[salesbury]

Today we picked up our wonderful 12-week beagle puppy, Rigby. He is such a joy and an affectionate pup. My wife and I thought we were doing a decent job taking him out to pee (about 2-3 times an hour). He barely pees outside. He started getting it towards the end of the day. However, once he gets in his crate, he pees inside of it. After he peed in the crate, we washed the mat that goes inside the crate, but it back in, and he peed in the crate again! What do you think we are doing wrong?

 

[Halfyank]

Crate training

Sounds to me like your puppy's crate might be too big. Try getting a smaller crate so that he doesn't have a way to urinate on one side and sleep on the other side. I know it sounds mean, but more than likely the first time he pees in the crate and has to lay in it, he probably won't be tempted to do it again. Also remember that a puppy can only hold his urine in for a little bit. If he is two months old, add the number of months and add one, therefore he should only be able to hold his urine for up to 3 hours, four hours for a three month old. Good luck.

 

[araine]

Also, like our puppy, he does it because he has seperation anxiety issues. Take the matt out as well. The puppy should only have the room to stand up and turn around in it and lay down. Make sure he has had no water about an hour before you put him in the crate and he has gone outside. If you take him outside, and he doesn't go, put him on your lap for 10 minutes and keep taking him outside telliing him to go potty in the same spot and reward him when he does. Then, place him in the crate.

 

[Jesslyne]

Ours will do it, although he pees outside his appropriately-sized crate - it's wire, he doesn't get a mess inside the crate, but just lifts his leg and pees through it to a spot just outside the crate (we had to start laying paper to save our floors, and I've noticed that it's generally in the same spot).

My feelings are that it's a behaviorally motivated thing in our case, not an overwhelming physical need to urinate...he's pretty crate-resistant, but due to his propensity for destructiveness when unsupervised, leaving him uncrated during the workday isn't an option. He is ALWAYS thoroughly walked/exercised and given time to urinate before he is crated...but he gets worked up and anxious and pees. It isn't something he's done when he's left longer than he can hold (he's not left longer than he can hold, and he doesn't ever have accidents when people are home and he's in for that same length of time). It's just something that he does because he gets anxious about being crated...kind of how kids can we themselves due to emotional upset. It's as likely to happen if he's crated for twenty minutes while I run to the store as it is if he's crated for a full workday.

Interestingly, it doesn't happen if we have to crate him while we are present (like while we were dismantling the Christmas tree and didn't want him breaking ornaments, or when repairmen come, or while we're eating. He'll bark and want to be let out, but he can defintiely sit in the crate for twenty minutes while we eat dinner without having to pee out the side, yet, if we leave the house for those same twenty minutes...pee city. And since he doesn't have to sit in a pee-soaked crate, there's nothing to dissuade him from doing it.

 

[cobismom]

My boys have proven the adage that "dogs won't pee or poo in the place where they sleep" many times. I don't know why they do it, they just do. Mostly because they are mad because we are eating and won't let them beg or sit at the table. If you figure it out, I'll be watching.

 

[Jesslyne]

Okay, he just did it again when left for 2 hours, 1-3 this afternoon (I'm home today due to the holiday; I'm a teacher - ordinarily, this would be a day where he's crated for 8 hours and some change. ). I took him for an hour-long walk at noon, where he both pooped and peed, then I came home, and crated him so that I could run some errands. Came back to a big puddle on one side of the newspapers I'd left on either side of his crate.

It's seriously not a physical issue, it's definitely behavioral. I'm getting a little worried that it's becoming established as a habit..."go in crate, pee." I could understand it if he went in at 8 a.m., and we were late getting home and he didn't get let out until 5 or later, that there might be an odd accident, here or there (although he's proven that he can hold it for that amount of time). He's an adult dog who is absolutely capable of holding his pee for two hours. I don't think it's about that, I think it's a reaction to being put in the crate and me leaving, no matter the amount of time. I think it would happen if I put him in and went out the door and stood on the porch for 10 minutes and came back in.

What to do? I've done everything that all resources recommend, as far as making the crate a pleasant place. I can't put bedding in it because he'll shred it, but I stock it with his favorite toys and hide treats in his Kongs, I leave it open as a nice place to go lie at will (though he seldom does), I feed and water him in it so he associates it with food, I put him in it for short periods of time when we're home so that he doesn't always associate "crate" with "people are leaving." I don't know what more I can do to make him more amenable to the crate, but I have no choice but to use it, due to his behavior.

