347. Excellent feedback from Golden Retriever owner.

Toilet Training Your First Puppy in Singapore


No time. Just copy email reply as follows:


E-MAIL FROM DOG OWNER
...singnet.com.sg> wrote:

Dear Dr Sing,
We went to your clinic last Friday (7 Jul) with our 7-mth old Golden Retriever, Rocky for his 3rd vaccination and seeked your advice on how to toilet-train him.
After some thoughts on your suggestions, we decided to start off with neutralising his urine and poo smells in the house with white vinegar and water.
On that same evening, we neutralised the entire living room and part of the kitchen area, leaving the unneutralised part of the kitchen as his intended toilet area (the spot that he frequents most). Then covered that area with fresh newspapers and some soiled ones.
That weekend, we tried confining him to that specific kitchen area after his meals and monitored him, also tried bringing him out for walks and kept asking him to pee/poo, but were not successful. He did not pee/poo as we wanted him to. We gave up, but continued neutralising the floors every night as he still eliminates randomly at those 2 areas.
On Tuesday (11 Jul) evening, just when we thought that the methods weren't working, we saw him pee-ing right in the centre of the newspapers. We quickly praised him and offered him a treat. This time, he took the treat happily and ran off chewing it. Initially we thought he had learnt to eliminate there, but later at night, we found his poo on the kitchen floor. The following days, as we continued with neutralising, we saw some improvement. We observed he has stopped eliminating in the living room, and does it only in the kitchen area, however, he only pees on newspapers, still poo everywhere in the kitchen.
Last night we've decided not to neutralise the floors. This morning, to our surprise, we saw both his pee and poo on the papers. We're very happy to see that, and we'll continue to monitor him closely until he's really stable and makes no mistakes.
Will update you again on his progress.
Really appreciate your help and professional advice.
Thanks,

First-time Golden Retriever owner.




EMAIL REPLY TO ...singnet.com.sg Sunday July 16, 2006 NLB Toa Payoh Library 10.30am.

My computer is infested with viruses. It shut down and re-started several times earlier. After that it shut down completely. So, I am using the NLB library to reply to you. It is hard to find real computer experts in Singapore who can resolve this problem without having to re-format the whole hard disk.

I am very grateful for your contribution to my research and a book on Singapore puppy toilet training.

In reply:

1. My research and reading of other reports. It appears that white vinegar is effective only to neutralise the ammonia smell of puppy urine. Acid plus alkaline = water, to put it simply. So, the puppy can't find the elimination area.

I presume you used the same mop or had not rinsed off the urine smell thoroughly, so the puppy could detect the "accident" areas for the first few days. Corners or edges of doors may still have traces of urine. The sense of smell is very acute in the canine. However, after a few days of your hard work, you probably wiped out all urine smell. So, the puppy goes to the newspapers. I presume you did not use the soiled newspapers (2nd layer) but the floor is OK too.

2. White vinegar is said to have no effect on the poop as it does not smell of ammonia.

3. So your success later may be due to your monitoring and praises. Your puppy probably now expecting treat. Some will sit and wait for it after peeing. A few owners tell me that some even pee less but more often to get treats. I hope your puppy does not think this way.

4. Poop after feeding times. If you can have a regular schedule of feeding and exercise, without distraction of playing immediately after eating, you may be successful. Signs of elimination like sniffing, squatting and circling - bring puppy to newspapers. Praise and reward.

5. Will be most grateful if you let me know your progress in the pooping training aspect. It is from such case studies that I am able to advise as each situation and each puppy behaves differently.