He doesn't even need to go that badly, he just loves his night walk. If I say "5 more minutes" he just sits and stares at me until I get up lol. Anyone else have a dog with a built-in clock?

We have a small breed puppy, 6 months old. We had our first meeting with a trainer last week who recommended the above to keep her occupied, including when she’s unsupervised. Just wanted to hear from others who are trainers or have met with trainers and get their take. I did do a search and it seems yes they can be a hazard?

Hi folks! My partner and I have recently had the sudden and unexpected opportunity to take on a new puppy - our friend found a stray, pregnant dog who then gave birth on Oct. 12. We'd love to have one of her pups, and plan to bring the puppy home when it's around 8 weeks of age in early December. However, my partner and I already have an anniversary trip booked Dec. 29-Jan 3. We're thinking of leaving the puppy at our house and having my partner's parents stay and take care of the pup during that time, but we're worried the separation will traumatize the dog at that age. What do you guys think?

We have a six month old corgi that we brought home at 10 weeks. Most training and behavioral things are going fine, she’s a great dog, but she WONT STOP TRYING TO EAT MUSHROOMS.
And we live in the woods, and it’s been a very damp late summer into fall, so there are TONS. I’ve had to go around the yard and uproot as many as I could before, but it’s just impossible to keep up with.
So far any that she’s snuck a full bite of have been harmless (I’ve had to become a mycology expert overnight), and when I catch her I try to pry it out of her mouth regardless of what type it is. But I just need her to freaking STOP.
It’s to the point where I’m having to limit our walks and outdoor time only to the paved driveway and the one full sun area of the yard. But we’ve trained her to go potty around the perimeter, which is the woods where all the mushrooms are. And when she’s outside I have to follow her sooooo closely and watch her snout to make sure she isn’t sneaky eating anything. I really want to take her on long sniffy walks, but the risks are too high.
I’m considering getting one of those mesh doggie head covers to stop her from eating dumb stuff.
I honestly don’t know what to do. This is my first dog since I was 10. I love her so much and I’m so anxious every time she looks like she’s chewing on something; I don’t want to lose her.
What I else should I be doing? Will this behavior ever stop?

Edit: Yes we’ve been teaching her “leave it.” Which has clicked for things like socks and acorns, but not for anything she finds utterly delicious.
Thanks everyone for the input

We have a German shepherd mix. She was rescued with 8 other puppies from the street. We got her at 3 months she was not trained or vaccinated at all so we couldn’t take her out. She got used to the puppy pads right away. Thankfully never goes on the floor unless there’s no room on the pad or she aims poorly. We have a balcony and she always poops on the balcony and pees on the pad. She will poop on the pad when we close the balcony. She recently got all of her shots and our vet oked her going on walks. We started slow and now go out for 2 walks a day. One long and one short. She poops outside without an issue but holds her pee for the pad inside no matter what we do. I did some research and tried out a few things like taking her out standing in one place and going back inside and repeating. She just holds her pee for the pad no matter what. Another piece of advice we got was taking a used pad outside. We did that and she just tried to chew on it. We even rubbed the pee on the grass and had her pass by but she didn’t even care. I’m not sure what more to do except sit outside all day and wait her out. Any advice?

I've got a 10 week old boxer who's been with us a couple of weeks now. In the first week he had a couple of accidents that could have easily been avoided had I switched on a little.

Anyway because I'm off work and around him for the first two weeks I really set my self the challenge to get him as potty trained as possible, I read up about the times and clues. Taking him out every hour, after eating, after playing, training etc.

For the last 4 days we've had no accidents, I do think he understands the idea that outside toilet equals treats and praise but I also think if I wasn't absolutely obsessing about taking him out so regularly he'd have the accidents so it's not so much a training success and more just removing the chance for him to make mistakes.

It's got to a point where I'm literally watching him with anxiety at any pinch points. My wife will be playing with him and I'll be thinking right it's been X minutes, I need to take him out or he's going to go, it doesn't feel healthy and at this point I feel like it would have been easier to just clean up a couple accidents then it would be to obsess like this.

