I have a 3 year old chocolate lab named Oliver (he's on the picture). We recently moved to a bigger place and decided to get a second puppy, another chocolate lab we named Wellington. They get along great and everything seems to be going well, except that Wellington is having trouble with the potty training. We walk them twice a day and they get access to our backyard about 6 more times a day. But as soon as we step out of the house, Wellington pisses and pooes everywhere. We decided to get a crate, but are wondering what's going to happen when Wellington is put in the cage and Oliver is left outside....So, is there anything I need to keep in mind when crate training a second puppy??

I would keep the crate out of view of where the other dog will be seen. Give Wellington a little corner of his own, that he can 'claim' as his little resting place. Make sure to NOT let Oliver in that area for awhile, and not to let Olivers scents and smells approach any of wellingtons things. Wellington needs to establish something he can call his own. Chances are, that wellington is marking his territories, and tryingt o establish some type of dominence over Oliver. By giving Wellington his own space and place to call his own, it'll be good enough for him to claim that, instead of everything else.

wellington should, in theory, start to learn from oliver, though since this can take a long while, i agree with your idea to use a crate. now, when you walk him or let him out and he comes in, if he starts to pee or poo inside, get really mad, yell 'no! wellington what are you doing!', he will stop because he will be shocked, and thats your chance- shove him outside, and he can finish his business out there. when he does business outside, cheer him on. 'wellington, you're such a good boy! what a good boy!'. when you're about to be going out, give him a chance to use the toilet outside before you leave, then crate him. the first few times he will probably still use the bathroom in there, and that is quite frustrating, but since he will realize that since you're not home, he has to sit in it, he will get the hint and stop going in there. when you get home, immediately let him out. praise him if he was good in his crate, but don't scold him for being bad unless you catch him in the act, since (i hate to say this as it's mean) dogs are simple minded- they don't know what you're yelling at them about, as far as they're concerned it was okay to poo since you didn't yell at them when they were in the act. if the crate is so big that he can poo on one side and curl up on the other side and go to sleep, take one of those milk crates that everyone likes to steal and block off one side of the crate with it, leaving him only space enough to lay down. i know it sounds mean, but my mom's been breeding dogs (and thusly crate training a lotttt of dogs and puppies) for 28 years, and i've been in on that for all my 17 years, and all these methods work. and remember, if oliver is good in the house, wellington should eventually start to pick up on it, probably even faster since he will miss being able to play with oliver outside the crate. once he's had a couple of dry days and nights while he's in the crate, try letting him out for the day. if he's good, let him stay until he's bad. good luck!

Even thought he can follow the older dogs example he still needs to be trained. What I did was to leave the pup in a small area, with their food, bedding and newspaper. The pup will now want to get his area dirty so he will only do his business in the paper to keep his area clean. As he gets better, allow him to roam in a bigger space and continue on until he can be in your house without any accidents. The best thing to do is be patient. If the pup has an accident, take him to the newspaper area. If the accident happens when u are not there, he wont understand what he did wrong if u start screaming or showing him your anger. Hopefully this will work for you as it worked for me. :-)

I have crate trained in a multi dog household. I had two older dogs who were no longer crated and a puppy who was. There were no problems. My other dogs would generally nap in the same room with the puppy. If you have never crate trained before, be prepared that Wellington may not initially like his new crate and may protest with a lot of barking and whining. Especially since the crate wasn't there when you first brought him home. All 3 of mine fussed at first, but eventually, they would go in their crate on their own and lay down when they saw I was about to leave the house. Good luck.

[rayter]

Read this article on dog crates training:

Important Reminders During Crate Training Your Dog

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