Afternoon,

New to the forum so hoping someone can help...

I have two 1yr old Dachshunds, Male (Spayed) and a female who were litter mates. Both pups I have had since they were 9 weeks and have been taken to dog training since they were 4 mths old, both have responded well to this.

Every morning, when I am home from work and before they go to bed (they sleep in their crate) they are taken outside attended so they can do their toilet on the 'go wee wee/ go poo' command.

I have tried the ' put them on a lead, follow them around the garden and give them lots of praise when they performed' method in additon to the crate method i,e come home at lunch and let them out for a wee/poo then place them back in the crate. (tried for two months) I had no problems until I thought 2 months was long enough and at xmas begun to 'trust' them to use the dog flap to toliet outside. I believe since then I have only had two days without an accident waiting for me!

The methods above were given to me by two different trainers, I have even paid for a home visit to try to improve their toliet habbits but the female is still having accidents. What is frustrating is that the male dog does not have accidents inside the house and goes outside. The female will go toliet outside if we are at home and keeping eye on her but the minute our backs turned (i.e at work or busy with an activity) she will go inside.

We have been having ongoing home improvements since we purchased them, so appreciate that this can be unnerving but they have been brought up with it should not bother them. If we have workers in on a day, then the dogs tend to bark and 'camp out' in the garden until they have gone.

Both my partner and I adore our pups and give them lots of attention so cannot see why one of them continues to misbehave.

I have been advised that daxies are stubborn and really hard to train so any tips you have would be grateful.

At present its a daily occurance with the accidents at home as I am unable to make it home at lunch time due to work commitments to try the crate method again. Therefore they are left for 7 hrs on their own each day, with a run area of a conservatory, Kitchen and dining room including access to the enclosed rear garden (accessed via a dog flap that they both use)

n.b When they were younger they used to use puppy pads whilist Ii was at work successfully but found that they never went on them if they were outside the house. I stoped using these when they were about 7mths as they began to 'rip them up' and also used to see a rug/mat and think that was a puppy pad.


Many thanks

Emma

No doubt someone will pop along and tell you that it is not ideal to leave a dog for more than 4 hrs but we are not here to judge! only to pass on any help that we can.

i am getting the impression that the female is the more reactive of the two dogs.

i also feel that in your situation the dogs probably have too much access to the house! could you leave them in a smaller area? say the conservatory with access to the garden??? obviously it is not a good idea to crate them for 7 hrs but i feel a smaller area would make them more secure, less likely to get up to mishcief and would at least contain any mess that they did leave you.

Also, i assume that you are exercising them before you go off to work???? A tired out dog is more likely to settle and wait your return than go walkabout. Leave them with chews, water and a radio on if possible. lots of dogs prefer some kind of background noise (even a ticking clock would do) to an empty, quiet house.

The weeing may well be a nervous thing....maybe someone comes to the door, rings the bell or whatever and the dog cant gain access to see who is there? or maybe there are outside noises that are worrying the dog. all manner of things could be triggering a nervous response (ie the weeing).

hope this helps.

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ZACK (1993-2007)
forever in sunshine