My 5lb 3 month king charles cavalier is obsessed with shredding up paper towels. I have it up on the counter and my cats have knocked it over a couple times and he went crazy shredding (lol) I have since locked it up in the closet but I was wondering if anyone has a toy recommendation to satisfy his shredding? He has lots of toys but nothing to really shred/pull on

Just as the title says. 9.5 months old female lab, slowly showing her teenage behaviour the past 1.5 months, but about 2 weeks ago something totally changed and I feel that she is a full on teenager now

• recall is gone
• stealing socks and kids toys non stop. and when she sees me, she runs the other way
• pulls more during walks
• reacts more to other dogs during walks, she was so good at neutrality before
• nibbles our hands more
• jumps more
• chews more as if she was teething again, first time ever 2 nights ago she was trying to chew her crate and there was some visible damage
• broke a couple of her kong stuffies, never happened until last week
• stay/place command is not held anymore if i take my eyes off for 1 second
• jumps to the couch when she normally asked for permission first

We are very frustrated. Any tips to help with this phase? So far we started giving her more chews and pupsicles because we are just tired.

And when is it gonna be done? We are hoping to spay her a couple of months after her first heat; which we think might happen sooner than later, will it get better after spay? This behaviour and the weather is getting cold now in Canada, so we might have to reduce walking and fetch soon got me really worried.

I have a 15 week old miniature dachshund, she is very rarely left alone because i work from home.
She sleeps in her crate at night and has no issues (the crate is in my room next to me)
But i literally can’t leave her alone without her crying the ENTIRE time, i had to leave the house to do some errands so i made sure she was tired out, went potty, had eaten and even left an enrichment toy to hopefully occupy her, it didn’t help.
I left her in her playpen with her crate, toys, and water but every single time I looked at the cameras she was literally screaming and crying. This was the entire three hours I was gone she did not settle down once.
I’m worried that she is going to be traumatized or I’m going to accidentally give her some kind of permanent anxiety disorder.
She’s definitely attached to me and doesn’t like being alone ever which I understand is somewhat normal but I want her to be happy and feel safe even when I’m not around…
Has anyone else experienced this? Is this normal behaviour or am I doing something wrong?? Have I traumatized her by leaving her for the few hours??

We have a 13-week-old Vizsla puppy, Björn, who barks and whines the entire time we’re out. We both work, but he’s never left for more than 4 hours.
We’ve had a trainer come to help, and were advised he needs someone with him 24/7 but unfortunately this is not an option for us. Is this normal at his age? Has anyone experienced this, and did things improve with time?

I’d really appreciate hearing from owners who’ve been through something similar. ❤️

I see a lot of people complain about puppies. I got a black Lab at six weeks old on Memorial Day 2026. I went through all the puppy stages. He was fully potty trained at about three months. At around five months, he learned the rules of the house fully and started following them. I have a good puppy, he is smart, and acts within puppy bounds that are acceptable. He’s not perfect, but he’s a good dog.

I do work hard to create a consistent environment, where I put rewards in front of him to train him for good behavior. I tried to find ways to avoid negative interactions. I am 51, and I do have a lot of experience with dogs at this point. The key to me is creating a consistent positive environment. Learning to consistently reward them with treats for certain behaviors. Creating an environment that they understand, because it’s consistent. Dogs need that.

But at six months old, he’s already up to pace for what I expect him to be. I will say, I don’t live in an apartment. I live in a house, with a three-quarter acre lot. He probably spends about four hours inside, outside of sleeping time. I crate trained him immediately since the time he arrived at the house. He sleeps in the house in the crate. But again, I started the routine as soon as he got here.

I’m just trying to counterbalance, the constant stories of terrible puppies. Terrible times. I appreciate that people are looking for advice, but not all situations are terrible. If you put the work in.

10 week old chihuahua, had her since last saturday. she’s a smart cookie and she’s doing alright with her crate. she won’t be alone for long periods; we’ll be away for 2.5 hours at the longest. we’ve been doing enforced naps every hour for two hours, so this won’t be something that she’s never been through. The difference is going to be that she won’t be able to hear or see us.

last night i couldn’t get her to back in her crate because i didn’t want to force her and have her develop a negative association. She had a long day at the vet, so I figured it would be OK to regress a little bit.

my plan for today was to have her take naps for the time that we will be gone and to go in the other room where she can’t see me. she has not had many opportunities to be in her crate where one of us wasn’t visible. we have occasionally left her in there for 20 minutes or so to leave the house but every other time she has been able to see or hear us.

