The Silent Pee-er

[Nate's Mom]

Hello everyone,

My Nate is 5 months old. He is pretty much housetrained. He still has occasional accidents, of course. He knows that he is supposed to go outside, and will go to the door . But, when he goes to the door, he doesn't do anything but sit there and look at us :(. This is fine when we are in the same room with him. I don't want to have to put him in his crate every time I have to go to the bathroom. (He's only in his crate when no one is at home.) Don't get me wrong, I'm very proud of his progress, and make all attempts to pay attention to him and let him out when he needs to go. However, I just want to know if he is going to always be like this, or if I need to start trying to train him to do something to get our attention. Obviously, I'd prefer something a little more attention-grabbing, especialy when we are in another room, etc. I hung bells around the door, and showed him how to use them. Sometimes he rings them (softly) and sometimes he doesn't. Does anyone else's boxer do this? Do they grow out of it and start getting your attention, as some have told me he will? Am I just expecting to much out of him? I'm willing to be patient, I just don't want him to get used to it and always be silent. This is the first dog I've had in my adult life and I'm not sure what to expect.

Might I add that he does a fine job of barking/screaming when he wants out of his crate :p.

Thanks

 

[TigersMommy.]

Boy, I'm so glad I am not the only one! Tiger does the exact same thing! He'll walk over to the door, walk to where I am and sit down and look at me. That's it, no barking, nothing. I have started to become somewhat of a doggie mind reader.

Now when he does this, I asking him. "What?, Do you have to go out?" He hears the out and the ears perk up and head tilts. If I don't get up right away after I say this, he starts crying. So, we are steadily making progress....

Good luck with Nate. It is frustrating.

 

[Sabrina Jay]

Keep working with him on ringing the bells. Make sure you make him ring them every time before going outside. All my guys will still ring the bells. (ages 22 months - 6 years)

You can always take him with you into the bathroom. That is a good time to work on sit, sit/stay commands, etc.

 

[Kailin]

My brother's Boxer would walk up to us and snort whenever he needed to go outside. I don't know how he hit upon this method, but getting sprayed with snot is a really good attention-grabber... It's certainly not something he was trained to do tho.

I'm trying to teach Lucy to bark before she goes outside. She already knows how to speak--something she learned by accident, and which I thought at first was just a cute trick, but it's now proving to be very useful. We make her sit by the door and speak before she goes out. I'm hoping this will catch on, so she'll learn to alert us by sitting at the door and barking whenever she has to go. It'll certainly be a relief not to have to watch her like a hawk anymore... *wry grin* Got a long way to go yet I think.

 

[jonathan3]

I have a 9 week old boxer that rings a doorbell at least 25% of the time. I saw the doggie doorbell on the internet and wanted to get it. After you pay shipping and handling to Alaska 2nd day air it is 60 dollars. I went to home depot and bought a wireless doorbell. I cut a gap in a piece of 3/4 inc plywood set the doorbells in these and cut a piece of tile so that only the button sticks up. Whenever Jed has to go out whether he whines to us or we just see him hovering, we tell him hit the button. This is followed by good-boy and let's go outside. This has seemed to go quite well. I am going to put the other button outside for him to come in when he gets used to going out by the bell. I feel that the biggest thing is to get them excited about whatever they are doing right. Mine definitely knows if I am unhappy. He is a total momma's boy and if I tell him NO he runs straight to mom. He acts so much like our daughter that it is like having another baby in the house so we treat them the same. If they think they did something special like big people they are on top of the world.

 

[Nate's Mom]

Thanks, everyone, for the advice. I think I'm going to try the wireless doorbell idea and keep working with my little clown clowicon

 

[puppymom]

house breakking

I've always used the bell on the doorknob for training. It's like a sleighbell type thing. I always take their paw or nose (depending on size of dog)and bump the bell each time. Then I have a treat waiting for them when they come in. Of course, then they figure out that they get the treat, and it becomes a revolving door.