Category: Top Dog

We got our 14 week old puppy this past weekend. We're in love. She is house-trained (I hate the term potty-trained for a dog) with accidents happening because we didn't notice her signal.

She has 'sit' down cold, and now sits 'at me', unasked for, but staring at me like 'where's my treat?'

I'm working on 'stay' and 'come'. We haven't figured out 'down' at all.

But we have probably missed some steps. She doesn't always lift her head when we call her, for instance.

I started watching kikopup's videos and incorporated luring her away from my body with the treat, and giving her treats when she is just sitting calmly. But even attempting to watch her videos for beginners, I feel like she assumes prior knowledge or she references skills taught in other videos.

I read through all the wiki training links on this forum. But I didn't understand what a 'mark word' was or a clicker. (I know have a better understanding of that). A treat back and two clickers are being delivered Saturday (cyber Monday purchase meant very delayed shipping)

What I am asking for is a start-to-finish training program I can follow, with games that I can teach my 9 year old to play. (She's felt a little left out of this process) This program should assume no prior dog experience. (I had a dog someone had abandoned at 6wks when I was 17. But I didn't know what I didn't know, the result was a very sweet, but ill-trained dog. ) and I took her to puppy classes.

I homeschool throughout the day, so we can have 'family training breaks' throughout the day, we just need to know what to do, with a 'skill map'.

My puppy is around 15-16 weeks old. He goes potty outside and knows what I mean when I say potty ( if he gets distracted with playing and I say go potty he’ll stop and go potty). He only poops outside, He does not poop inside at all anymore so he’s gotten very good with that. The issue is he’ll keeps peeing inside sometimes and it happens just about every day a couple times a day and he walks while he pees at the same time so it’s a gigantic mess to clean up. We see about 90% of the accidents and tell him no, pop him on the butt, take him outside when it’s happening or sometimes crate him depending on the situation. We take him out just about every hour (unless he’s in the middle of a nap) and we have even started water limiting (which I hate) but even then he’s still having breakthrough accidents. Sometimes it’s a lot of urine so I understand it’s hard for him to hold that much but sometimes it’s just a little bit so it’s not like he couldn’t hold it. He also holds his bladder for the entire night, so I know he is capable of holding it for larger amounts but chooses not too? We already checked him for UTI, he doesn’t have that so I’m just looking for any tips or tricks that’s not the same stuff that I’m already doing. For more context we do have another puppy (almost 1 year) who is potty trained. Also we have done treats for pottying outside and other good behaviors. Any help is welcome if it’s different from what we’ve been trying or just hope that it’s all normal 🥲 our other dog caught on a lot faster about no inside pottying especially when we moved into a house with easier yard access.

We are planning to travel from India to Dubai, and would like to take our small sized dog in cabin. We have done our research online and contacted a few airlines too. Most don't allow in the cabin, and some of them ask us to submit the form just before the travel date. I don't want to leave things to the last minute. Do you any of you have direct experience with the same? Would appreciate if you can share how it went for you.

The best part of my morning is waking up and seeing this little face looking at me. She always makes my day start better 🥹💛

My husband and I just got a labrador retriever puppy four days ago. and I’m not sure if I’m equipped to handle this.

My husband picked up this 6mo puppy from an Amish farm. From what he told me, it seemed like she was living in a barn/outside, and the dogs weren’t in the house.

Since bringing her home (we’re in an apartment on the second floor, no fenced in outdoor area but lots of grass and pathways), she’s had potty issues. I expected this, not only with a puppy, but after learning that she was a barn dog. I figured she was probably pooping and peeing wherever with no proper training at the farm.

We’ve done everything we thought we were supposed to do from what we’ve been reading online. We’ve been crate training her, taking her outside after she eats naps and plays, and interrupting her and taking her outside when she tries to pee or poop on the floor.

This morning in particular was especially frustrating. I’ve been trying to get her on an eating/potty schedule, She typically goes potty around 5AM, eats at 6AM, naps around 8 AM, eats at 12PM, potty at 2pm, potty at 5:30-6PM, snd eats between 5-6PM. I always try to get her to go potty again around 8-9PM but she usually won’t. For the past like two or three days she’s been really good about peeing as soon as she goes outside at 5AM. This morning she would not go. I knew she had to pee because it had been almost 12 hours since she had last peed. I brought her back inside and she immediately tried to squat and pee on the rug, so I took her back outside. Again, she would not go potty. It’s almost like she was refusing to go outside. This seems kind of strange to me since she grew up outside and in a barn for six months prior. I’ve been trying to use treats and positive reinforcement when she does go outside, but it just doesn’t seem to be working.