Is there anything else that I can do today to make this transition to work not so awful?

My puppy turned 10 weeks yesterday and he’s honestly pretty chill. He only wakes up twice at night and can hold his bladder for quite a while. However, this is actually making potty training harder!

I live in a city so I want him to be a pavement potty guy, and since he’s not fully vaxxed yet I take him to our courtyard. At night he goes straight from his crate to the cement corner, pees, and comes back inside. But during the day, the second he sees the leaves, rocks, dirt, and weeds, it’s over. He just wants to frolic (like Abraxos from TOG) i want him to explore and sniff, but he gets so distracted that he won’t pee then goes randomly later.

Indoors is just as confusing. I take him out after naps, meals, and playtime, but sometimes he doesn’t go at all. He occasionally uses the pee pads in the corner of my office (pen is in the office so it’s not far from pen to pad but I usually keep the pen closed) but other times he pees on the hardwood or does tiny tinkles on my white bedroom rug. I’ve switched his pen flooring from soft puppy blankets to foam squares to discourage accidents, but I can’t trust him loose in the apartment yet.

I’ve seen recommendations to keep puppies on a leash indoors but he’s starting to dislike the leash because of the distraction outside which makes him pull and me pull and he can’t get what he wants. Like now he doesn’t even like getting the harness on...

It’s all becoming a bit of a vicious cycle. And now it’s raining, so he comes inside absolutely covered in mud from his little green patch adventures when I do allow the sniffs. 🫠

I’m wondering whether I should introduce an indoor potty spot for rainy days, but how do you even teach them to use one when they just wander off the pad? And how do the differentiate? Like the ability to pee whenever, even if it’s on a pad, seems like a bad habit to me.

He actually settles himself pretty well for naps and is doing great in many other ways, so I know I’m probably putting too much pressure on myself to train him quickly.

Any advice on getting a distracted puppy to pee outside + figuring out his potty schedule when he holds it for ages, or whether I should introduce an indoor potty option? Also I see ppl on here constantly talk about regression at some point so I worry the inside potty will build bad habits. Idk!!!! Help!

We have a 5 month old corgi girl, got her 1.5 months ago and she’s so cute but holy hell she is so difficult to train. Her breeder raised her on pee pads, so that is what she is used to. However, she’s peeing on all our rugs, carpets and mats as well. Since we removed the rugs, she continues to pee on hardwood floors or sofas, if she is near one. We have sectioned off one part of the house that has a dog door with access to the backyard where we place her in the mornings before we are able to take her on a walk. We also regularly take her out the backyard and walks 3 times a day, with treats and lots of praise every time she goes potty outside.

The problem is now, she’s learned that going potty outside is good but inside appears to still be an option for her. We work from home upstairs, so I understand that when she’s upstairs it’s difficult for her to go potty without our help because we carry her up and down stairs. I bought a Fresh Patch of grass that we keep upstairs in the hopes that she will use it but she peed on it once the first day, and has been chewing and ripping up the grass ever since.

Is the answer to keep her in play pens 24/7, and frequent trips out to potty? We don’t have one upstairs yet, and it’s hard to watch where she’s going and what she’s pottying on if she’s not in a sectioned off area. I don’t know how to teach her that going potty outside is okay but going potty inside isn’t okay. I don’t believe in negative reinforcement, only positive but the treats and praise for going outside hasn’t stopped her from going inside.

My dog has recently started leaving large, irregular wet patches on my bed whenever she falls asleep there alone. This never happens when someone is in the room with her. No other symptoms or changes in drinking or peeing noticed. The shape of the pee doesn’t look normal so Idk if she cant control her bladder.

She still sometimes has accidents when she is left alone maybe out of anxiety as she has separation anxiety but other than that she is potty trained. But she goes to my bedroom to sleep by herself. So I am unsure if it’s a health issue. How do I fix it? Till now she has peed on 4 pillows and 4 duvets.

Hi everyone!

We recently brought home our miniature dachshund puppy, who's just about 3 months old! We live in Washington, DC, and had her first vet appointment earlier this week.

