why has the bloody dog taken to waking up and scratching at the door at 3am?

[AtYourCrucifix]

wakes me up. i go down, ut him back to bed, tuck him up again and he's fine.

every bloody night.

why?

Because he can and the more you go down the more he will do it. Ignore ignore ignore, don't know why he started, but worse thing you can do is give unwanted behaviour attention.

How old is he?

hes 2 and a half. it's hard to ignore at 3am and don't want the whole house awake. he shuts up again after he's tucked in.

Mine are the same, now instead of coming down and nicely put them back to bed I just shush them (loudly) from upstairs. That seems to give them the reassurance that I am still around (and happy to come down to leave them out in the garden even if they don't want to, if they continue)

I do appreciate it's hard to ignore at 3am, when we had beagle last year, she cried for first week, 3 hours solid every night, DH can sleep through anything and I stuck ear plugs in, neighbours suffered though! But she was 9 week old pup them.

Only other thing I can think of, is he in a crate? If so cover crate with a blanket, makes it snug and Cosy for them.

Can I hijack this with a similar problem?

My adult collie has for the last week started to wake us in the early hours (at least once a night, sometimes twice) to be let out for a poo. He doesn't have an upset stomach so I don't understand why he is doing this. Usually he is very good at doing his business at walk times & never wakes us at night. We haven't changed his routine or his diet & he is still doing his business as usual at walk times. My worry is that this nocturnal toileting will become a habit & that going to the toilet this many times a day isn't normal.