I know it’s only been a few days, but I am just so frustrated and lost. If anyone has any tips I would really appreciate it. Would a trainer help with this?

I just got Mochi October 20th. Her birthday is August 1st, 2025. She’s been using the bathroom inside on a pad but sometimes has accidents off it. So she does pretty well with them. When I take her outside, she doesn’t use the bathroom at all. She waits until we get back inside to use the bathroom. I was waiting for her third booster and rabies shot to start taking her outside. Should I take her out more often? She also doesn’t sleep in a crate and does her business in the middle of the night on the pad. Should I have her sleep in her crate and set an alarm to take her out at 3am-5am? Since that’s the time she usually wakes up.. she’s very smart & learns things quickly. She’s a cockapoo.

I have a nearly 15 month old German shepherd/German pointer cross named Piper, and I am reaching the end of my rope!

Don't get me wrong, I love her so much. She's sweet and loving, smart and attentive, playful and so, so adorable. But she's also stubborn, strong-willed, rebellious, and so very loud. Around 8 months old she found her voice, and she has not stopped barking at us since. (We're working on it, and she is improving although the progress is slow and painful.)

The initial puppy stage was a tough transition with lost sleep, clinginess, fear of other dogs/people, and the potty training. But we adjusted fairly quickly and settled into our new routine. It's the lengthiness of the adolescent stage that is really beating me down.

She is the second dog that we've raised since puppyhood, so we were prepared for some of the hurdles. And our now 4 year old dog is such a good girl, so we have a light at the end of the tunnel for sure. But I personally think the 12-18 month stretch is the hardest. This was the time with our last dog as well that I really started to wonder if it was worth it. Because the adolescent stage hit around 6 months, which we were ready for, but it lasts so long! It feels like you'll never come out the other side. And by the time they're over a year old and still haven't chilled out, you want to throw in the towel.

Based on the trajectory of our other dog (who is around the same size), I expect her to start calming down in a few months. And on good days, I can see the amazing dog I know she's going to be. But oh my God we're in the trenches right now friends.

Which age range has been trickiest for you to navigate with your pup(s)? And if anyone has tips on curbing the incessant barking, please drop them for the sake of my poor ears!

Hi first of all. For everybody that answered on my lrevious posts, many thanks for the constructive advice and tips 🙂

So I read on reddit and the webs that you can use a damped, curled and frozen washcloth or towel as a toy for a pup. I wanna try that too but I wonder how great is the chance our pup will see regular towels and washcloths as toys when I give her old ones as toys? Also with old T-shirts or old slippers?

The thing with the slippers is sometimes our pup is sometimes faster and smarter then us and runs away with it but sometimes i'm like if it occupies her for 15 min, maybe more and i'm tired as hell, just go for it girl. Even though i know it's something i should teach her not to do i know, but some moments are just go nuts with it but if i could give her one that i don't use anymore maybe she stays with that one rather my new ones? 🙂

Thanks in advance!

Hey all,

So we have a great puppy, Lois, who’s almost 5.5 months!

For the most part, she’s awesome, we love having her around, but she wants to bite everything.

A trainer told me we should leash her indoors to help curb some bad habits. I unfortunately did not ask any more about this.

If we were to have her leashed indoors, what is the procedure to correct things?

Like let’s say she’s after the baseboard, do we yank the leash, she turns around and makes eye contact, do we treat her?

How do we make sure she learns from this and what do we need to do to make it work?

Thanks for any and all help with this! If leash indoors is not the best way to help fix some behaviours, we are all ears on whatever else!

My dog goes to daycare 1x per week to get his beans out. He’s got a lot of them and I have a newborn and can’t keep up as much right now. They post on Instagram stories all day long and he’s using a blast. He’s running, wagging, playing etc. but for some reason when we drop him off he does not want to get out of the car. He absolutely protests and is shaking.