MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
We've just got a new puppy home a few days ago - things aren't going too bad and wanted to bounce our routine off STW doggers to see if we can improve on what we are doing.
Our puppy is going to bed in the kitchen in a puppy pen with paper down and water - we have also got a crate in the puppy pen as a place to sleep but we leave the door open.
We're taking her to toilet before bed at about 11pm after some vigorous play to wear her out. Once we turn the lights off she crys for about 10-20minutes and then settles.
However, we are finding that when we get up in the night for toilet, she doesn't want to go back to bed and whines for 30-60minutes. Any ideas on how we can reduce the whining or is this normal?
OK, who's going to be the first to admit to being a dogger?
Mine did that and ignoring it was the solution.
TTIWWP
Ignore it. If that's the routine you want it to follow and where it shall sleep then you have to set the standard. Just make a big fuss when you get up. Its only been a few days and would be used to its brothers and sisters next to it in the night.
The most important thing with a new puppy is being consistent even though sometimes it may pull at your heart strings.
Ignore...it's bloody hard to, but 'tis the only way.
I caved. Let him sleep under my bed. As he got bigger, he didn't fit. He wanted up on the bed, I caved. Best part of ten years sharing my bed with a massive German shepherd (dog, not a bloke looking after sheep).
I know it's not the done thing but I loved that dog. Don't regret it to this day.
OK - will have to ignore.
I have to add that at 4.30 this morning when I was out in the garden the neighbour behind me had his light on and was staring at me with his arms folded. But as my wife and I said it was the same if not worse with both our kids.
As above. We've never bothered with nighttime wee though tbh. But yeah it's hard. What's the breed?
Oh, and you ask for puppy help, you put up puppy pictures, quid pro quo Clarice...
Are you waking the pup to put it out, if so don't bother, if not give it as little fuss as possible, let it out, praise any pee and then put it back to bed.
As already said above, just ignore it. I went to the neighbours and warned them too just incase they got a bit arsey. Ours got bored after a few days and decided to sleep instead 🙂
We're not waking the puppy up, I'm sleeping in the spare room directly above the kitchen so I can hear it crying for a wee. Then I let it out.
Breed is Patterdale / Labrador cross.
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Great looking pup.
I caved like Onzadog, 9 stone ridgeback sleeps on my bed!
DO NOT CAVE IN.
Cheers - this is one of my favourite pics of my daughter holding her..
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We went one step further, and she sleeps in the crate with the door shut. Still does now at 4 months.
As above, don't cave. The only other thing we did was to leave a radio playing in the background at low volume. Highly likely she's never experienced 'silence' before.
Our 9 year old Greyhound still cries and howls at 430-5ish. Been ignoring her for years and it hasn't made a blind bit of difference!
Cheers
Danny B
Hey bushwacked.. hows the puppy getting on apart from the above? as above tho just ignore it and it'll get through the night.
Edit... I think it took our lab/Patterdale a few weeks to get in to a rhythm. ..
I have known people to take month for pups to settle. A work colleague wondered what the hell he had done to try and get his boxer to settle. We manage to settle our pup in 8 or 9 days. The wife was sleeping in the lounge near her cage and apart from waking for a wee or two, she was fine. Pup looks lovely by the way.
We use to put a watch (not a digital one !) and a hot water bottle in with our pup at night and it seemed to help her settle
We put a t shirt we'd worn all day in with our pup on his first night. one of mine and one of MrsNero's never had him waking in the night. Well he may have but he never cried. Also second leaving radio on for background noise.
We fitted a dog flap, spent 15 mins training her to use it, hey presto takes herself out for a leak, then straight back to bed/sleep this was at 12 weeks, still using now at 2.
Wonder how patterdle and lab got it together, must have involved a buffet.
were having exact same issue with our new puppy, Saluki/Greyhound cross. Very interesting to read some of these replies...
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we had the same problem.. we ignored it for nearly a month.. but then it started waking up our 9 month old son, who had only just cracked sleeping through the night
it drove me insane
we sold the puppy
Put the crate somewhere close so she can see and smell you at night. Dogs are social.
My lab sleeps on the floor outside our bedrooms. We used the crate till she was house trained and moved onto a dog bed after that.
