If you are looking for the greatest gold-mine of easy to use "change your dog's behavior" advice ever crammed into a newsletter series then read on!
Also, make sure that you check out our 100% authentic testimonials from people who have bought Secrets to Dog Training and find out the massive difference it has made to their owner-dog relationship!
"I have 2 year old GSP (German Shorthair Pointer) named Dakota. After I got her I became a member of NAVHDA (North American Versatile Hunting Dog Association) and trained with a local group of NAVHDA members. She accepted basic obedience almost too easily. After a few months everyone was complimenting me on how well behaved Dakota was, especially around kids and my son who was only 2 months old when I got her.
Dakota and my other dog Dixie (a Black Lab Mix) were inseparable and Dakota followed and copied everything Dixie did. After owning Dakota for 6 months Dixie was placed in a great new home after a very long and grueling decision to only keep one dog due to financial and time constraints.
One month later I received orders to Spangdahlem Air Base in Germany. When I got my orders our dog was not allowed to travel with us so she was left with my parents for 2 months while I moved and got settled and could pay to have her shipped over to Germany. When she finally arrived in Germany she was a completely different dog.
She was very aggressive toward other dogs, and disobedient and timid and often had accidents in the house when I was conducting training sessions with her. I tried everything to fix the problem I took her to the vet to see if the urinating problem was medical, took her to basic obedience classes offered through the local pet shop in Germany to try and correct her disobedience, and I brought her to "Happy Hour" for socialization. I was at a point where I was debating to give her up for adoption. Then as luck would have it I stumbled upon the Secrets to Dog Training website. I spent so much time (8 months) and money trying to fix the problems I was having with Dakota, that I was very skeptical but figured I would give it one more chance. I ordered Secrets to Dog Training and read through all the books in less than a week. A lot of the problems I was having were actually addressed in those books, but the book "Secrets to becoming The Alpha Dog" really caught my eye as my experience in trying to correct her problems had brought me to believe her problems were due to a dominance issue.
After only one month of using the techniques in "Secrets to becoming The Alpha Dog" Dakota had done a 180 degree change. She still had a couple disobedience issues and a few accidents in the house occasionally but we were finally making progress. After another month of using your techniques to become the Alpha Dog again and learning and using techniques in Secrets to Dog Training for Basic Obedience, Advanced Obedience, Tricks and Dog Whispering Dakota is back to her old self. She is everything I had hoped she would be and then some.
I can now let her run off leash again and not worry about her creating havoc or running away. Thanks Daniel for such a great training aid. I have recommended your books to many other military members who have asked how I got my dog to behave so well. Thank you for helping me keep my best friend!"
-- Nathan VanderZanden (Germany)
Hi Secrets to Dog Training Team
I am having real problems with my 6 year old entire male cocker spaniel, he has started to urinate in the house, as soon as he has finished eating before I have time to let him out even if I leave the door open he still does it. He also urinates during the night and has even done it on his own bed.... I am at my wits end... please help...
Pearl
Hi there Pearl,
Thank you for your email regarding your 6 year old Cocker Spaniel. Your dog may be urinating in the house for several reasons, and it will be up to your judgment to decipher exactly why this is occurring.
Firstly, I would like to point out that it is a relatively common behavior of entire dogs to urine mark, territorially. You will need to try and catch your dog in the act of urinating indoors. The distinct differences between a dog urine marking and simply ‘accidentally’ eliminating indoors includes:
- A dog urine marking will often urinate on objects you have recently added to your home, including belongings of a visiting friend of relative.
- There will often be dominance behavior displayed by the dog, including having fights with other dogs in your house or by reacting poorly to your commands
- Often in multiple dog households, a dog may feel insecure about his ‘position in the pack’ and feel the need to find dominance. This is often achieved by expressing itself via urine marking.
- The dog urinates in small amounts, and usually on vertical surfaces. A male dog will usually lift his leg and spray maybe 2-3 mls of urine on to an object. Although urine marking is less common in females, it still occurs, however they will squat to urinate.
- If your dog has not been de-sexed there is a higher chance of this behavior occurring. If you have a house trained intact dog urinating in side now and then, it is more than likely it is urine marking.
If this doesn’t sound like the sort of behavior your dog is undertaking, there is obviously a different cause for the problem that may be behavioral, but is more likely to be health related. If on the other hand, you think the above behaviors sound like those that your dog is showing then there are several steps you will need to undertake to put an end to it:
1. Firstly, it is recommended that you neuter your dog as soon as possible. This drastically reduces urine marking in the majority of cases. However, if this behavior has been occurring over a long period of time, a pattern may already be established.
2. If you have any other animals in your house it is important to try and resolve conflicts between them.
3. Clean soiled areas thoroughly. Don’t use strong smelling cleaners as these may cause your pet to "over-mark" the spot.
4. Make previously soiled areas inaccessible or unattractive and feed, treat and play with your pet in the areas he is inclined to mark.
By undertaking these techniques with your particular dog, you should notice a distinct difference in his urinating in the house. From what you have detailed in your email however, it does not seem like a marking behavior. The judgment of course is up to you since I cannot see your dog in person. Because he is urinating after eating as well as in his own bed, I am thinking your dog may well have more of a health related issue here. This is something only your Veterinarian can help you with, and I definitely recommend you take him soon to get a thorough check up and so you can explain to your Vet the exact situation. By providing clues and allowing your Vet to do a check up, he may be able to help fix this situation. There are many possible causes for an adult dog to become ‘incontinent’ all of a sudden and these do include behavioral issues such as urine marking – however in adult dogs this can commonly be due to health related issues. It is VERY uncommon for a dog to urinate in the area in which it sleeps, particularly while it is sleeping. For a dog to need to toilet directly after eating is not uncommon, although this is usually the urge to defecate rather than urinate, and a dog will usually have plenty of time to move outside to do this anyway. For all of these reasons, and the fact that it sounds as though your dog previously was well house trained, you should be consulting your Vet as soon as you can for more help and advice.
I am not, at this stage, prepared to continue with any specific techniques on how to train your dog out of this behavior other than the urine marking as described above, since it sounds as though this is probably more of a health problem than a behavioral one. If your Veterinarian clears your dog from the possibility of having a disease caused form of incontinence, please email me back and I will be happy to provide further information. I do this since, if this is a health related problem, any urination is purely accidental and you won’t be able to train it out of him.
Best of luck consulting your Veterinarian. He may agree in that this could be a Territorial Urine Marking behavior, but the places in which your dog is urinating steer my thinking away from this. Please let us know how you get on anyway.
Kind regards,
Daniel Stevens and the Secrets to Dog Training Team
"Secrets to Dog Training - STOP Dog Behavior Problems!"
I've been a professional dog trainer for well over 20 years, and in that time I've helped thousands of dog owners just like you to get the friendly, well behaved, slipper fetching, best pal they always wanted.
But it didn't start out that way. I've always loved dogs, some things never change. But when I first started my professional dog training career I relied on the so-called 'best practices' when it came to dog behavior training. It was only when I heard people tell me over and over again that they just weren't seeing results that I started to question the old accepted wisdom. So I started a journey, a quest to search out the best, most effective, techniques, tips, and tricks that really work.
And that's how I came up with Secrets to Dog Training. Year after year I found new techniques that achieved the results I wanted. Eventually I had a whole book worth of great resources: Secrets to Dog training...
So, if you want to:
Then Secrets to Dog Training is just what you've been looking for!
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