So confused, not sure what's going wrong

[permaquandry]

Had permapup (20 weeks) since oct (8 weeks). Had very few accidents, she literally, had 4 wees and 2 poos indoors in the first few week or so then no accidents until until xmas. she has wee'd in the kitchen almost everyday since then and did a poo in the lounge last night!

She makes no attempt to go to the back door, the only signal she gives is sniffing, which she does a lot anyway.

She goes out in the garden all the time, on one day last week, I put her out, she scurried in garden for a while, yipped to come back in and literally weed on the kitchen floor within seconds!

I think she knows its wrong as always looks sheepish and kind if hides after doing it.

Any sound advice of what I can do?

Afraid it doesn't sound as though she's house trained yet. She certainly won't know she's done wrong - she hasn't a clue.

Ignore all accidents unless you catch her actually doing it; if you do, a stern no, scoop her up and put her outside to finish off.

Go back to the beginning and take her outside and stay with her until she does something. Go outside every half hour, after every meal, after every sleep and every game. Treat when she does it in the right place.

If she is weeing a lot more than usual, take her to the vet for a check over just in case it's a UTI.

I'm still confused though, she went from 10 weeks to 20 weeks with no accidents though, surely, that's house-trained?

Did you have a change in routine over Xmas or people to stay that could have upset her routine? TBH it doesn't take much to upset some dogs.

The christmas period will have changed routines and as flora said, doesn't take much to upset puppies. Do as Daisy advises, right back to house training, outside every hour, after drinking/eating, stay with her, and praise with a treat whilst using the word you choose for toiletting once she does so. Is she crated overnight? If so, she won't toilet in there and that'll help her train her bladder to hold it.

Yes she is crated overnight. I will go with the putting out after meals/sleep etc. Xmas was a bit chaotic, so it may be down to that.

She is a terrible land shark and very bitey and has destroyed a lot of stuff and been a bit difficult. Bizarrely, her redeeming feature was that she was so good with toiletting, now the biting has got much better, seemingly at the compromise of that!

You can't have it all, eh and she is incredibly cute!

You can't just put her out, you have to go out with her and make a big fuss/treat when she wees or poos outside. Otherwise you'll get a repeat performance of her coming back inside to wee.

Get used to this pattern, it's very common, if our dogs manage something a few times we tick it off our list as sorted, but behaviours often taken longer to firmly establish than we realise!

It can take over 10 months to house train a dog. It sounds like she may have an aversion to your back garden. Has anything happened to scare her when she's out there? Something silly like a rustling plastic bag, a bird flying overheard or even another dog barking can spook them.

Main thing is to never scold her for peeing in the house. She'll associate the scolding with peeing and will try to hide in future when she needs to pee. Then all you'll get is a dog that pees under tables and behind doors.

Reward based training has been proven to be the best route to dog training. Lots and lots of encouragement when she pees in the garden and lots of treats. Do you go with her to the garden and use a specific word? I used 'go for a pee' or 'number two' with my pup and praised her like crazy every time she went. She's 18 months now and I still do it occasionally to reinforce the good behaviour.

My mother is a dog trainer so have spent considerable hours being her demonstrator at dog classes.

She loves the garden, spends ages out there, and will mostly toilet out there.

I will go out with her, I meant take her out, not put her out.

I haven't scolded her, as seems pointless. I think she knows tho, coz her behaviour changes to sheepish when she's done it.

Watch this space!

Agree with others completely and would also question if anything has happened in the garden.

By the way, she really doesn't understand 'guilty' she is picking up in your body language and your expression. Back to basics, lots of praise and a game outside once she has performed!

Dogs don't know right from wrong, she's just reading your body language when you're cleaning up and what she does know is that you're not happy so she offers appeasing gestures. Read the Culture Clash, excellent for explaining this kind of thing.

Anyway I wonder if the garden is actually too interesting? Maybe there are so many interesting smells etc. out there that she doesn't get around to weeing? My friend's young dog won't poo in the park if he's having an exciting time playing with his dog friends and then does it on the way home.

I think she may enjoy the garden too much. She definitely enjoys it out there and nothing has happened, she happily trots out there.

I watch her after she's done the wee and she cannot see or hear me, maybe I'm reading it wrong but her body language comes across as worried.

No accidents so far today, lots of wees outside and praise and attention. We'll see how it goes.