I have a 7 month old german sheperd dog. He has been house broken since about 3 months with no accidents. He is very well behaved and listens very well. Since we want him as a guard dog, I have been letting him out of the crate at night. He has been uncrated at night for about 3 weeks.

The last 2 of 3 nights he has pooped in the basement family room. Friends have said their dog did the same thing. Is this common. Suggestions?

Randal

Any diarrhea?

It's common with a dog that's not totally house trained.

He has no incentive to not poop in the house, and apparently it isn't ingrained.

Rule out medical stuff, and then go back to basics, crate, supervision, and reward for going in the right place.

No, No diarrhea.

Dave..so you think 4 months of not a single accident in the house (uncrated much of the day) and crated for several hours during the day-- and 3 weeks uncrated (at night) with out an accident is "not house trained?". I guess I am surprised by that.

Certainly, however, I am in no position to disagree you -- otherwise he wouldnt have pooped in the house.

We have recently gotten alot of snow here in Utah and someone said he maynot like to poop in the snow. This didnt make sense but being a novice owner I am looking for advice.

Dave - do you think 7 mos is too young (in general) to expect him to be uncrated at night?

thanks

Randy

I can add that I have seen mysterious reversions in fully adult dogs.... I mean, middle-aged and senior dogs..... and I have just started over with http://leerburg.com/housebrk.htm

It has always been very short and fast compared to the initial training.

About the snow:
Do you have a shoveled area to take him to, in case that is a factor? I'm absolutely not going to poo-poo (hahaha) the idea of weather playing a role, because I had a senior long-haired dog who hated rain so much that she would hold pee for hours and hours rather than go out and get wet. I did end up kind of coddling her, since she was old and had had kidney problems in her previous home: I walked her to an area of the yard that was covered by a big evergreen to the point that it was almost dry underneath. (We walked over there briskly.)

Oh, and you might consider redoing the feeding schedule so that poop-time falls in the daytime. If he somehow sees the basement as not part of the house, which can happen, then you will have the opportunity to watch him there and reinforce the outdoor poop by taking him out quickly when he starts to squat, and, as David says, reward for the outdoor potty.

Hey Randy,

Sorry if that seemed abrupt, I certainly didn't mean it as a slight against you in any way.

My personal training philosophy is this: If my dog doesn't consistently exhibit a behavior, it is not adequately trained. There are exceptions. For instance, if there is some physical ailment that causes her to be unable to hold her bladder or bowels, or if she is confined for an overly long period of time and fails to "hold it", I can excuse these lapses. Otherwise, no matter how good her track record is, any time a dog fails to perform an action that I "know" is trained, I go back to square 1, and assume that I was wrong about the dog.

There's a big difference between being loose in the house when you're awake, and when you're asleep. Most dogs are engaged when you're awake. They want to be near you. They know that they can go to the bathroom by barking and they have more fun and find more reward in holding it and being with you. If he's roaming around the house at night with nothing else to do and the urge strikes, there's no reason for him not to find a place outside of the family "Den" that he can do his business. Do you spend less time in the basement than other areas of the house? This would make it a more likely canidate. Odds are he held it too long the night before, needed to go when you went to sleep, and by 4am he was dying. Nothing to take his mind off it, no reason NOT to, he pooped. Perhaps he held out for as long as he possibly could. When he finally pooped, he was rewarded (the sensation of having to GO was relieved) and there was no correction. "Wow! Pooping in this spot is great! I don't have to go anymore, and no one seems to mind! Ok!"

If his housetraining were complete, he would have woken you up with his bell (or barking at the door, or whatever) long before he broke down and went in the house.

It's possible that the snow irritates him, you just need to treat it like anything else. I assume you feed him on a schedule. I would go back to basics, use the crate as a means of making sure he doesn't have an accident so that you have the OPPORTUNITY to lavishly reward him for going outside. You may also have him Sit and Speak before going outside WHEN You're going outside to do business (NOT when you're going outside for fun play/walks (And there should be a clear difference in business trips (hah!) and fun/walking)).

In General: I think 7 months is too young for uncrated freedom in the house. But, if you have a dog that doesn't chew the couch and he's pretty sedate, it's your decision. There's nothing wrong with giving your dog the free run of the house if he's house-safe and you're comfortable with accepting responsibility for anything he does while you're asleep.

The only danger is that, a lot of the trouble he can get into is self-rewarding (like pooping, or eating a couch) and there's NO WAY to correct this if you're asleep. So it can teach him that doing these things is Ok. At 7 months he's more likely to do these things than, say, at 2 years. And thus, more likely to establish bad habits.

Just to emphasize one big point, Randal: It's *never* the wrong thing to back up and start training (of anything) again. :>

It's totally common for even completely housetrained dogs to have accidents in the house after a snowstorm.

I know that some of my house dogs really don't want to go out, and if I didn't make them leave the back door they would just stand there until I let them back in.

Make sure you are seeing your dog poop OUTSIDE before letting him back in, don't assume he's going in the snow.

Interesting. We don't have this "Snow" that you speak of. There are a lot of benefits to actually going out with your dog and watching them do their thing, though.