Puppy still not toilet trained at 9 months

Hi,

I am a little worried my jack Russell cross isn't toilet trained at 9 months. She is spayed. She is let out every couple of hours and gets a lot of praise for going to the toilet. She never poos inside only pees. She often will go to the door to go outside but then other times will show no signs of needing to go and then just wee inside. I try to correct by stopping her and taking her outside straight away, she's never punished or shouted at. I'm worried she still hasn't got it, I think I worry more cause I keep seeing threads about how they should be trained at 6 months. She also has bizarre accidents such as on our bed (she sometimes escapes upstairs and jumps on) and most recently she was sat on my knee and stood up and peed right on me!

Oh dear
Seems to me and I maybe way off here but I think your dog is toilet trained in that she knows how to ask to go out.Think she'd be pooing also in the house if she wasn't getting it!!
Imagine the peeing on the bed, in the house and on you maybe a separate issue all together. A territorial issue possibly.
Other members with more experience hopefully will be able to offer advice. Hope you get it sorted

To be quite honest it occured to me that it could be something to with being spayed so very early. Very often spayed bitches can be incontinent.
Again the peeing on the bed could be another issue, but peeing when on your knee shouts incontinence, or maybe a urine infection. I would get her checked over by the vet before anything else.

I agree with the vet check. It doesn't sound like a training issue.

As soon as I read this I didn't think it was a toilet training issue. My first thought was anxiety/insecurity - only you would know if that was an issue with her and after reading the responses, I too agree it could possibly be a mechanical problem. It sounds like she may not have the sensation of needing to pee and then it just comes out? That might be an infection or an injury (during spaying maybe).

I'm no expert but just be careful what medication the vet offers. My old girl became incontinent at a late age and the hormonal medication was horrible it made her bleed and I think over time it made her very unhappy. Maybe acupuncture or homeopathy could help your dog.

I agree with TawneyWolf and Baxter about this taking her age into account.

The only thing I'd add is that with dogs who are not totally 'housetrained' yet - I don't leave it up to them to let me know when they need to go out to pee' I stick with the regime of me taking them out very regularly whether they show any signs of needing to pee or not.

I would get a wee urine sample and ask your vet to check it for an infection - you need to rule that out before anything else

There is no magic age when they should be reliably house trained, my Pugs were not reliable until a year old. I have a dog with spay incontinence and she only ever wee'd while resting or asleep, she never squatted randomly in front of me because even mid flow she was blissfully unaware of what was happening. I would get a urine analysis done to rule out any health issue but it sounds more as though she is a having trouble differentiating between indoors and out. I know with my pugs I think the tiled floor in the conservatory confused them a bit as it's a very similar surface to the patio, they never went on the carpets. With my girl with spay incontinence the treatment once we found one that worked has been problem free, and she's on a very low dose for her size. Mine takes propalin not incurin which is known to cause problems with bleeding and didn't work on my dog anyway. Although she didn't bleed on incurin she did become very attractive to male dogs.

Lets turn this round to help you understand more, often when there is a problem we don't understand.

If you were toilet training a child would you expect her/him to understand what is needed by taking her go every couple of hours? Training a dog is getting them into the habit of going outside. You need to put aside 2 weeks were you can concentrate on teaching her to toilet outside. I will put below how I train pups and adult dogs, like children they learn at different times.

She isn't ready to be left to go when she wants, many owns stop taking them out to son then wonder why their dog goes back to toileting inside again, they blame the dog but it is there training is at fault.

Stopping her from weeing is correcting her, she will get anxious and stressed, this is difficult one though, you really eed to get her out BEFORE she starts to wee.

She probably hasn't for many reasons but the reason doesn't matter now and ignore what others say about when they should be trained, they don't have your dog.

Weeing on the bed is not an accident but could be stress, keep all bedroom doors shut then she can't.

This is how I toilet train a dog.

It is very important to us humans for our dogs not to toilet in our homes but teaching a dog not to seems to be causing a lot of problems. It doesn't matter how young or old your dog is, they can still be toilet trained but you have to be very consistent, slip up once, and it will set your dog back.

First make sure you have several days free to concentrate on toilet training your dog, you need this to get it established for yourself and your dog. Dogs learn by being repetitive, miss and your dog goes backwards.

