Puppy will not house train, feel like throwing in the towel

[Tropics4]

Dear Mumsnet
I have posted on here a few weeks ago, I have tried for 9 weeks solid to house train my puppy, 18 weeks on Tuesday. I have given it my all, trust me. In the beginning going outside every 15 mins, watching him like a hawk. I always felt he didn't get it just I was catching 90% of poo and wee due to sheer vigilance. He is clean overnight in his crate but will happily pee or poo in it on occasion. I am replacing our lounge carpet, the only carpet downstairs at great expense, he has peed at least 3 times on it. I felt going forwards I would stress less. I have owned a Jack Russell before, for 18 years, he got it in about 3 weeks. This pup seems smart enough, has learned many commands, sit, stay, down, leave, quiet, take it, even relax ( this means to lie quietly on my lap). However, I need help, I feel for the first time like giving up, he also hates leaving the house for a walk, loves other people and dogs, likes nothing better than to sit by our feet chomping on a chew, couldn't care less about going it, he just drags back on the lead and if we turn around to come home he practically drags us, all 3.kg of him! .
Please did your dog take forever to house train? Any success stories for slow coaches? I feel if I can at least get on top of that I can carry on. He currently has Kennel cough (was vaccinated against it too). HELP!

Sirensays: great I will check Zak George out, thankyou.
Warmfluffy: will check Amazon for the bells, thank you.
Lougle: yes he has been clean at night for a long time and then between 6- 10am, brilliant, I'm just also wondering if I need to stick to set times? The only thing with that is I've kind of put my life on hold for two months and realistically I could miss one of the scheduled times if that makes sense just through normal day to day errands appointments.
I have never tried clicker training, might be worth a look...my little guy is smart too, very stubborn but smart, he will literally look at my hands to ascertain if I have a treat and will at times just wander off rather than perform any command even though he knows so many! Real little monkey!

Carrie: thank you, I will try the treat on return. I have tried a house line on him, he squatted and piddled in a flash when I turned to pick up kettle, the thing is most of the times we succeed then just when i feel confident we are there after a week with no accidents that he piddles on the floor.
And yes I will start writing down, just of course recently he is not too well and it's so hot and drinking more so I guess I need to be more understanding/lenient.
Thanks everyone! Here we go again, I will give all a go and hopefully not have to post back. Xx

This'll give you a laugh then Tropics - when I was typing my reply, I realised that I actually miss the little puppy pee stage! I've kind of made peace with the fact that I probably won't have another puppy, but I did really enjoy that stage. Shame we don't live next door to each other!!

At 16 weeks my poodle bichon cross was still peeing on kitchen floor and upstairs landing after coming in from garden.
This is what I did.
I cleaned the floor with white vinegar.
I shut off upstairs access.
I removed all rugs whilst I was training or access to rugs (a week only)
I cleaned crate floor with vinegar( not anything with ammonia ingredient like bleach )
I put crate over area he choose a toilet spot,
Ditto food and water, I choose popular toilet spots to place them on even if not long term convenient. Dog won't wee near food or water or in his actual bedding.
Put puppy in a crate not too large with his bed in.
WHEN PUPPY NOT IN CRATE I KEPT HIM IN GARDEN at all times.
Puppy then only uses garden to toilet and breaks link with indoor surfaces association.
You don't need to keep taking puppy out, he is either in crate next to you chewing a toy or asleep, or in garden playing and toileting.
You are breaking the ASSOCIATION.
The minute he wakes from a sleep he goes in garden (presumably toilets) then praise praise praise.

In a week he cracked it. It was March so not easy to spend all that time in garden...but it worked, if you are consistent.
Every mistake ..no comment but vinegar treat area.

