House training a dog who won't poo in front of anyone

[QuirkyHorse]

Have a 2.5 year old rescue bitch. She had 3 litters and I suspect was crated for a large amount of time.
Got her in July and it took her a few days to pee in front of us, she would sneak off and do one, same with poo.
Now, she is clean in the house but will not poo until nighttime when she is alone.

How can I train a dog to go outside when she won't poo in front of anyone? 🤷🏻‍♀️

My dog didn’t particularly like pooing in front of people either. He preferred to do it in bushes when he was off lead so I would try giving your dog a run off the lead in the late afternoon so she can do her business more privately.

What's her routine of food, exercise etc. L?

Just let her off in the garden to poo on a regular basis so she has lots of opportunities to go. Make it routine for her to go outside.

@snoopythebeagle @Twiglets1 I live on a farm, she has access to 5 acres of fields. She goes out umpteen times a day, can be out all afternoon whilst I am pottering, has every opportunity to poo. She doesn't.

@PinkFootstool she is raw fed. Has her meat in the morning about 6:30am, a liver or pork chunk at lunch and the rest of her meat at teatime. She goes to her kennel about 10pm.

Can you not let her out for a run before bed as well?

Yes, she goes out then too.
She is out and about lots, she has plenty of opportunity to poo, she won't.

I was hoping someone may have an idea how to "make' her go, rather than just stating the obvious

You should have put more info in your first post because we're not mind readers.

Are you absolutely sure she doesn't poo during the day? Sorry if that's an obvious question but unless you can see her at all times then it can't be ruled out. And the way to deal with it if the nighttime poo is an extra poo rather than the only poo is going to be different!

My dog hates being watched while pooing (I feel the same tbh 🤣) but we did a lot of work when she was a puppy with a command word ("busy") so she will, grudgingly, hide behind anything she can and poo when told to. But if you can never catch her in the act then teaching a poo word won't be possible.

It's a training issue - allowing her to free range all day isn't working for her or you, as it results in her pooping in the house at night.

Back to puppy style basics by the sounds of it - which she's probably not had in her original home? Keep her on a lead with you all day in and out of the home. Huge praises for pees and obv especially poops.

If you want her to poop on command as such, you'll need to put in a huge amount of training similarly to how Guide Dogs are trained.

I fear this is going to be more difficult than anyone can imagine.
She definitely doesn't poo when out and about because she doesn't leave our sides. I could put her on a lead but it wouldn't make any difference because she is rarely further away from us than a lead length. She'll go for a quick run after our other dog but never out of sight.

I am wondering if a behaviourist could help, I think this is more deep rooted than just being shy.
She was very, very shutdown when she came to us and has only this last week, 4 months of her being here, actually made a sound.
Maybe I just need to give her more time to know she won't be punished. She did initially eat her nighttime poo, so there has been progress of sorts.

@Twiglets1 I did say she won't poo in front of anyone, I couldn't really have made it any clearer 🙄

In fairness, you didn’t give us much to go on with
regards to her diet, routine or, well, anything, really.

Ultimately you cannot force her to go. I would just give her plenty of opportunities and clean up any accidents appropriately. She may never “get it” so just make it as easy for everyone as possible.

I don’t have any training advice but it sounds like you will need to give her more time. I’ve had my rescue dog for two years and he still has some anxieties and behaviour issues from his stray days. He is a million times better than he was and most of that is down to time passing rather than lots of training.

As has been said, she needs more time. She's clearly been through a terrible time and is lucky to have found you.
I think that you should stop focussing on poo and concentrate on building her confidence. How much confidence-building activities do you do with her? Food is usually useful for these kind of things, for encouraging her to explore, to think, to work things out and the trouble with raw feeding is that it tends to mean bowl feeding. Giving her cold-pressed biscuits that go with raw feeding might be an idea.

Having said I wouldn't concentrate on her poo... what is her poo like? I know raw fed dogs produce small, firm poos but could she be constipated? I wonder if some added fibre might help? Also, I notice you say you give her a chunk of liver some days. Don't know how big the chunk is but liver is supposed to make up only 5% of a raw-fed dog's diet. I wonder if she's getting too much. Too much liver can cause all sorts of issues, some serious.

Just some thoughts. Like I say, she's lucky to have found you. Good luck.

We had a shy dog who needed to be out of sight. No trauma or backstory - he just didn't like pooing in the open or when visible. We planted a very small area with bushes on three sides, let him pee in there and left him to it. We made sure never to interrupt him or look at him but would just wait at a distance. Lots of praise when he came back. From the clearing up we did when he was out of sight, it was obvious that he was using the area. In 14 years none of us ever saw him actually poo

@redboxer321 she is raw fed because her tummy is extremely sensitive.
We were told she eats anything, which is true, what they didn't tell us was it went right through her. We started her off on Arden Grange, the people we got her from provided none of her normal diet. I took her to the vet for a once over and decided between us to raw feed. It wouldn't be my first choice but that's where we're at.
She was 5.5kg when she came to us and needed to be nearer 10kg so we wanted to feed her something that wouldn't just pass straight through her.
There is the added complication that she is almost certainly deaf ☹️ but we do have duck chunks that we use as treats, she loves them.

If she sticks to her raw, her poo is pretty perfect consistency wise. If she sneaks the cat food, you can tell as she becomes very loose.

Because we live on a farm and she has the run of the fields, she doesn't tend to mix with other dogs. I did start driving her to the local park to socialise with other dogs, she behaved beautifully, was very polite to other dogs and were tolerant of them sniffing her.
Out of the blue, she then had hyperplasia. We were hoping she had been spayed by the greedy bastards who bred her 3 times before the age of 2 and had at least 2 sections, the vet said she would be surprised if it was a DIY job so that forced us into an emergency spay, rather than a planned one which she would have had if/when she had come into season. She bore that illness like a trooper and bounced back after her spay.
So in a relatively short amount of time, she has been through a lot with us.

We have the time and patience to give her.
She is in a centrally heated kennel, which she is happy to go into. If she doesn't learn that it's okay to poo out during the day, it's not the end of the world, she can carry on going in there. It is only during the night time she is in there, she is in the house with our other dog during the day.

She is not a breed I would ever choose but she looked so sad and shutdown, I couldn't let her go back to where she had come from.

You say she is always by your side then you say she has the run of the fields. Which one is it? I’m gathering that she sleeps outside - so where does she actually poo at night?

She has access to fields if she wishes, she doesn't wish to access them and stays by our side, as I said, she occasionally runs a short way after our other dog before returning. If we walk through the fields she will join us. If we just walk the lane up to the road, she will do that. Basically, wherever we walk, she will follow.
She poos in her kennel, where she sleeps at night 🤷🏻‍♀️ which isn't outside, it is in the dairy attached to the house.

I can understand. I've never particulary liked an audience either, even when they applaud politely on the completion of a 'task'.

@TwoLeftSocksWithHoles I think you are missing the point and clapping would be pointless as she's deaf 🤷🏻‍♀️