Question:
My female blue heeler pup is 15 weeks old and still not toilet trained — is this too soon? We are trying very hard to teach her.
Judy Pittard, via e-mail.
Answer:
Not at all! It may take a little while to toilet train but starting a consistent routine as soon as you get your puppy avoids confusion. Firstly, you need to decide where you want her to go. If it’s outside, that’s fine, but you need to take her out regularly (they go about 10 times a day), including first thing in the morning, last thing at night and after meals and sleeps. Basically, the more you take her to the spot, the more often she’ll do it in the right spot, and the quicker she will learn.
The other option is to train her to go on paper. Spread large sheets of newspaper down and you can gradually make it smaller as she learns where to go. The most important thing about toilet training is positive reinforcement. Give her food treats and praise every time she goes in the right spot (even if you put her there). Punishment won’t help. It’ll only confuse her and make her anxious — so no rubbing noses in it! Clean up any accidents with enzymatic washing powder to remove traces of odour, not ammonium-based cleaning products because they smell like urine to pets and could encourage them to keep going back to that place.
As adults, dogs only go to the toilet about two times a day and can hold on until you take them out for a walk if they are inside dogs. They will often learn to bark to tell you to let them out. For now, you’ll just need to persevere and have a bit of patience for the little accidents that will happen from time to time — they learn very quickly so don’t worry, it will happen!
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