Need help with my Malamute!

[steph4136]

We seem to be stuck at the last hurdle with house training our puppy. He’s a 7 month old Alaskan Malamute, unneutered. During the day, he’s fine – he’ll go to the door and ask to go out. It’s at night that he’ll pee/poop in the house. We’re both getting very sick of waking up to a pile in the morning, plus we recently bought our first house and move next month and had hoped he’d be fully trained (we got him last May).

He gets plenty of exercise, about an hour a day, plus we play with him during the day. He likewise plays with our 2 ½ year old daughter, so I don’t think it stems from lack of attention/activity.

He nearly always goes in the same place, on a throw rug. This morning I decided I’m just throwing it out, it was a $5 Walmart deal so it’s not like we spent a lot and I’m sick of washing it. Plus, because it’s always on this rug, I figured that it’s no longer just a scent thing, but that it’s his spot in the house, even though we never used pee pads when he was younger. Usually it’s on throw rugs that he goes, we have hardwood flooring here.

Any advice? My husband thinks he does it when he’s miffed at us, such as when he (our dog) needs to come inside earlier than he wants to because my husband wants to go to bed earlier. We live in Canada, it’s cool here now, and Strider wants to be outside most of the time. That or on the rare nights we don’t take him on a walk because we’re too busy.

[KOPsarah]

Hi, thanks for your post. It may well be that your puppy is just having difficulty holding on all night on nights when you go to bed early. Try feeding him earlier so he has more time to digest and pass the meal before bed also restrict water intake an hour or two before bed. Exercising him at night often does helps prevent accidents over night because dogs really love toileting and marking while out and about and will try and use up everything they've got stored!

If early feeding and evening exercise doesn't solve the problem you may want to try crate training. This may help because dogs are very reluctant to toilet in their own crate once they are used to it.

Good luck with the last step of toilet training and please don't hesitate to ask any other questions you may have.