Daftvader - all good otherwise, shes quite content and loves my wife and the kids. No real issues at the moment (4 days in now)
Shes awake now after I went to the toilet at 12.30, ignoring her with ear plugs and she seems to be quiet... I think 😉
Hi , with my Setter I used to spray him in the face with some water, not a super soaker but just a fine mist from one of those plant spraying bottles, shut the wee bugger right up! The upside is that he doesn't whine and at nearly 4 years I have yet to hear him bark, the downside is that he hates water, won't wade deeper than his tits and goes into his bed when I'm refilling his water bowl.
get in there quick with the training and you'll be ok. best dogs in the world... mad as a box of frogs but still the best!
Not a bad night sleep really - left her in and came down at 6am (after a little whining from her) Not sure how much she was whining though as a 3hour ride and a 4.30am start yesterday ruined me.
Daftvader - been teaching her to sit, bit of recall etc so far and I think the Lab in her is loving working for the rewards. How are you getting on with yours? How old? Got any pics?
Just seperation anxiety, all puppy's go through it.
Sure he'll be fine given time.
Lord merchant, our lurcher didnt settle until I slept in the living room with the pup in cage nearby. Took two nights and then she was fine. Later she voted with her feet and refused to come in last thing at night to go in the cage preferring her kennel. She now aged four sleeps on the sofa, although recently its been too hot so she has slept outside again a few times.
Here's my 6year old with Jinx who's 2 in a month and still believes he's a little puppy!
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Ear plugs. It'll stop in a week.
Lilly is just a year old and is becoming one of the best dog I have had for years. Her recall is pretty good but she still loves to jump up at people especially kids... minivaders fault I'm afraid, he doesn't care so she thinks its ok... we're working on that. She loves food, proper dustbin given half the chance and will also happily eat anything she finds, dessicated frog was this weeks favourite! She is still a bit manic in crowded places but that is getting better too. All told I don't think we could have gotten a better family pet. Loves walking and will happily go for hours and still want to play when she gets home, equally loves to cuddle up on the sofa and chilli out... pics now as requested. .... and we have no idea where her piggy tail comes from 😀
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Lovely pics. How do you get on with the harness?
Kristoff - I'm assuming a purebred Lab there?? 🙂
Its great... she just pulled her head out of a collar so we tried a normal webbing type which didnt fit too well. This one we got from robinsons (the horse place) half the price of the other stores. It fits well and doesn't get in the way when she's hooning around like a mad thing
I've heard good things about harnesses from a point of view of not damaging the dogs neck. But then a lot of people have recommended slip leads too.
Getting bedlington puppy on Tuesday,will befollowing and getting involved with this thread
Slip leads are good if you train with them early imo but I just prefer harnesses had them for all of my dogs
Bushwacked - yea he's a KC registered purebred.
I'm sure you will have many happy years to come.
Our lab doesn't jump up at all unless he's told he can. Amazing with children, my 2.5 year old can do pretty much anything with him and he just isn't bothered.
We had a slightly iffy time when he was around 18months but as our vet confirmed he was in his teenage years so fighting to be top dog.. Bit of rough play with me to show him who was top dog and he's been fine ever since.
Being a pack animal sooner or later you'll have to put them in there place. I'm not saying to hit your pet, a light tap on the nose with a rolled up newspaper works, I was told never to hit (not that I expect you would anyway) as you don't want them to associate a hand coming towards them with being hurt and could cause them to lash out (possibly at the wrong people).
We found with the water it was best to remove the water at say 10pm.. Final wee around 10:30pm then sleep time. At your puppy's age their bladder is tiny so allowing free access to water overnight won't help with stopping overnight toilet breaks.
Meet Rufus. He's 14 weeks old now so we've just been through what Bushwhacked is going through. For the first few weeks we took water away at 10pm, tired him out, took him for a pee at 2330 ish and put him in his cage, closed the door then let him out at 630 for a pee again. We didn't hear a peep from him during the night. His bladder is much stronger now and he lets us know when he needs to go out by sitting by the door.
As with everyone else in the thread my advice would be don't cave to any bad behaviour or whining. You're in charge and you set the boundaries. Enjoy!
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Rufus is cute, what is he?
Goldie, must be. He's Just. So. FLUFFY!!!
