How long did house training take?

[Floofboopborkandsnoot]

What age, or how long after training started, were your puppies fully house trained or at least trained enough that accidents were rare?

I don’t know if I’m expecting to much or too little of my puppy

[adaline]

Mine was fully housetrained (as in, no more inside accidents) at five months old. Between four and five months he knew to go outside but got caught short a few times!

[BiteyShark]

Around the age of 5 months. It took a hell of a lot longer than what a lot of the 'training articles' lead me to believe.

[Girlintheframe]

My pup is 5 months. Stopped having accidents around 4 months but that was purely down to us knowing when he might need and taking him outside. Now he is 5 months he indicates when he needs

[Blobbyweeble]

Virtually 100% reliable by three months but we did do full on training, setting an alarm for every 20 minutes unless they were asleep, 100% supervision when awake, in crate when not able to supervise eg in bathroom. For nights it took 4 days with me sleeping downstairs by the crate and taking him out when he stirred, the fourth night he didn’t stir so I went back to sleeping upstairs, he’s never messed his crate.

It was very time consuming but successful, helped by only having grown up children! When I had a puppy with small children it took a lot longer, probably nearer five months.

When they went outside they were on a lead so that we were right there to treat.

[Floofboopborkandsnoot]

That’s reassuring. She is only just 2 months

I spoke to a trainer that said 4-6 months but smaller breeds and in an apartment he says more like 6 months which is what I was aiming for. When chatting to my mum about it she didn’t believe it and thinks she should be sorted by now and is going to ask her friend with the same dog how long it took her Happy I can go back and tell her she is wrong though

Yes to taking longer than articles say. At first I was expecting her to pick it up in weeks judging by those but lowered my expectations when she didn’t.

[GooodMythicalMorning]

Mine is a bulldog so stubborn, about 8 months. Occasionally accidents halpen but its usually human error when we haven't noticed his signals.

[BiteyShark]

The thing is you will always get the occasional owner/puppy that was toilet trained in a few days.

But you have to remember that for the majority of puppies their bladders and bowel control are still developing and simply some dogs don't make a big thing about indicating they want to go. My puppy did a half hearted paw and that was it to say he wanted to go out. If I blinked I would miss it.

All you can do is to try and minimise the number of accidents inside compared to the praising outside and eventually they will get it.

[werideatdawn]

Dog just turned 6 months and hasn't had an accident for I think just over a month now. We are still vigilant though. I do think a lot of the guides are unrealistic and then people are surprised when their dog has accidents.

[Her0utdoors]

Several years.... unless you count the two turds she left on the inlaws carpet last time she was there. In her defence, fil winds her up to the point where we couldn't tell she was asking to go in the garden. She's never soiled her crate.

[ouchyoubiteybugger]

Bitey dog is 11 weeks and going backwards as it's wet out so would rather wee on the carpet. So I'm no help at all !

[Cath2907]

He was about 5 months old (we'd had him 3 months) when he would reliably indicate to go out. I put a LOT of effort into housetraining and spent may hours standing in a cold garden cheering when a puppy peed. He has only had 1 accident since and to be fair to him he told me he needed out but it was 3am and he NEVER needs out in the night anymore. turns out he had a bad tummy. He did his business as close to the back door as he could!

[ChestyNut]

ouch I feel your pain, 10 weeks old here and hating the rain

[Floofboopborkandsnoot]

Bitey dog is 11 weeks and going backwards as it's wet out so would rather wee on the carpet.

Mine is 15 weeks and just pees everywhere, be it inside, outside, her pads, my bed , luckily we don’t have carpet apart for the “mezzanine” as they call it and the stairs leading up to it so, unless it’s on my bed which she seems to be doing less now, it’s fairly easy to clean, still annoying though. Hope you get sorted it soon. 🤞🏻

[BiteyShark]

Floofboopborkandsnoot I know some people swear by using puppy pads which is what I think you are referring to as pads but you may want to think about whether that is confusing to her because effectively they say it's fine to pee inside sending mixed messages.

[tabulahrasa]

About 12 weeks where he realised going to the toilet outside was what we were wanting and we were in a routine enough that it was the occasional accident inside.

16 weeks before he would actually indicate he needed out reliably enough that we could get him out in time.

Since 16 weeks, he’s had one accident at home (he was very very ill though, in fact it’s what prompted me taking him to the out of hours vet) and twice scentmarked in a vets lol

[Floofboopborkandsnoot]

Yeah, we are considering removing them but waiting til we start her training classes tomorrow to get some proper advice as so far it’s been 50/50 on whether we should be using them.

She’s good at indicating when she needs to poo, but she won’t do it outside she only wants to do it in our bathroom, suppose there’s less appropriate places. Weeing though she shows no signs and just does it where ever she is, but does do it outside occasionally so we make sure to reward when she does and ignore the times she does inside so hopefully she’ll start learning.

Something suggested was to start putting her in her crate at night until she gets into the routine of going before bed and holding it until the morning. Would this work? I don’t want to try if not as I don’t mind her being in bed with us and love cuddling with her and will miss it so don’t want to do it for nothing.