What does "housetrained" really mean?

[PamH]

If I take Maddy out regularly or if sitting in the living room I leave the door to the patio open, she will go outside. However if she runs off to the patio door and it is closed, she will pee on the rug there. She doesn't bark except at night in bed when she needs to go. She doesn't come running back to me in the kitchen.
So in my mind she is not housetrained. Housetrained means she communicates with me. She is 7 months old.
What can I work on? 99% of the time I am very aware, watching her, taking her out etc. It is the 1% when I don't immediately notice her heading to the patio door. Then I notice and go running over to the area and she is just squatting!
Any suggestions?
Pam

[Kodee]

House trained I guess can have a few definitions to different people. To me it means you hold it a reasonable amt of time - till I can let you out. On the age it will vary - my lab could wait about 8hrs easy - you'd be pushing it at 9. But smaller dogs have smaller bladders and I have read to never expect a cavalier to hold as long as a lab - I think I read 6 hrs is more norm for a grown cavalier.

Edit: I thought I'd add, we didnt expect her to hold it 8 hrs a day - its just sometimes she could if required. When I worked full time usually my husband was home at lunch and the kids got home from school at 3:30 if he didnt so about 2 days a wk she sometimes waited about 7.5 hrs and she ran pretty fast outside!

[Karlin]

She still has too much freedom if she has the option of squatting on the carpet, because that means she is able to make choices out of eyesight. She shouldn;t ever have that option. Also be aware that just because a dog is housetrained to one room, doesn;t mean they are housetrained to the whole house. You need to be vigilant and housetrain for every single room, one by one. Seven months would be too young for a dog to have free rein in the house for example. This means you need to either tether her to you by fastening a lead around a belt loop, crate her, have her in arm's reach, have her on your lap, or she is asleep.

It is really important to be very strict at this point as 7 months is an age where, although generally you can expect occasional and fairly rare accidents (it takes them til about a year to be reliable in most cases), she really should be pretty clear on where she always should be going for say two rooms, and not viewing the inside as a regular option. If she keeps having options on where she goes, you will have her continuing doing this until it is a very hard habit to break. I think you'll have a bit of a challenge to break this already hence the suggestion to be very strict, structured and focused in getting her out and limiting her options.

I'd suggest only giving her a single room at a time in which she can run around but again, under a watchful eye constantly. If you really focus on this for say three weeks, you'll probably really have the idea set in her mind and bewell on the way to getting her housetrained so she isn;t backsliding any further into weeing inside. I'd also not let her run out on her own to go -- she needs structure. I'd put on the lead and take her out at regular intervals, reward and praise when she goes.

PS I'd take the rug off the floor and either get rid of it, or clean it with an enzyme cleaner then stow it away for a few months. Right now she has probably marked it enough that it will keep drawing her back and she associates that rug with peeing as well. So it would be a good idea to break the association totally. I took all my rugs up for about 4 months when I first got Jaspar, until the bulk of housetraining was over, as they can go so fast and that smell is a magnet to them to keep repeating the action.

[Pumkin]

PS I'd take the rug off the floor and either get rid of it, or clean it with an enzyme cleaner then stow it away for a few months. Right now she has probably marked it enough that it will keep drawing her back and she associates that rug with peeing as well. So it would be a good idea to break the association totally. I took all my rugs up for about 4 months when I first got Jaspar, until the bulk of housetraining was over, as they can go so fast and that smell is a magnet to them to keep repeating the action.

What a great idea!!! I'm going to be sure to pull my rug up b4 bringing little Pumkin home. That away I won't have to worry about her using the rug... I did buy some Simple Solution so I'll just use that on the floor. It will be much easier to clean as well.....

[Zippy]

Neither of our Cavaliers barked to go outside.

Even with adult dogs, it's up to the human to be observant, after about the four hour mark, I just put them out.

We always make sure that Mary Alice goes outside (on a leash) before we leave her alone. That way, we know she's had a pee or whatever.

She won't go on our front lawn yet, so it means a short walk. When we return, we walk her again.

Charley used to just walk around near the door if he needed to go out, Mary Alice gets a bit restless but nothing specific. It's always between the fourth and fifth hour.....except at night, Mary Alice sleeps all night now, thank heavens!

[Cathy Moon]

My cavs will hang out by the back door when they need to go out. India will whine. Geordie will try to 'tell' me by putting his front paws on me, giving me intense, meaningful looks, and will tip his head and jump if I ask him if he has to go out.

It has taken ages for them to 'tell' me they have to go out. I used to let them out every 3-4 hours, so they didn't have to ask!

I let them out at set times, such as first thing in the morning, last thing at night, and both before and after meals. If I'm going away for more than an hour, I put them in the kitchen with gates.

I recently read in a dog magazine that an occasional accident in the house (when something out of the ordinary is going on) should be viewed in the same way as when we accidentally drop or spill something. According to the article, we should not expect our dogs to be perfect without fail. It's more like when a child is distracted at the dinner table and accidentally spills a glass of milk - not intentional! So if something is happening that is out of the ordinary for our dog, we have to think for them in a proactive way.

[arasara]

I would say Kosmo is reliably house trained but he still doens't tell me that he needs to go out (except for rarely.) I have him on his schedule though and I never miss an "out time." If I ask hiim "Kosmo, do you have to go potty?" he will get up and go to the door if he has to go. If not he sort of rolls his eyes at me and goes back to sleep

Faith doesn't tell me either.. I just take her out frequently. I don't mind this set up at all. I just have to be consciously aware of how long it's been or how much water they've drank.

Faith is 5 months and is allowed everywhere in my house. I just keep an eye on her. If she gets up and goes to the other room then I take her out "just to make sure." We've been really lucky by doing this.

Good luck with Maddy.

[IzzieBell&MommyBell]

Have you tried using bells? For Izzie we've hung a bunch of jingle bells (really a xmas decoration) on the doorknob of the door we use to take her out. We started with ringing the bells on purpose when we'd take her out, then moved to bumping them "by accident" on our way out, and within a few weeks she was hitting them on her own. We discovered that hanging the bells higher rather than lower forces her to jump up a bit which equates to her hitting the bells harder and them ringing louder. Good luck!

[Roxanne]

None of my dogs tell me when they have to go out either. I just consistently take them out . It works fine . I think Maddie might be a great candidate for the bells though ! Sounds like she is going to the door and when you dont notice her she goes right there. There is a place that sells cute bells , I think its poochee bells.com or something like that . I have some but mine never caught on .........I dont think I was consistent enough !