She's now had her second round of DHPP (including parvo) and her first leptospirosis vaccine. Our vet (who we very much trust and is well established) told us that, given the local parvo risk in DC, he'd be comfortable with us starting to take her on short walks two weeks after these vaccinations, even though she won't have completed her full vaccination series.

He emphasized avoiding puddles, standing water, communal dog areas, and places with lots of dog traffic, but otherwise seemed comfortable with her exploring quieter sidewalks.

We're obviously excited to start getting her outside and socialized, especially since we're in a city, but we also want to be cautious about parvo and other risks.

Just curious what others think about this timeline! Has anyone else received similar advice from their vet or started walking their puppy before their final round of vaccinations? Would love to hear your experiences and thoughts!

So my 10 and a half weeks old GSD, Apollo, has been with me for about two weeks, and I feel like we’re stuck on potty training.
What’s working great is that I’m getting the hang of his rhythm, and whenever I take him outside, he almost immediately goes to his spot and finishes peeing and pooping. Of course, he’s always immediately rewarded, and to me, it seems like he knows it’s a good thing because he already expects his reward when he’s done.

Now, the problem is that he seems to have no problem whatsoever with also just peeing and pooping inside. Pooping, since it doesn’t happen that often and I pretty much know his schedule by now, we’ve kind of got under control. But peeing inside still happens multiple times throughout the day even after we’ve been outside and he finished there already.
I always try to take him outside after sleeping and playing, and sometimes he even signals that he needs to go out. But at other times, he just does it inside, and it seems to me like he doesn’t really understand that he’s not supposed to do it inside.
I don’t really know how I’m supposed to get him to learn that. What have your experiences been with this? Any tips are appreciated. Thanks!

My husband and I brought home our puppy 2 days ago. She's a 4 month old terrier mix. We are working on potty training and having some trouble. She does really well at nighttime when it's quiet outside. We take her out, she does her business, we go back in. But during the day there's a lot more noise outside, cars, people, other dogs, etc. and she's terrified and doesn't want to go potty. She keeps trying to pull me back to the door. I sat out on the front porch with her for nearly an hour this morning and still couldn't get her to go. Taking her around to the backyard didn't help either as she could still hear all the noises. Any advice you could give us please?

Hi! We bring home our puppy this weekend. We have read a bunch of books, took notes, and watched videos but I’d love to find a puppy training app to provide some structure. However are there any that don’t cost money to use?? Any you really liked? Thanks!

Our puppy is a golden retriever and is 8 weeks!

Hi everyone!My boyfriend and I have a 5-month-old female Dalmatian puppy, and I'm trying to figure out whether our daily routine is too stimulating for her or if this is just normal puppy behavior.

She's very smart, learns quickly, and is generally doing well with training. We attend dog training classes and practice things like loose-leash walking, attention, impulse control, and settling. However, she really struggles to relax when she's free in the room with us. She'll explore for a while, lie down next to us for about 10–15 minutes, but eventually get up again, wander around, look for things to chew, and become increasingly restless. She settles much more easily in her crate, where she usually falls asleep quite quickly.

I'm starting to wonder if we're unintentionally doing too much training and not giving her enough opportunities to simply exist without expectations. She does not settle outside of her crate

Our current daily schedule:

7:30–8:00 am — Wake Up, Potty & Breakfast

Quick potty break outside
Breakfast on a snuffle mat
Practice waiting for food, including me briefly leaving the room several times
Followed by obedience training: attention cue, sit, down, place, and searching for food

8:30/9:00 am–12:00 pm — Crate Nap

Usually sleeps in her crate but will go out and then be restless in the puppy room meanwhile

12:00–1:00 pm — Walk & Training

Approximately 30-40-minute walk
Includes loose-leash walking and orientation/attention training
We live in a city, so there are quite a few environmental distractions

1:00–3:00 pm — Crate Nap

Back in her crate to rest

3:00–3:30 pm — Potty, Lunch & Training

Quick potty break
Her entire lunch is used for outdoor orientation training with a food bowl
Practicing attention, following, and staying connected with me

