# 5 Month old puppy is a terror



## hdebruyn24 (May 24, 2013)

I am at my wits end with a 5 month old puppy we adopted. He is cute as can be, but is giving my boyfriend and I nothing but trouble, and causing us to be unable to give our other puppy attention that she needs as well because we are constantly trying to correct his behaviours, to no avail.

He is a pointer/terrier mix, and my best description of him is that of a frat boy who doesn't know the meaning of "NO". We got him around 8 weeks as a foster, and while I fell in love with a calm, mild-mannered hound mix, my boyfriend had to keep him as well, because, and I quote, "he's got spunk."

Well, spunk has now turned into just plain annoying. We have had 2 trainers come in, both telling us that we are doing the right things with him, and he is just not getting any better. The biggest problems that we are having with him is that he poops/pees in his kennel during the day and at night, and gets down-right physical with our other dog, who has a good 10 lbs on him. We are only getting about 4 hours of sleep each night because he wakes up and whines to be let out, and if you don't let him out, he poops in his crate. Not the best thing to wake up to each morning, and it cuts into his walk time. The word "No" is not something he understands, regardless of punishments and time outs and leash corrections.

He gets two long walks a day, plus some treadmill time almost every day. We kennel him during the day, seperate from the other dog so that he can't harass her. We wait til he is calm before feeding, petting and letting him out of his crate. I've started to feed him in his crate as well. Both dogs are fixed. She is a complete angel, but I can't get training done with either one of them because there are so many other pressing problems to deal with every day with him and it's exhausting.

Am I totally missing something here?


----------



## Willowy (Dec 10, 2007)

Well, he's a puppy. That means he doesn't understand human things, he doesn't have full control of his bodily functions, and he's going to be super annoying . And he's a sporting breed mix, which means he'll probably be the frat-boy type for at least another year, maybe 2.

If he's going in his crate, clearly he needs to go out more often. If you have to set your alarm to let him out every 3-4 hours, so be it. The more often he goes in his crate, the more it solidifies in his brain that his crate is a good place to go. So you need to prevent it from happening. The more often he goes outside and is rewarded for it, the more it solidifies in his brain that outside is a good place to go. You need to set him up for success. 

Don't don't automatically understand what no means. It's just a meaningless word to them. You need to manage his environment so that he can't get into trouble. Put things up, tether him to you if necessary, etc. He's really too young for things like leash punishments (not that I think that's a good training method at any age. But even trainers who agree with leash punishments don't use them on puppies). And what other kinds of punishments are you using? Many types of punishment can make matters much worse.


----------



## hdebruyn24 (May 24, 2013)

We take him out in the morning around 4:30 when we hear him get up and it's just frolic time for him. He runs around but doesn't pee or poop, so we put him back in his crate, where he continues to whine until 6 unless I take them both upstairs into their other crates and then sleep on the couch, which I don't want to turn into a habit. If we just put him back in his downstairs crate he cries and cries for hours, and on most occasions will relieve himself. I don't want to pull him out of his crate every time he whines, because that will just enforce that behavior. He will actually sometimes go in his crate immediately after we put him in it, even if he's been outside. When we are home we take him out every 30 minutes, and he is let out every 3 hours during the day, as my boyfriend's mom comes in and lets them both out and plays with them for about an hour. The last two days, he has actually slid back quite a bit in regard to his potty training. It's so hard, because Lady, our other pup who is the same age, has never once had an accident and we got them the same day. 

The corrections are usually pulling whatever he has in his mouth out and telling him no and redirecting, same with when he is being aggressive when playing with the other dog. Poor girl has long hound ears, and it's his favorite thing to grab and tug, and has led to some bloody messes. I usually just ignore the whining, but we do try to use proximity and getting in his space, which works really well with the other dog but not so much him. I can't reward him much with treats as he has a sensitive stomach and turns a bad situation into a worse one when he does decide to poop in his crate, so we give him lots of loves and "good (insert command here)" when he poops or pees outside. We have gone back to the water bottle on occasion out of frustration, which I know is not the way to do anything. Every trainer makes a big deal out of energy, but I feel like an unhinged psychopath on 4 hours of sleep somedays, so it's hard to remain calm and assertive when dealing with him.


----------



## pawsaddict (Apr 17, 2013)

hdebruyn24 said:


> I can't reward him much with treats as he has a sensitive stomach and turns a bad situation into a worse one when he does decide to poop in his crate, so we give him lots of loves and "good (insert command here)" when he poops or pees outside.


Have you tried to give frozen veggies (such as small frozen peas and carrots) to him as a treat? That may not upset his tummy so much  At this point, I would I think you have to decide which issue you want to fix first...his anxiety, for lack of a better term, when you're not with him at night or his house-training. If it is his house-training, then let him out as soon as he starts whining. Like Willowy said, set your alarm for every X amount of hours so you can let him out before he has an accident. Be sure you are waiting the appropriate amount of time for him to do his business outside as well. Have you trained a "potty" command? If he eliminates as soon as you put him back in, take him outside to show him that that is where he needs to go and then put him back in his crate (once the mess is cleaned up, of course ) Don't let him run around and have fun. Just outside to show him where to go or outside to let him know it's pee time and then back in. Don't make a fuss over him unless he does a good job and pees outside (happy fuss). Remember, any attention - even negative - is attention. Perhaps get a smaller crate for him if this one provides him enough space to eliminate and then move away from his mess as well.


