[parkie]

Morning all
We have a Cockapoo girl called Pepsi who is nearly 6 months.
We introduced her to a Puppy crate from when we brought her home just before xmas. Pepsi has now outgrown her crate so we decided to put her in a large puppy bed and sleeps in the kitchen. When in the crate and the first week in the bed she always waited until the morning when we took her out for a walk to go to the toilet. However lately she has been doing number 2's in front of the kitchen door during the night (the door is the exit to the garden)
Not sure why she is doing this as she's a playful energetic cockapoo who has a good temperament - eats all her food and gets plenty of attention from all of the family (2 kids aged 7 & 9)
We were going to buy a larger puppy crate today and see if Pepsi prefers it back in there during the night.
She has 3 meals a day - is this too much - she never leaves food
Any suggestions/advice would be greatly appreciated
Many thanks Gary.

 

[embee]

Morning all
We have a Cockapoo girl called Pepsi who is nearly 6 months.
We introduced her to a Puppy crate from when we brought her home just before xmas. Pepsi has now outgrown her crate so we decided to put her in a large puppy bed and sleeps in the kitchen. When in the crate and the first week in the bed she always waited until the morning when we took her out for a walk to go to the toilet. However lately she has been doing number 2's in front of the kitchen door during the night (the door is the exit to the garden)
Not sure why she is doing this as she's a playful energetic cockapoo who has a good temperament - eats all her food and gets plenty of attention from all of the family (2 kids aged 7 & 9)
We were going to buy a larger puppy crate today and see if Pepsi prefers it back in there during the night.
She has 3 meals a day - is this too much - she never leaves food
Any suggestions/advice would be greatly appreciated
Many thanks Gary.

Maybe she just needs to go in the night because of the time you feed her. You can maybe start thinking about reducing to 2 meals morning and evening/late afternoon then maybe keep track of the time she poos compared to time she eats (someone else just posted this idea of a wee/poo 'diary' which could help with this problem - note down timings to work out when she needs to go). You could then adjust the timing of her feeds so she doesn't need to go in the night. Flo pretty much does a poo within 15 mins of eating so I always let her out shortly after her meal. maybe feed her early morning then early afternoon instead of late afternoon/evening.

It may be a behavourial thing but maybe others have ideas if they think it is. I would think however that dogs are more likely to wee if it is to do with behaviour rather than poo?

 

[Dylansmum]

I think it's that dogs don't like to soil their crates but now she can move about more she can find somewhere that feels ok to poo, so she doesn't bother to hold it. We don't use a crate and we found it very hard to housetrain Dylan as he had free run of the house at night and would poo. When we moved him into our bedroom he stopped instantly. If you put her back in a crate then she'll probably stop again.

 

[wilfiboy]

Yeh I agree with Helen its just that she's not in her bed so does nt feel the need to hold it ... is that the door you take her out of to go to the loo, if so she probably wants to go out to do it but no one s there to open the door x

 

[kendal]

how many times a day does she poo, does she poo before going to bed, some times it just means she can hold it all night but because she has so much room she can do it and not have to sleep next to it. maybe she just isnt redy to be out of her crate yet.