Ramblings of A Labradoodle Owner

Housetraining: where an intelligent adult human tries to teach a canine puppy how to PEE PEE and POOP OUTSIDE on the ground and NOT inside the house. There are no instructions attached to your puppy’s collar or any taped to the crate.

Fine, I know how to read articles on the internet and use common sense as well.  Besides, I raised 3 kids born 4 years apart. One was trained at age 2, the other at age 2.5 years old and the 3rd child at 3 years old. I didn’t use treats, kept a constant eye on them, bought them the “big boy” and ”big girl” panties. OH and what praise I would lavish on them when they went potty. Yes there were a few accidents here and there but in a short time period each and every child of mine were easily housetrained. Each child was different due to maturity and willingness. But now we’re talking about a cute 13 week old puppy that I am told can be trained in weeks, not months or years, using consistency!  Alright, how hard can this be? Dave was just looming over my shoulder a moment ago reading this and now is in the other room snickering away. I asked him what was so funny and got the reply, “Nothing honey” while he wears his Cheshire cat smile and stays quiet. (Smart man if you ask me)

Alright, here is the real truth on our housetraining skills: I have a college degree in computer information systems, graduated in the top 4% of my college with a 3.85 GPA, was vice president of Phi Theta Kappa, have 15 years experience in landscape design, completed Toastmasters Inc with numerous awards, was on the board of directors for Cornell University Cooperative Extension, a Master Gardner and the list continues. So for the time being I consider myself to be a responsible, somewhat intelligent, organized woman that uses common sense daily along with humor. HOWEVER, housetraining is NOT a course you can take at college (notice I did not use the phrase “hands on training”). I may not possess the greatest of canine housetraining skills. Yet I do have the power of positive thought and the good old “try, try again till we reach success” attitude! So what do Dave and I do? OH, we enthusiastically read every article on housetraining [success] stories we can find on the internet, absorbing that puppies primarily need walking right after sleeping, playing, and eating. Okay, we walk Max every 30min for the first week, commending him with GOOD BOY! Good POTTY MAX! And Max is so darn happy wagging his stumpy tail like he won the jackpot of dog treats. Wow this is great! Or is it?

When your puppy does circles acting like it is trying to catch its stumpy tail, well it is cute. That is till you realize your puppy is now doing number two on the floor while you stand there in total shock. Finally the brain registers what is really happening. Then you try to remember quickly where the leash is, try to run out with your puppy that is in mid poop, saying “Noooooooooooo” while picking him up and run out the door so he can finish outside what he has already finished in the house. Some dogs I hear are trained in under 2 weeks. Is that a mail order dog? Or am I just lucky enough to get the dog that helps me lose the extra 6lbs by walking him every 30 to 45min for weeks on end? I must say my Labradoodle puppy is great for speeding up my metabolism and other times curbing my appetite.  Nature’s Miracle is now a household word and we bought the 1.5 gallon jug complete with a motorized power spray handle as Max somehow didn’t quite catch on quickly to housetraining. I now re-strategize what ARE WE doing wrong? Why? Well, Max does prove himself to be highly intelligent in other areas, like faking a poop or pee when he sees a treat.

BUT at the moment carpets seem to be the number one choice spot for Max, with tiles and laminate floors being second, the crate being the third, and for some reason the icy, partly snow covered grass being last choice. We do not tell anyone yet of our failure, instead when asked how it is going we just reply, “Max is doing really well as he doesn’t pee in the house at all and can hold it all night long” and promptly change the subject.

To be continued later on as right now Max needs a potty walk OUTSIDE and NOW.

PS: Did you hug your doodle today?

The contents of this blog site are copyright (c) 2007, Annmarie Sparks. All Rights Reserved. 

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 1st, 2007 at 1:44 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.