----------



## packetsmom (Mar 21, 2013)

It sounds like he's spending a lot of time in his crate, if he's in there all day and then even eating his meals in there, and then back in for the whole night. Is he getting enough exercise and mental stimulation in the time he's out? Wearing out his body and brain may help him sleep better through the night and get you all some much-needed rest as well as help curb some of the "rotten puppy" energy when he is let out.

I like to make potty breaks in the night or early morning very businesslike and not exciting. During the day, if a pup goes potty successfully, there's treats, tons of praise, and play. At night or early morning, there's a "good boy/girl" and then right back in to the crate. If I take a pup out at that time and they don't do the deed and are just goofing off, it's right back in the crate and we'll try again. They learn that potty trips in the middle of the night or early morning are boring and are less likely to decide that the middle of the night is a good play time. This, plus making sure that there is enough good play time in the day and evening, helps wear them out and make nighttime a good time to sleep.

I'd also try feeding earlier in the evening, if you can and feeding a lighter meal in the evening and more in the morning, so that there's less need to poop in the middle of the night.


----------



## hdebruyn24 (May 24, 2013)

We walk him in the morning and the evening and then he gets on the treadmill for about 15 minutes. His walks are usually around 45 minutes, and he gets the hour of playtime in the afternoon with "grandma". I then try to do training with him on commands to stimulate him mentally. If he doesn't get his walks, it's a lot worse. We also take them both to puppy playtime to get them both more socialized. I will try the frozen veggies as treats; hopefully that will be better on his tummy.


----------



## xxxxdogdragoness (Jul 22, 2010)

Yep just go out there, don't may too much attention to him & just be boring. Once he goes, give him a little game as a reward, then back inside, no matter how muh he whines (as long as you are sure he has fully released himself) Ignore him even if that means getting ear plugs or noise reducing headphones. 

Josefina only made a fuss when she had to go out & I remember being out at 2am in the middle of winter waiting for her to potty, so I do feel you. Do you have any bedding in the crate? If so take it out so there is nothing to absorb the accident, how big is the crate? If he can do his mess on one end & sleep on the other then it's too big.


----------



## hdebruyn24 (May 24, 2013)

His crate is just big enough to let him turn around and lay down. He actually has to stoop a bit when he sits up. I have told my boyfriend we need to take the bedding out, but he relents because Becks looks so pathetic. 
Like I said, we let him out and he seems to relieve himself completely, and we have moved him across the house and let him just whine, and woke up to the biggest mess I've seen from him in a long time. I swear he has a poop reserve. We are going to put a thick door in between our room and the space we keep them soon, and just deal with it. I just don't want any clean up to have to cut into his walk time he gets, because that makes the situation a lot worse.

Thank heavens the other dog is problem-free..... for now


----------



## blenderpie (Oct 5, 2012)

I completely understand being frustrated. I also have two puppies (7mo and a 4mo) as far as house breaking and picking up on subtle reinforcements, he was a breeze to raise (he was a shark, though, I have the scars to prove it. It's hard not to compare the two, because my youngest's problems are completely different.

I have a few, long winded suggestions.

1. It does sound like he's getting a fair bit of physical exercise. He's bred to work all day, so I'm sure if you walked him an additional two hours a day, he would happily take it. I'm not convinced that would solve the problem, though. 

He sounds bored. And I know that it's easy to shut them away when they're being annoying. I've done it, everyone here has done it! We all need breaks sometimes. It's just important to remember that unless you train through whatever it is that's bothering you, it will ALWAYS be a problem. Ellie (the 4 mo) has done some ding song things that tempt me to put my first through the wall. It's these moments that I take a deep breath and pick up the clicker.

First of all, picking up the clicker at that moment (outside of normal training sessions) has two benefits A) whatever was bothering me, say....not responding to her name, gets practice right then not at some indefinite "later" it only takes a few minutes, but It's easy to spend hours thinking of excuses to put it off. B) training is a great bonding experience. It's easy to forgive a knocked over trashcan or ripped up piece of paper when you and your dog are working as a unit to accomplish something. It gives both parties a sense of pride and accomplishment.

2. How are you handling the accidents in the crate? Because remember that negative attention is still attention...

Ellie came to us as an 8 week old with a UTI. She couldn't physically hold it AT ALL. She would even pee in her sleep. Because of this, we had no choice but to take the divider out of the crate and put puppy pads in it to try to keep her clean at night (I still got up every hour). But, this caused her to see her crate as an okay place to go. So, even when her antibiotics were done and her crate was the correct size, she would still go in it and then start screaming her head off because she was dirty. We then realized that we couldn't consider her crate a potty training tool and took her out every 10-15 minutes when she was in it just like we did when she was out (when we were home) and every two hours at night. Preventing the accidents was the key.

Eventually we noticed that she could sleep through the night and wouldn't go 95% of the time we were out of the house. But, when we were sitting on the couch for dinner within sight of her crate, she would go every five minutes! She realized that as soon as we saw her squat, we rushed to her and took her out. She trained us! She doesn't like being in the pee, so her realizing that it might take us 2-3 minutes to take her out decreased the behavior. She'll now pee for attention maybe 2-3 tines a week instead of like 6 times a night.

Is how you are reacting a motivator for him? I wanna make it clear that I am NOT advocating leaving to dog in his filth. I'm just saying that you need to figure our WHY he feels the need to do it, and train him to an alternate response.


----------



## xxxxdogdragoness (Jul 22, 2010)

Yep, there is a reason puppies are so cute ... So we don't strangle them when they frustrate the crap out of us xD.


----------

