Quote:
Originally Posted by dpg
Do you own a crate for the dog? Sounds cruel but dogs love them and in time think of them as "their" space to escape too. Also, when their young they can spend some time in them and they will not go while in there cause they will never "go" in their home. They might of course if he's never brought outside enough but that's only common sense. I have a five year old (dog  ) who has the run of the house and still returns to his crate on a regular basis to just chill out. Ask your vet about crate training, he/she will strongly agree I'm sure. |
My dog hated his crate. The vet said that's because he is a party animal and wants to be where the action is. My sister's dog loves her crate...especially when I'm visiting with my dog, and my dog becomes amorous (even though he's been fixed).
When my dog was a puppy, he got a bad case of diarrhea (possibly giardia), so he obviously couldn't hold it in and messed in his crate. So make sure you get a crate which is easy to clean (if you don't already have one).
One unrelated comment that I'll make about puppies and it pertains to stairs. We didn't know that dogs aren't naturally good with stairs until our first puppy (about 12 weeks old) fell down a flight of stairs causing injuries to his lungs which were eventually fatal. Fast forward 12 years and we have one of his littermates who has arthritis and is not good on the stairs anymore. So needless to say we're very carefully with him and stairs.