Mini_M

We had one, but as Kayne's Mum said the grass stank really bad after a few days. Even washing it didn't help. We ended tossing out the grass and filling the tray with sand. That works great as its much easier to scoop out the poo with the sand, and about once every month we just replace the sand.

Are you at home with him all the time? You need to work out his 'pooping signal' and as soon as you see it scoop him up and take him outside. The idea is to not let him have any mistakes in the house, as this will just make it take longer to train him. If he is running off and pooping then try tethering him to you with a lead so you can always watch him. After he poops, then he can have a few hours of off-leash play time. Of course after he poops in the right place then he gets lots of praise, treats, playtime etc. It took about 2 weeks for our guy to get it, once we were able to catch him 99% of the time. bye!

Have you tried actually teaching her to bark on command? It's counterintuitive I know, but it worked for us. There is a thread on it here: http://www.dolforums.com.au/index.php?showtopic=9497 Basically you clicker train them to bark on a command and hand signal and ignore them if they bark any other time. Now our Milo knows only to bark when requested. Granted, he didn't really have a barking problem before, so your results may vary.

Does your breeder have a suggestion? Our breeder said not to get the new vaccine because she's heard of dogs having a bad reaction to it. Our vet assured us that she's probably being over-cautious, but was happy to give our Milo the traditional shots. That was the C3 vaccination at 6 weeks (before we got him), the C3 + kennel cough vacc at 12 weeks (I think this may be a C5?) , and then another C3 at 16 weeks.

After many false starts, we've just gotten our 16 week old pup to do exactly this. The secret was treats! Every time after we put him outside and he weed, we would jump up and down excitedly and then give him one of his favourite treats (cubes of frozen roast chicken). They were in the fridge inside, but if we kept the jumping around and praising going while we brought him in and opened the fridge to get the treats, he quickly understood he was being treated for the correct toilet. After only about 2 days of this, he started going to the back door and looking at us expectantly. If he was out of sight he'd start whining. Until we let him out for his toilet and then repeated the treating game. Try it like this. Ian Dunbar recommends treating after toilet as a way to get your dog trained, and it certainly worked for us. bye!

Have you tried giving her a pigs ear or something to chew on while you're brushing? Or treat her when she stays still for 5 seconds while brushing, then gradually increase the time.

We feed Milo, our 15 week old toy poodle, 2 meals a day of puppy kibble (Nutrience brand) and 1 of raw lamb. He only eats about 5-6 little pieces of kibble for those meals, and then wolfs down the meat in 20 seconds. We've tried not giving him meat for a few days, but then he hardly eats anything. We've also tried soaking the biscuits in water but he's still not very interested in them. We've also tried a different brand of food (Artemis) but he's not interested in that either. We've been told that his puppy kibble is important for him as it has the vitamins he needs, but it seems like he's not eating enough of it. Any suggestions? thanks

Our Milo was exactly like this when he first started walking, it took about 2 weeks but now he quite happily follows us pretty much anywhere. If he stops for a sniff or a sit all it takes is a slight tug with the lead and he's back trotting with us again. Not game enough to take him off lead at the park though, he's so small and quick we're afraid he might get spooked at something and bolt off. We walk him on an extendable lead which is kept short during the walk, and let out to 5 meters when we get to the park so he can romp around safely.

Hi Maximum, Our breeder said to ask our vet to pull Milo's remaining baby teeth at the time of desexing, all her poodles get this done. Our vet also said that he usually does this. Maybe Max being part poodle needs this as well?

Hi Maximum! Have you tried the vet clinic at Sydney Uni? We went to a vet we didn't like much near here, and are going to try Sydney Uni next, they have been highly recommended by a number of people. Though it does mean you'll have to cross the bridge !

We initially thought that but then our vet indicated that it should be ok to take him out 1 week after his second vaccination, just avoid taking him to places where many other dogs are e.g. a dog park. Our dog trainer said it was fine now, but only on sealed surfaces. This seems to be something that everyone has a different opinion on. Now we're a bit confused.

Hi all, We've just started taking our 14 week old toy poodle for short walks down the road. Initially he was a bit scared of everything, but now he comes along quite happily... but with one small issue. About every 20 meters or so he will just stop and plonk his bottom down and not move for about 30 seconds. He'll just sit there looking at us. During this time he wont be budged. After a short while he'll start up again and we're off down the road. Is this just him getting tired and wanting a rest? Or is he being stubborn and telling us to wait here until he wants to move off again. If he's tired then I'm happy to let him rest every short while, but I just want to know if this is a dominance issue that we should be trying to break early. thanks!

Just thought I'd let you know that Milo is coming along well with his socialisation. We've introduced him to a few other (calm) dogs during the week and he got along with them fine. He still gets a bit scared at loud barking, but that's to be expected at this age I guess. The other day he met a 1 yr old cattle dog who kept grabbing his lead and trying to drag him around the park. After a few initial scared responses he got used to it and was happy to sit quietly with this other dog holding him by the lead. Was very cute to watch. In puppy class last night he got along well with all the other puppies and played with them without fear. I'm meeting up with Maximum in a few days to introduce our puppies to each other.. if anyone else wants to come along to our next meetup, let us know!! bye

We are using a tray of sand for our puppy to toilet on. I've heard kitty litter can be bad for them if they decide to swallow it, but I think you can get special puppy litter. The sand works really well, its cheap and easy to scoop up, also doesn't smell.