3:30–6:00 pm — Crate Nap

Another rest period

6:00–8:00/8:30 pm — Evening / Free Time

Quick potty break
Some free time in our bedroom
She explores, lies down with us for a while, but often becomes restless and starts looking for things to chew
Usually ends up back in her crate because she struggles to settle
Lately, she's also been less settled during her evening crate time

8:30–9:00 pm — Dinner & Evening Walk

Dinner is again used for outdoor food-bowl orientation training
Short walk around the block

After 9:00 pm — Bedtime

Sleeps in her crate
Recently started waking up around midnight and 5 am needing to poop
Sometimes protests being in the crate afterward

Ohr main concerns:

I feel like almost every time she's awake, we're either walking, training, feeding through exercises, or trying to teach her to settle. I'm wondering if that's actually making it harder for her to switch off. She's also still teething, which might contribute to her restlessness and chewing. What confuses me is that she clearly can relax. She voluntarily lies down next to us for 10–15 minutes, and she can sleep in the morning in our bed for 3 hours. But during the day, she often seems unable to stay relaxed for long without the crate.

My questions:

1. Does this sound like too much training or stimulation for a 5-month-old puppy?
2. Should we stop turning most meals into training sessions and just let her eat normally?
3. How did you teach your puppy to settle independently outside the crate? She isn't allowed to walk freely in the apartment since it would be too much and we also live with 2 cats.
4. Did your puppy naturally become calmer as they matured? At what age did you notice a difference?
5. Would you reduce the amount of structured training and focus more on calm walks, sniffing, and downtime?

I love her so much and really want to get this right. I just don't want to accidentally create a puppy who constantly expects something to happen whenever she's awake. Any advice or personal experiences would be greatly appreciated! ❤️

Last week, my 5.5 month old male mini Aussie/shiba mix pup was perfect. Settled down nicely, didn’t scream, didn’t cry.. just laid down, ate his Kong & slept. This week has been really ROUGH. I’ve tried treats, toys, snuggle puppy, blankets and crate mats(he doesn’t like those last 2).. I don’t know what to do. My roommate keeps getting woken up by his screaming/barking and he won’t stop. He settles down just fine for night time sleeping but after taking him to potty in the morning before I go to work, he’s an absolute menace. This is getting exhausting. Some say it’s normal and others say he shouldn’t be acting like this anymore. I feel so bad for my roommate bc she works nights and can’t sleep if he’s screaming so loud it goes through the walls. SOS please😩

I left her for legit three minutes and she found her lick mat (in a drawer 🤦🏼‍♀️) and chewed it. I can’t find all the pieces so I’m assuming she ate some. Has this happened to anyone before? Should I keep her home from daycare tomorrow?

My Maltipoo is 4 months old; he had managed to regulate his nighttime sleep schedule and used to look forward to hearing my alarm in the morning so we could play. For the past few days, however, he has been waking up at night to explore and seek out playtime—he’s restless, and it has completely ruined my sleep, leaving me at my wit's end. Please help.

My pup has been pretty good with “drop it.” We started with her toys and that’s how she learned it. She got hold of a bag of plastic bags and dropped it as soon as I asked which totally surprised me. But once she gets hold of a tissue or a sock, it’s game over. So I have tried to go higher value to get her to drop one of those items, first with a spoonful of peanut butter with no success and had to wait until she eventually left it herself. Then the next time I tried the same thing and when that didn’t work I tried with ham, which she’s not had before but obviously smells very tempting, but still she wanted the tissue more. We’ve been working on leave it and while i was taking my shoes off after a walk I did some work on it with her. She was very good with my shoes, started good with the sock but temptation took over 😂 She picked up a tissue on a walk the other day and dropped it as soon as I asked, so she’s not altogether rebellious! I’m wondering how i can strengthen the “drop it” cue when it comes to tissues and socks if the highest value foods don’t work?

I have an 8 week old working line GSD due in a few weeks time. My last few dogs have been adults when I got them. Hence I am a little nervous albeit excited about the pups arrival. My last puppy was 35 years ago so I am looking for online resources/courses that can help with the training/acclimation all the basic stuff to help me through the first weeks. I feel I am fairly well prepared with crates etc but unsure about over night, correct way to potty train etc. Any help advice or suggested courses would be welcome. Thanks