1. Never try to teach your dog to toilet on paper or pads.
Many dogs taught this way never learn to toilet outside because they have been taught it is ok to toilet inside, dogs don't generalise and don't understand that they can't toilet inside when there is no paper or pads.

2. Keep all outside doors closed while you are toilet training no matter how hot it is.
If you have the outside doors open your dog doesn't know where the house stops and the garden begins, this really does confuse your dog so all doors must be closed.

3. Always take your dog outside, never put him out while training him.
If you put your dog outside you can't see when he goes, if you can't see him go you can't tell him that is what you want him to do by giving him lots and lots and lots and lots of praise, party, make him feel is the best thing since sliced bread. Many give dogs treats but I prefer to use praise. Puppies do a double wee, they go outside, you praise and bring them in only for your puppy to go on your lovely, white carpet, this is normal, with pups once they have gone and you have had a party, take him for a walk round the garden/yard to give him the chance to do the double wee.

4. Take him outside as soon as he wakes up
Dogs normally want to toilet when they wake up so take him outside and give him the chance to. This is for afternoon snoozes or anytime your dog sleeps.

5. Take him outside before and after he is fed. Some dogs prefer to go before being fed, some after and some like to go before and after they have been fed.

6. Take him outside after a training or play session.

Often after a play or training session the dog relaxes and needs to toilet so give your dog the chance to do this by taking him outside as soon as these are over

.7. Take him outside ever 30/45 minutes for pups, every hour for adult dogs.
Pups like human babies are not developed enough to hold when they need to go, they have to release it, we have nappies on our babies but expect pups to know they have to go outside, they don't. We have to give them the chance to toilet where we want them to by taking them there at times that will suit their needs not ours. If you go over this time to finish a job you are doing and your dog toilets in the house, that is your fault not your dog's so roll up a newspaper and hit yourself over the head with it saying "I must take my dog out to toilet when he should go".

8. If your dog does go inside, put him outside before you clean up.
With many dogs or pups it won't matter if you clean up in front of them but with a sensitive dog it does. No matter how much we try if a dog toilets inside our body language changes, dogs pick up on this and think they have done something wrong, they haven't, they have not yet learnt to toilet outside. By putting the dog outside before we clean up, the dog doesn't get the same chance to think he has done wrong. Dogs that think they have done something wrong are harder to train. They will sometimes try to hide it or do it behind the furniture which you don’t want.

9. What to clean up with.
Never use normal household cleaners, most have ammonia in which encourages a dog to toilet in that spot again. Even though we can't smell the wee, our dogs can because they have a much better smell than we do. You have to take the smell away for the dog as well as us. You can clean up with white vinegar or biological washing liquid or buy something for the job from a pet shop. They will all take the smell away for your dog which is very important when you are training your dog.

Some breeds are easier to train than others, some dogs are more excitable than others, some dogs are slow to pick things up like this, no matter how quick or slow your dog is it is very important to be consistent, only by being consistent will you succeed in teaching your dog to toilet outside and not in.

With pups remember that their bodies are not mature, they may not be capable of holding so don't expect them to. It is normal for a pup to go through the night even though they are not mature enough to hold, this is because their bodies, like ours, slows down when we are asleep. With very young pups, they will be clean and dry quicker if you get up during the night to take them outside to toilet, by stopping them from toileting in the house completely by taking them out, they don't get mixed messages.

If you have an adult rescue dog that isn’t toilet training you don’t know what has been tried in the past so treat this dog as not having any training and start at the beginning. Many are still taught to toilet on pads or newspaper, this will make it more difficult but can be done especially as you don’t know how they have been taught. Some maybe toilet trained but their time in rescue may have stopped this, this happens a lot, and of course there is stress, often a stressed dog will toilet inside for many reasons.

It isn't difficult to toilet train a dog or pup but does take a lot of work but well worth the effort when they are clean.

What I have found with an adult dog that they can become clean when someone is there but if on their own they don't learn to hold until someone gets back, we can't do anything about this because we cannot train a dog if we are not there. With dogs like this I take for a short walk to empty their tanks before going out, I then have a chance of getting back before they need to go again.