He's a Golden Retriever and also our first puppy. We had a Greyhound called Benny but he died during the winter. He was a retired racer who we had from two years old so puppy training is a new experience. We've found that as long as we are consistent with him he learns fast. Lead training and being a bit mouthy are currently the current objectives to improve on but he's getting there.
Unklehomered - I can confirm that he is fluffy squared.
loving the bouffant!
Loving the picture of Rufus I had a Golden Retriever for 15 years and he had the most loving temperment and was a character. He died 14years ago and I still think of him.
Wolves are pack animals, dogs are not.
Ignore the whining, it's the only way.
This advice will be no use to anyone who's already brought their puppy home, but might be helpful for anyone who's planning on keeping a pup; A week or so before we collected her, we slept in old t-shirts for a couple of nights and then took these round the farm where she was growing up. These were then left where she liked to play, so she grew to associate our scent with safety and happy times.
I hope this helped her homing experience... five years on I still feel like a bit of a bastid for taking her away from her family, but she's our furry daughter and I can't imagine being with out her, even if she did roll in dead stuff earlier in the week, and still smells rancid after three washes.
We got our Duck Toller at 12 weeks old and have been quite lucky with her. We read Gwen Bailey's book The Perfect Puppy and it was a huge help as it was our first puppy. The Victoria Stilwell videos on YouTube are a great resource too.
Whatever you do don't cave in! My wife called me at work in tears one afternoon as the puppy was wailing like a banshee for her and the cries were getting to her. She held off rushing to her and we only ever go to get her from her crate when she's good and calm. We only had a couple of days of it.
We taught her very quickly that the crate was a good place to be and not a prison. We used a clicker to train her to go into the create at bed time and now we just have to say "Teal,go to Bed" and she heads there. We also fed her in the crate so she got used to being enclosed and having a great time eating in there.
We did two toilet stops each night for the first few weeks,11pm and 3 am, then just midnight and 6am. We'd always open the door before we got her out of the crate because she'd be bursting to go and we didn't want to delay her and cause and accident inside. Add mentioned above, no fuss, when she was weeing we gave it a name, quick-quick, and rewarded her once complete then straight back to bed. After a few nights she was on auto pilot and would take herself back. She was always on the lead too so we could control her every move.
If you can, start using a clicker to train your puppy. Teal took to it very quickly and being food oriented helped. You can quickly teach the puppy all sorts of useful good behaviors: sit, stay, leave it, down, up, go to bed, etc We were amazed how quickly she learned.
Lovely puppy by the way!
I might look into a clicker.
Had a great night last night. Got her in the pen with the crate (She doesn't like the crate that much at the moment but we're working on making it a fun place she wants to be in) and turned the lights off and sat there for 5 mins in the dark on a chair giving her no attention but just being there. She calmed down after 2-3mins. I went to bed about 11pm (left a light on in another room she could see it) and 6am I'm up and she's out in the garden doing a poo. Admitedly there is a wee on the paper but if I can get her settled to be quiet at night then once she is used to the crate I can confine her in there and get the toilet training sorted with her whining more when she wants to go to the toilet than just for attention.
Lazgoat - When you did the toilet stops did you get up at those times and take your pup or did the pup wake you up?
Bushwacked, we set alarms to get us up for her toilet stops and we woke her up to go out. She spent 12 weeks at the breeders kennels and could go whenever and wherever she liked in the yard there, so we had to break her out of that habit and into ours.
We had a couple of accidents when we changed her to midnight and 6am toilet stops but she soon increased her bladder control and was dry thereafter.
She's almost 8 months old and we take her out between 10 and 11pm when we go to bed and then again when we are up at 7.30am.
Cool, cheers for that
Bit of an update (was gonna post one sooner but thanks to a lightening strike we've been without Broadband for a week and still waiting for BT to pull their finger out - currently using a mobile phone hotspot)
She's now sleeping through the night locked in her crate and not wetting her bed from 10.30 until 6.30am 🙂 Few issues with weeing on the carpet in the dining room and play biting but otherwise everything is going really well.
She's definitely got a bit of Lab in her as she will eat anything and everything - including dried cat poo which is an absolute joy to forcibly remove from her mouth.