# House breaking help



## suze (Apr 3, 2007)

This is my first post. Hope I did this right. This website is great! I have gotten so much invaluable information. 

Any suggestions for my problem would be truly appreciated. My pup Beau is "pooping" me out . He is the second maltese I have at home. I got him four weeks ago. He is now 6 1/2 months old. I have been taking him out every 2 hours when I am home. He is doing pretty well with minimal accidents at this point. 

The problem is that when I have to go to work, which is for 4 hours each time and 3 days a week. I put him in an X-pen with puppy pads. He goes on the pads 50% of the time (He is not pad trained) but at this point that is not the problem. When I get home, he has stepped in his poo and has tracked it everywhere. On his food dish, bedding etc. Needless to say it takes a while to clean this all up. It has been happening almost everytime I leave. I crated him the last time and he pooped in his crate. He is crated at night next to my bed and has no problem holding both #1 and #2 through the night. I am not sure what to do. 

He is not neutered yet, I was going to do this when I got over this housebreaking problem. He is also a fairly active pup. I was wondering if this had anything to do with it. My older dog is 99.9% housebroken and doesn't want to be anywhere near his own poops.


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## Max & Rocky (May 20, 2004)

Hi Suze,

Welcome to SpoiledMaltese.

I took the liberty of deleting the duplicate thread... I've had a couple in the past myself.

As far as your question, you really do need to get him neutered ASAP... There is a possibility that he will start lifting his leg and marking, which is another problem you do not want to be dealing with.

Now, as far as walking in his poop and making a mess...

Is his poop well formed or is it runny? We are dealing with a similar problem but in our case, it is runny which makes a real mess. If it is runny, that is another reason to be seeing your vet ASAP...

If the poop is normal, lets look at giving him things to do which will occupy his time. Bully sticks are always a really good idea and mine can occupy themselves for hours. Also, you might consider getting your little guy tired by taking him for a decent length walk before you leave for work. A tired dog is not normally going to develop OC problems.


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## jmm (Nov 23, 2004)

I've had 2 dogs who would do that as puppies. 

My solution was - no more x-pen with papers. I crated them when I was gone. At 6 months he can hold it for more than 4 hours. Make sure he has pottied before you leave and do leave him with something to keep him busy (food toys are my favorites - stuffed kongs, stuffed sterilized bones, busy buddy toys).


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## suze (Apr 3, 2007)

Thank you guys for your suggestions.

Glad to know that I am not the only one that had gone through this. I am going to try the crate again. The last time I put him in the crate, I took him out twice to relieve himself and gave him a stuffed kong toy to keep himself busy . This time I'll do the same but walk him before I leave. Hope this will work 

He had normal poops so I don't think it was an upset stomach. I will make an appt. for the neutering too. He doesn't lift his leg yet but likes to pee a little something everytime I take him out. I am taking this as a sign.


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