Carrie: if I lived next door to you- you might find a pup tied to your gate post with a label saying 'please take care of this incontinent pup!' Currently I'm saying, never, ever again!
Nettle: trouble is...he will poop and pee in his crate, not often, never at night but seems to if I change the bedding, today I gave him my old dogs duvet blanket to lie on, almost instantly peed on it in his crate. Trust me I have been in the garden to the point of getting a suntan from this only, at all hours of the night (once without draws on, it was a breezy night ..minuscule nightie, but hey, all in the cause!")
I am a very driven personality type, when I go for something I really do, trust me, but on your recommendation I will up the toilet breaks to the point you are suggesting. However it's not exactly against his religion to soil his crate! But I cant stand it when you try to help people and they wont accept help so I will definitely try all suggestions and keep at it with pup. Please, wish me success!

Did you use puppy pads at the start op?

We put them by the back door and then gradually moved them into the area of the garden he should be using to wee! He could then smell his scent on the pad and realise that's where he had to go.

It does take time - our 9 month old lab took until 4.5 months to fully get it!

Wineandsunshine: yes I did start with puppy pads in his crate, he went on those, but also on the actual bedding. My house design doesn't exactly make house training a pup easy, kitchen has no access to garden, lounge has carpet( being removed in a few weeks) and then a hot conservatory through to garden..didn't really want to put pads on carpet and conservatory too hot. Otherwise putting them at back door would have been great. I do show him his lead and say 'toilet' to get him to follow me to garden, use the same word with heaps of praise when he goes outside, to be fair he has had 3 or 4 accidents on the carpet in the two months I have trying to train him, one in the conservatory and one in hallway, oh and one in kitchen, this is due to my vigilance, ...I'm worn out (ha!) Oh and had a poo under the massive sofa in the conservatory..which I only discovered at 3am on the way out to another toilet break..(the joys).

We followed the advice in the group dog training advice and support on FB. They don’t know that they should only go outside. Bells won’t help. You need to just make sure that pup is outside whenever they need to go. (Not as simple as it sounds!) unfortunately pads can delay things as they learn to go indoors. Good luck.

Our sprocker puppy took forever. The only way we cracked it was having a 15 minute buzzer on my phone, and keep taking her out. Every wee was met with effusive praise and clapping, and accidents completely ignored.

I think she was about 22/24 weeks by the time she was reliable. Thank god we've got hard floors throughout the ground floor.

Mine is a lurcher. She was about 1yo when we got her, and I did wonder if the lack of house training was why she was dumped in the first place! She's not that bright but very eager to please. It took 9 months of constant vigilance.

@Tropics4

Catsrus: Not sure if I'm misunderstanding but he is 18 weeks almost, I have tried house training for 9 weeks solid.. Longtompot: yes I praise him the second he goes and yes he is always on a lead, we use a command too. Really grateful for any other suggestions or success stories

but 18 weeks is nothing! he's a baby - would you be in despair if an 18 month old toddler still had accidents? It might be frustrating but it's perfectly normal.

The problem with having an easy to train first dog is the same as having an "easy" first baby - you think you've done it all right and it;s just a question of having the right attitude - then the second one arrives and all your strategies fail because they never actually worked with the first - you were just bloody lucky.

I thought dog training was easy until I got my second dog (my second child was actually easier than the first though!). 30yrs later and I've finally got another who has been a dream to train - but I'm under no illusions that it's all down to my skills as a trainer, she's just an easy dog to train.

Only you can decide whether you are in it for the long haul if this one is a tough one to train. You might also have to deal with scent marking, as it's a boy, that's a different issue.

We got our pup at about 16/18 weeks from Battersea , it did not appear that he had ever lived in a house . He did not pick up house training very quickly at all and what I think finally made him get it was when I caught him mid wee , picked him straight up and ran to the door saying ‘quick outside ‘ . Quick / go quick being the command word we were using . I think the shock of being stopped / picked up mid wee seemed to explain what we wanted better than all the praising outside had done .

Spinningspaniels: timer is a good idea, also I guess we have a few more weeks to catch up with your success- I hope we do.
Catsrus: I am in for the long haul, I'm just letting off steam I think. Imagine I lost a perfectly trained elderly and sedate dog, enter the incontinent rascal that does not give a hoot for my approval and I'm soo tired. We love the life with a dog, walks, evenings by fire, the companionship and the training and events, my other Jack competed in Obedience, he even won local trophies. So perhaps I'm just floored at being held at first base, house training!

