too big) but you see crate soiling a lot with puppy-mill dogs/dogs that are crated for too long. crate soiling can be a bit difficult to fix, but it can be done. but first i would want to make sure that he isn't doing this because of illness...

Tine2105

He's been checked out completely, I never leave anything to chance and have had all the analyses possible done (feces, blood, urine etc...) when I got him. I have a grill to make the crate smaller, I'll have to try that...

fawkese1

try it, and see, but if he has any more mistakes you'll have to try a different approach, you absolutely do not want him to continue to soil his crate, imo, it is worse than house soiling and harder to remedy...

poor li'l guy, and poor you! hope the smaller crate size works!

pawzaddict

how small is the crate? can you take a pic?

Where did you get him from a breeder or a store?

Tine2105

I figured out the problem... He soils 'cause he just can't hold it in!! I caught him emptying the contents of the cats water bowl right before bed time! I woke up at 3h30 because he was moving around a lot in the crate and I took him out. He barely made it to the door poor thing, and it was a very, very big puddle!

So far so good with the leash, the special treats and figuring out his "schedule". No accidents since the weekend! I think he's slowly getting the hang of it.

Crate is an XS one, dunno the size (never could figure out inches, I calculate in centimeters lol) He comes from a store, but it's one who has their own breeders (you can contact them and their vet if you want, they have the dog's papers and they only sell them neutered and chipped, which is pretty much unheard of here...)

brodysmom

I'm having the same problem with my new addition Brody. We brought him home at 10 weeks as well. Brody is sort of "crate trained". He has his bed in the crate and that is where he sleeps for now until we can get him potty trained. I take Brody out first thing in the morning and sometimes he'll pee outside and sometimes he won't. He has only pooped outside ONCE. When we take him outside we give him about 15 minutes, he does A LOT of sniffing but never does anything. When we bring him outside he immediately will pee and then not long after that he will poo. It's like he things he supposed to pee inside the house!! We have put down 2 puppy pads by each door to try to help him learn to go toward the door when he has to go. I'd say 8 times out of 10 he'll go on the puppy pad. I'm so confused about why he won't go outside. I know potty training takes time, but I feel like we've gotten nowhere because he hardly ever will use it outside. I've read ya'lls posts and its good advice but do you have any other suggestions since its like he refuses to go outside? I'd appreciate any insight you have.

fawkese1

if you make sure to reward him every time he goes outside, he will eventually start to pick up on it... as was suggested to the OP, keeping him leashed to you when you can't completely supervise him will help as well as taking him out once every half hour to hour for atleast 5 minutes... that way you are sure to catch him going outside... he will get the idea, and if you keep track of around what time he actually goes, you can slowly take him out a bit less...


congrats good job!