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The doghouse

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Original poster

Door bell training

9 replies

Oops4 · 10/09/2017 12:16

I've posted recently about issues we're having with our dogs tummy and food and that the number of times pooing in a day has massively increased. As a result our previously toilet trained dog has started doing the odd poo in the house which I am VERY keen to nip in the bud. He's never really told us when he wants out but I guess with the amount we take him out on walks/let him out in garden it covered whenever he needed so he didn't have to. But now with the increase in poos (I'm just about to change his food again) it seems that if we don't happen to see him at the door he just goes. We have a really busy house so it's not always possible to follow his every move.

So........I want to train him to tell us when he needs out. I've heard of people using a bell at the door that the dog rings to signal when they want out but how best do you train to do that? We're expecting our new pup in a month so would like to get this sorted and follow it on for her when she arrives.

Or if anyone has any other ideas I'd love to hear them!

OP posts:

BiteyShark · 10/09/2017 12:28

I put the training bell near the door and when I took pup out I would bash the bell and open the door. I also took his paw and bashed it on the bell, or held a treat to the bell so he came close with his nose to touch the bell before opening the door. It really didn't take long for him to get it (a couple of days) but he was a few months old when we trained him to use them.

Original poster

Oops4 · 10/09/2017 12:40

Thanks. I had thought but about doing it when we did the toilet training initially but it didn't really seem necessary.......until now. He does pick things up very quickly so fingers crossed!

OP posts:

NewBrian · 10/09/2017 18:25

marking place as I'd like to train mine to do this!

BiteyShark · 10/09/2017 18:40

Just a warning that they soon learn that banging the bell gets you to come and open the door so mine, when he gets in a mood, will keep bashing it just to get my attention or when he just wants to peer out into the garden but doesn't actually want to go out to toilet.

sparechange · 10/09/2017 18:50

First step is to teach him to go on command.
That is pretty easy... when you let him out, start saying 'go pee/go toilet/be quick/whatever you want the phrase to be' and then as soon as he starts to go, praise and treat.
He will learn the association between the word, toileting and a treat pretty quickly.
You can then use it to get him to go before bed or before you go out
(It's also really useful if you do lots of long car journeys because you can get them to definitely go when you stop for breaks)

Once you've got the toilet command sorted, then you can introduce a bell

The sort of you get on a hotel reception is probably going to work better than a door bell?

Set the bell up by the door and pick up his paw and ding it, then treat and praise, then open the door and give him the toilet command and then treat and praise again

Again,he should make the association but keep it with toileting rather than just when he wants a potter around outside
Keep up the treats and praise as long as you need to until he has cracked it and then phase out the treats (every other time, every 4th time, every 10th time)

Lucisky · 10/09/2017 20:22

I had this idea with our pup. She would just sit silently by the back door in hope. If you didn't see her, then she was forced to go elsewhere. I can't see the back door from the sitting room (this was invariably in the evening). So, I bought some doggy door bells. These work to a certain degree (there are training vids on you tube), and she jangles the bells if she wants the door open, but they are not loud enough to be heard over a tv. I have now got a proper doggy wireless doorbell on order from amazon. It has a pressure pad for them to push with their nose (she is a poodle, and has already been taught to 'touch' with her nose, poodles seem to love pushing things with their nose) so I will report back when it arrives. It did occur to me that she might ring it if she just wants to go out and chase a pidgeon/cat/run around, rather than go to the loo, but I roughly know her loo habits, and I would rather let her out unecessarily than have a mess on the floor.

SpiderCid · 11/09/2017 09:41

I taught my dog to bark when she wants to go out.
First I taught her to bark on command which thankfully she picked up pretty quickly.
Then whenever I noticed she wanted to go out, I would get her to bark before I open the door.

Original poster

Oops4 · 11/09/2017 18:04

Thanks sparechange, you make it sound easy! He already goes on command so hopefully shouldn't be too much harder for the next step.

I had planned to do it initially but then a combination of it not really being necessary and my neighbour telling me their dog used it as a way to get their attention put me off 😂

Spider, I'd like to do that but how did you teach him to bark? I can see saying the command whenever he does it until he associates it would work but our wee guy doesn't really bark very much so not sure how to get him to actually bark in order to build up the association!

OP posts:

SpiderCid · 12/09/2017 07:14

Oops I will admit I got really lucky with my dog. Shes not a big barker either but I was able to catch her doing it a couple of times and she just picked up the speak command very quickly. I know that doesnt help you much. I also feel she mastered barking at the back door before she fully learnt the speak command.

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