Floral: ok, once I managed to pick him up mid flow, he stopped dead but this is good advice, I will keep doing this.

Mines a patterdale x JRT ( probably ) , very trainable but basically stubborn .

I've house trained a LOT of puppies, and I've had ones who were perfect at 8 weeks (one who at 6 weeks would ring the bells to go out, but she is insanely bright), and some (Ethan I am looking at you) who were 6 months old when they came to me and were hopeless even after a month of me training them solidly (he did get it in the end btw).
If yours is tiny, is his crate small enough? This is key to deterring them from soiling in it.
The puppy pads (esp in the crate) has been and gone for you, but imo they are a terrible idea as you are encouraging them to toilet in the house.
I take them out a million times a day - a soon as I come down and they come out of the crate their lead goes on and they go out. We don't come in until they wee. Then after their breakfast, 30 min after that if they are awake or the moment they wake up. Then every 30 min or on waking till lunchtime, repeat until tea time, then bed. Standing in the garden being really, really boring and just saying Busy is incredibly boring for me too, but they don't get to play or wander around, we just stand there. If they toilet they get a treat when we come inside, but they get lots of praise as soon as they start weeing/pooing.
I do use door bells, but all you are teaching the dog to do is to tell you they want to go out, not anything to do with toileting. But its a useful thing to combine with toilet training as otherwise you end up with issues like ddog2 who just does a meaningful look which isn't easy to interpret.
It will get better, and every dog is different. My next foster arrives on Friday so I'll be getting everything out again this week and practicing my sprint to the back door

Floral: yes this pup is very stubborn, but I love character, it's why I love JRT's, I guess my last one was a low grade JRT, this one is top notch everything JRT, for good or bad!
CMOT: What I'm getting from this thread and all the excellent advice, yours included is: take them out to toilet constantly, super praise them, a schedule is good, bells - possibly a good thing, it may take way longer than expected (and some! )interrupt accidents, small crate (however mine will poo in his bed) timer on scheduled breaks helps even more, clean accidents properly! treats on returning from potty break and be dead boring- same spot to pee on the potty break, puppy pads maybe not the answer and most importantly I haven't heard of one total failure to train? If I have missed any advice, please remind me. Also, thankyou so much, I hope to report back a success..in the end.. xx

CMOT: fancy another short term foster? I will take him back when he graduates from spoiling the home!

Soiling! Flipping auto correct! But he is also spoiling the carpet...

I don't do tiny dogs! The chickens would eat him :-) but after my last foster who was perfect on the toilet training front, but not on many other issues, I am hoping for an easy one this time

My dog took almost a solid year to toilet train.
My other dog only ever peed in the house once!

Even now, if she is nervous, she will poop inside.
We Recently, I had family to stay for a week, and she pooped inside every day, despite not having done that in almost 2 years!

CMOT: I wish you well, bless! However if my pup fails to train and your chickens are super hungry..(evil cackle!).
Bookaholic: a year! all I can say is...grubs up chickens!

@Wolfiefan

We followed the advice in the group dog training advice and support on FB. They don’t know that they should only go outside. Bells won’t help. You need to just make sure that pup is outside whenever they need to go. (Not as simple as it sounds!) unfortunately pads can delay things as they learn to go indoors. Good luck.

Totally agree. Pads are a new invention and hinder rather than help. When I'm training a pup, apart from when they're asleep, I never go more than 10 minutes without putting them outside. The instant they wake up, straight after food or water, straight after playing and every 10 minutes otherwise. They come back inside the minute they do a wee/poo. It's really hard work and you can't do anything else but the dedication pays off!

@Naaaaah as a first time dog owner that group has been an amazing source of info and reassurance.

I have a 6 month old rescue who, until she arrived 3 weeks ago, had never been in a house, had a lead on etc.
I took her outside every 30 minutes, often stayed out there for an hour before she’d do anything. I did put down puppy pads in the kitchen at night, more for ease of cleaning up than anything else.
She’s doing very well, I’m knackered!
It takes loads of patience and perseverance and profuse praise at the appropriate time I’m afraid!