253. E-mail No.1. Silkie will not use the pee pan in the guest bathroom. Why?

Toilet Training Your First Puppy in Singapore


E-MAIL:

Dear Judy,

I just bought a 5 months old silky terrier 3 weeks
ago. We are trying to toilet train since the first day
she arrived at our home. We confine her in the guest
toilet with her toy, bed and pee tray. Whenever she
had accident we will bring her to pee tray but she
still don't get it. She will sometime sleep in her pee
tray although we put her urine there. Now we even sit
in the guest toilet wait for her to eliminate, but she
will hold for as long till we leave (that was about 1
to 2 hour's time) then she pee on the floor or her bed
immediately. We really don't know what to do with her.
We bring her out every morning before we going to work
and in the evening after work. She will do her poo but
she will also poo and pee in the house when let out to
play.

We bought puppy potty training spray but no use.
Please help!!!!

Thank you very much.

Regards

E-MAIL REPLY.

Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:55:45 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Re: Please help on toilet training.

To: <...@yahoo.com>

1. Some puppies take a much longer time to toilet train because the owners are not free. Some take 2 months.

2. Three weeks of part-time toilet training is not sufficient. I presume you work the whole day, so you did not have much time to toilet train her.

3. As each case differs, I can only speculate that, in your case, you confused the puppy by putting her into a guest bathroom with lots of urine smell.

3.1 The guest bathroom is a big space from the puppy's point of view. She would have found a place to pee and poop by herself in the first 7 days (in most cases) if you had not introduced a pee tray with urine smell.

3.2 But you want her to pee in the pee tray as you had sprayed the housebreaking
urine spray. The bathroom is full of urine smell. So, the puppy got no particular toilet area.

Try the following:

Neutralise the urine smell in the toilet floor and toilet bowl with vinegar:water 1:2 thoroughly and daily.
Make the pee pan the only place with urine smell. I presume you put newspapers onto the pee pan?

4. After accidents, many puppies do not understand why you put her onto the pee tray. Lots of repeitition and hard work to make her understand.

Watch for signs of turning, squatting and sniffing and bring her to the pee tray. This is easier said than done.

4.1 Neutralise the urine smell in the accident areas too. Watch for signs of wanting to pee, carry the puppy to the pee pan. Say "pee pee". If she does that, praise a lot and/or give a treat. Repeat many times. For your case, 3 weeks of part-time toilet training is not enough.

5. Distractions. When you are there, the puppy wants to socialise with you. So she controls her bladder. Especially if you have had brought her outdoors to pee and poop.

6. Let me have a schedule of the puppy's daily activity, e.g. time to wake up, go downstairs, feeding, playing, sleeping so that I can advise further.

COMMENTS ABOUT THIS CASE.

Knowing the history of how the puppy was housed would be useful. If she was kept in a Singapore pet shop, the ideal housing would be a wire crate with wire flooring and door. The pee tray would be below the crate. When the owner works, the puppy is kept confined in the crate. When the owner is back, she is let out in the guest bathroom but nowhere else, for the first 2 - 4 weeks. This depends on whether she is using the crate as her toilet.



If she does that within a week, almost all toilet training problems are resolved. The puppy will just jump into the crate to pee and poop.

But the puppy was housed in a guest bathroom. So, she was given a larger space to roam. She did not know exactly where she should go to the toilet since she was also taken outdoors to pee and poop.

Probably there was no fixed time going outdoors too as the owner is busy working. In this case, the puppy would rather not pee or poop while the owner was around as this was the time to socialise and play with the owner when she is back from work. The dog is a pack animal and needs company.

How to toilet train the Silkie in this case? Get a fixed schedule of outdoor exercise, feeding and spend time monitoring the puppy and toilet training. Neutralise the urine smells. Accidents will occur. Watch for signs to prevent accidents and put the puppy onto the pee tray.

In many cases I encounter during my research of 300 puppies in Singapore, there is no fixed schedule for feeding, exercise and toilet training for the puppy as the owners are busy working or are not aware that there must be fixed times for feeding and outdoor exercise so that toilet training can be successfully completed in the shortest time.