wshook

I have a female basset that I seem to be having trouble house breaking.
She regularly relieves herself in her kennel during the night.
I have a toy poodle and a chocolate lab who never had these issues.
I am trying to work out that timing during the day issues and it seems as though I need to take her out to relieve herself about every 20 minutes throughout the day or she will have accidents.
Is this normal and what can I do to win this battle?

SophieB

How old is your pup? Whenever we have had a new pup where we have already had one or two adult dogs, the pup has learned quickly from the adults if out in the garden at the same time and soon gets the habit of copying the older dogs and wanting to wee in the same place as the adult.

We had our last two Basset pups (sisters) at the same time (9 weeks old) three and a half years ago so we have had DOUBLE the work and one of them was very much quicker at being house-trained than the other, but we always let them outside as soon as they woke up so they would wee and get praised. I think the 'slower' Basset really misses us if we go out to a gig or on the two mornings I work for three hours as she goes mental, squealing with excitement when we get home, but the other pup is much more laid-back about it and is always pleased when we come home, but in a less excited way.

We have had only Bassets in three generations of my family apart from a Spaniel we rehomed, who came trained at about 18mths and a lot of people say that Bassets are slow learners and they don't like being punished for mistakes and benefit more by being rewarded for being good.

Mikey is your man on here for excellent advice about anything connected to Bassets.

Jnfr

Does she seem to drink more than the others? If so, I would have her checked for Kidney issues.

My girl has kidney issues. she was originally diagnosed with renal failure (over a year ago) Initially they had little hope for her, but with meds and a low protein diet, she is thriving. You would never know she has any problems... other than looking at her food and med bill!

IF you have her tested for this and IF (god forbid) that is what the vet says, PM me. I will be MORE than happy to help you with this. Jen

Mikey T

If the dog is active that is to be expected see Housetraining Your Puppy
If you hafve not done so a strict secdule of feeding, acess to weater, sleep time and play time will make the dogs need much more predictable.

Quote:

She regularly relieves herself in her kennel during the night.

Now you Know first hand why basset are natorious hard/slow to house train. IMHO they are much slower than other breed to devlop sphincter control, the ability to hold it., Quite simply it is not that she is incontinent but simply you are asking to much of a basset puppy especial when compared to other breed. With any basset puppy I have had I would set the alarm for the middle of the night to take the dog out at least once and depending on the age and the particular dog, some time multiple time per night.

I do not think it is possible to fully housetrain a basset before the age of six months with 1 year being typical keep in mind a lack of accidents is not an indication of house training but simply management and is but the first step to house training., You are doping the basset housetraining a disservice by comparing to other breed you own, You need to adpt to the need of the basset not the other way round because quite simply it won,t happen.


Now if the puppy is spayed and the only accident are ocurring where the dog sleep but not just as night but during the day as well then spay inconinence could be the problem It usually does not show up till middle age or older spay female but on rare ocassion it can occur earlier, I had two female beagle develope it at arourn the age of two. It is generally easily treated with the treatment of choice is PPA which is available for dog in oerscrition form "proin" it has far fewer adverse side effect than hormone replacement which is another alternative.

Jnfr

I am lucky with my two.

Jake (my old fella - 9 yrs) is very good about waking me up at night. He doesn't do false alarms. When he says he's gotta go.... ya' get up and put him out. It is becoming more frequent as he ages.

Abby (2 yo), gets up on the bed and literally sits on my head when she needs out (it certainly gets my attention.... 65 lbs on your head wakes you up!) A
gain, it is never a false alarm.

The only time I mind it is if it is an hour or less before the alarm. Then it is either impossible to get back to sleep......... or I over sleep.

Again, I encourage the piddle pad training. It is great for middle of the night, great for instances of the squirts... saves a lot of problems.

It is not my preferred use for doing business, but it is certainly helpful in emergency situations where they know they won't get in "trouble"

Soundtrack

I would have her checked for a possible UTI, otherwise yeah, bassets are slow to housebreak. It's also possible that she came from an environment where she was often left in a soiled area.

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Mikey T

if the idea is to housetrain the dog then pad/newspater training only serves to confuse the dog and slows the development of a substrate preference. If you want to paper train the dog then do that exclusively as well. being inconsistent in rules only serve to confuse the dog and delay training overall.

Scully

I found that "Housetraining Your Puppy" page that Mikey posted a link to was quite helpful when we were trying to housebreak Ninja.

I would agree though, that you might want to have her checked out in case there is a medical reason, especially if you feel that something isn't quite normal. When Ninja was a puppy, I just had a feeling that her peeing was excessive, even for a puppy. She turned out to have a UTI, but once that was cleared up it was finally possible to housebreak her.

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Lucy&Millie

This was exactly my problem with Millie! I couldn't understand why she was having so much trouble with housebreaking. Finally, I had her checked out to make sure there weren't any medical issues, and she had a UTI! Once the UTI was cleared, it was so much easier!

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Wworm

Agree w/all the postings.

How old is your puppy? And how long does she stay in the crate at night?
Yeah, probably can help her by watching her water intake & not letting her have any near bedtime.

Also, when we got Worm, we were prepared to take him out for piddle in the middle of the night. We had read about setting an alarm at 3am or so to take him out of the crate for piddle. Well, it turned out that since we got him older (4 months) he was able to hold it 7-8 hours in the crate at night, so we didn't have to take him out in the middle of the night after all.

it might be an interesting experiment, to try to catch her before she goes in the kennel in the middle of the night. and if she will piddle for you outside, she prob won't end up going in her kennel.
--Worm

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