 

[Jesslyne]

SO and I just conducted an experiment...I explained the behavior as it occurred today, with Willie urinating through the crate onto the floor even after being given ample potty breaks and exercise, and when left alone for a comparatively short time.

We decided to crate him and leave the house for only 15 minutes...he should not have had to urinate...he certainly wouldn't have urinated had he been uncrated and hanging out around the house with us those 15 min. As suspected, we came home to a puddle of pee next to the crate. I'm completely convinced this is all anxiety/behavioral. If it were a physical problem, he would be doing it when uncrated, and he's not.

We really need to interrupt this "crate= pee" pattern. But how? It's not possible to stay home with him on a regular basis and sit in front of the crate whenever he's in it and correct him every time he lifts his leg. If I could stay home and supervise him like that, obviously I wouldn't NEED to crate him.

 

[araine]

This is def. seperation anxiety...I would cut off his water at least an hour before he will be crated. Also, because I think it may be this, you may want to try what I am doing to help this. I have cleaned up one area of the house, the luandry room, set up his crate with a bed in it, 3 puppy pads in a corner, hard toys filled with different treats. I have found that when I leave my 10wk old puppy like this, he pees on the pads, doesn't cry as much, and lays in his crate with no probs. Maybe try this?

 

[Jesslyne]

Do you confine him to the crate, or is he free in the laundry room with the option of going in and out of an open crate at will?

We can't really leave him out of the crate/confined to a room, there isn't a laundry room, and our kitchen is the only linoleum surface (it's where his crate goes). The kitchen doesn't have doors, only open archways, and he quickly learned to get through/over the gates when we tried that. Plus, there's too much stuff in the kitchen that he could damage/hurt himself on to be out of the crate.

I also can't put a bed in his crate, because he shreds anything that's in the crate that's not a Kong or Nylabone. I've just been using newspaper to protect the floor and for ease of cleanup; should I be laying pads alongside the crate? He's not a young pup, he'll be two in a few weeks.

 

[cobismom]

Casie is also two years old, and is home sometimes for as long as four hours. He does have Cobi to "keep him on the straight and narrow" But he will pee in his crate when we get home, and put him there during dinner. He's also figured out the way to "out" is through the kitchen and sometimes pees on the kitchen floor when not noticed when he has to go out. Our dogs are not crated except when we are eating or someone else is in the house. This is a puzzle to me, too. I don't know how to get him to stop, even when he has just been outside. I'm beginning to think it is his way of telling us "HE" is still in charge of him. NOT! But it does get aggravating, and it does take the patience of JOB to figure these guys out. I"ll be watching for an answer to, because in July he will be three, and I am thinking by that time...we aren't going to change him.

 

[araine]

I only put a bed in his crate when he is free to the laundry room (which I spent hours puppy proofing because of all the stuff) You could do this in a bathroom. I put puppy pads next to the crate near the wall, and then hard toys filled with treats to play with. I never give him water in there because it lessons his likely hood to pee as much.

 

[Jesslyne]

Unfortunately, his crate won't even fit in our sole bathroom (it's an early 19th century arts and crafts bungalow-style cottage, and that era isn't known for spacious bathrooms or an abudance of closets). Besides the tub and toilet, it has juuust about enough room to stand at the sink. Also, it has a rough stone tile floor that would just ABSORB the pee (smelly!).

The only other spot he could go is the basement, but, really, that's been our only option for taking everything that he can't be allowed to get into in our dogproofing efforts. It's off limits to him, because it's where we stash everything that he'd destroy that's not a permanent fixture or furnishing.

Today, he peed, but he peed less. There were only two smallish spots on the paper, which must have been done early in the day, because they were dried by the time I got hom and walked him. The past couple of days, it's been big, sopping puddles. These were more like marking sprays.

I know with the kids I work with, acting this way is a method of exerting control in a situation in which they're not in control, and born of anxiety. I don't know what all to do, I just know that I don't like seeing pattern behavior, because I know how hard it is to eliminate an error pattern once it starts.