Need Help Advice

[Rascalmyshadow]

I am in a bit of a difficult situation and not really sure where to turn. We are having huge issues with our 10month old toy poodle pup marking in the house.

If it was just puppy accidents weeing on the floor I could cope with that but in the last 3-4 months he has started getting up onto the couch and occasionally my bed and lifting his leg. He will also do it on the clothes baskets if I leave them in the loungeroom.

In the beginning he was such an easy puppy to housetrain always going on command and having few accidents, also happily sleeping in his crate all night without waking.

Now I'm at my wits end, our back door is open 24/7 except at night when we are in the loungeroom supervising, I also take them out as soon as I get up, every couple of hours through the day and right before bed.

Is he trying to establish dominance over one of the two older boys, is he marking to claim mine and my husbands stuff as his, is he asserting himself in the pack or is there another explanation why he is doing it?

We've lived in a multi dog house for years and he's the first dog we've had to do this (besides one foster who stopped it once she was only living with one other dog)

I'm almost 12 weeks pregnant and I am totally exhausted just trying to keep up with washing the stuff he's peeing on, not to mention the water and electricty bills ate through the roof from all the washing and drying. I'm worried if it doesn't stop I'm not going to cope after bub is born.

Edited July 6, 2015 by Rascalmyshadow

[persephone]

pup needs re-training , ..?

and needs restriction inside ?

possible a belly band ?

sounds an awful lot of work .....

[Justrace]

I've no idea but just wanted to say Uggggh. I totally feel for you being pregnant, what a lot of work

[brightstar123]

Many others will be more experienced with this problem but I did have a young male foster dog recently who was a terrible marker. It nearly drove me mad so I understand how you feel!

I basically treated him like a pup all over again and removed the privilege of free-roaming around the house. I crate-trained him and if he wasn't in his crate or outside then he was on his lead and attached to me, so I could keep a close eye on what he was doing. He certainly wasn't allowed in the bedrooms as he fancied marking on the soft furnishings/beds/clothes too. I also made sure he toileted after meals and regularly, like a pup, with rewards for going outside. I didn't let him mark during walks or drag me over to every tree, he was allowed time to mark at the park and that was it. From memory, The Spotted Devil hopefully will give you some great advice about this issue. A belly band might make life easier for you while you have him inside though. I found Drive washing detergent awesome for getting rid of the stinky smell!

[jemappelle]

Another vote for a belly band. My elderly male dog seemed to forget where he was and would just pee wherever. Not any more!

[Rascalmyshadow]

Ok have crate set back up in bedroom for during the night, puppy pen back in the loungeroom for if we're out for a short time, huge crate set up in grooming room just need to organise the kennel outside.

Definately going to give the belly bands a try, do they want to rip them straight off?