When our guy (14 weeks old) does that we say "No!" very sternly and stuff one of his toys in his mouth, if he starts playing with that then we praise him. He's hardly doing it now, but occasionally has a relapse. We find that he mainly does it when there's a wind blowing and a corner of the paper flaps in the breeze. Is there any way you can weigh it down?

We crate our 13 week old puppy at night and a few times during the day. The funniest thing is that my wife's sister who is a (human) psychologist talked to a colleague who is a (human) psychiatrist and determined that the reason our puppy has some slight fear issues is because he is kept in a crate sometimes... because if you did that to a human they would be scared of the outside world as well?? That's brilliant.. next time I'm sick I'll go and see my vet, because you know we're all the same on the inside. On the topic.. we're big fans of crate training. Especially with living in a small town house with no backyard, we needed him to get used to toilet training very quickly.

Hi all, I'll make sure not to give him treats in the future when he's scared. I thought I read somewhere that this was a way to have good memories of the time the scary dog barked, or whatever. He's 13 weeks old now, so may be entering the 1st fear period I was reading about. But I was told not to socialise him with other dogs until a week after his 12 week injection. We've been carrying him out of the house once a day for a walk. The puppy school seems really well run, and I'm sure there is no problem with their methods. They separated the puppies into a shy group and a confident group. Then the puppies were introduced slowly within their group on lead until they sniffed each other, and then were allowed to play. Milo started off having fun, but after a few minutes just kept trying to run away and was shaking. It's the one run by the Dog Logic instructors, which came highly recommended by this forum and other sources. I'll bring up this issue directly with the instructors next time. By the way, if anyone here is near Sydney inner west and has a puppy that could do with some socialising, I'd be keen to meet up and introduce our puppies.

Hi all, Our toy poodle Milo met some other puppies for the first time at puppy pre-school on Monday. While the other puppies seemed to get along and play with other quite well, Milo seemed to be terrified of all the others. He'd go in for a quick sniff, then run for the corner of the room. A few times he got stuck trying to escape through the bars of the large pen they were in. He'd sometimes run to the other people there, as if he was much more comfortable with humans rather than dogs. Is this normal for some pups? Will he grow out of it in time? We've been very careful not to spoil him. We don't carry or cuddle him excessively. If he gets scared by a dog barking we either ignore it, or give him treats to take his mind off it. Any ideas?

I'm doing their puppy pre-school right now with Milo our toy poodle. Its pretty good, the best part I think is the socialisation with other puppies. Unfortunately you have just missed the start of their latest class, you may have to wait 4 weeks or so.

Has anyone successfully trained their puppy to ring a doorbell to be let out for toilet? We found a good wireless doorbell with a nice big switch for his little paw to press. We are starting to give it a go, problem is whenever the pup sees the doorbell button on the floor he grabs it in his teeth and runs off with it, ringing like crazy. Funny to watch but not too helpful. Our breeder suggests this can be done, has anyone tried it and can give any tips? thanks

Did you get him from a breeder? We were given very strict instructions from ours not to let our walk outside until he's at least had his 12 week vaccinations, preferably 16 week. Lots of nasties outside where other dogs have been.

I would cover the whole area with newspapers initially, once she is happy going on the paper, you can slowly make the paper area smaller until there is just one piece at the far end of the pups area. Be warned though, you will end up with a 'paper trained' puppy, which is great initially, but can make it harder if you ever want her to toilet outside in the future.

Is there any reason you are not crating him at night? We put our 11 week old toy poodle in a crate with some toys and a ticking clock, and he's never had a problem.

Forgot to mention, our courtyard is covered in wooden decking, so going anywhere isn't an option for him. Also we live in a townhouse complex and the nearest grass is 5 minutes walk away... when he's older and can control himself better we will take him there on his walks.

Hi all, we're having a toilet training issue with our 11 week old toy poodle. We pretty much know when he needs to go because we feed him on a schedule, it's first thing in the morning and about 40 minutes after he eats. However, if we take him to the toilet area (it's a few sheets of newspaper in our courtyard), he will not go while we are keeping him on there. On Thursday I tried not letting him off until he went, we ended up waiting there for hours, back and forth between crating him and waiting for him to go. He was whining towards the end of it and definitely looked unhappy. As soon as we let him go to find his own place, he dashed off and immediately squatted, then we grabbed him and put him back on the newspaper and he finished there. This has happened a few more times, but we don't keep him there for that long anymore so he doesn't get too stressed. It seems like he's not happy to be told where to go, he wants to sniff around to find his own area. His scent is definitely on the toilet area as we've put him there after he starts going elsewhere. We don't scold him or anything, we just say the word 'toilet' in a calm strong voice while he's going and while we are waiting for him to go. Is this something we just need to be patient with and wait till he 'gets it'? Is there anything else we should be doing? FYI, he was paper trained by the breeder, but now we want him to go outside for his business.