Housebreaking advice

[Cheryl]

We brought our adorable puppy Molly home a week ago. This is our first experience with a dog so I know we have a lot to learn. I read a lot about house breaking and how often they need to go. The first thing is that we are bringing Molly out a lot and she simply doesn't seem to need to go. Every book I read says a puppy her age (9 weeks) should need to go every couple hours. But she will seem to go 4 or 5? It is confusing and I think she gets annoyed with us bringing her out after she eats or naps, she ends up just laying on the spot we want her to go and trying to nap or just chew on grass,etc. She has had a few inside accidents though but weirdly were a few minutes after she had gone and we brought her back in. Are we bringing her out too much. Should we be looking for signs (I don't see any, we just bring her when she wakes, and 10 min after meals).

Second question is we built a spot for her to go in, a wood framed area with pebbles as opposed to the yard grass. She doesn't seem to get idea this is spot we want. Sometimes she goes and we reward her but other times after I wait 20 min at spot with no luck I let her walk around and she walks across yard and pees.. Is it too much to ask a young pup to go in a certain spot?Thanks

[Debb, Lucy & Oscar]

Nature's Miracle for hardwoods and other hard surface floors is what we used and it worked well. I'm real sensitive to certain scents and NM is one I could tolerate.

As a side note (and completely off topic), after catching up on DK postings early last night, my DH brought to my attention that he thought I'd used the word, 'suppose' incorrectly. After reading through my responses I found I'd used it incorrectly 3 times! Shame on me! You used the correct form, BTY :)

[Debbie and Belle]

Thanks, I do have hardwood floors on the entire mail level, and that's where she has peed before - mostly in the kitchen.  We are going to pick up Nature's Miracle today and thoroughly clean the entire main floor so we don't miss anything.  Hopefully this will help.  Yes, the results of her UTI were negative this time (she had one several weeks prior to that, but these results were negative).  I know she is gaining understanding about going potty outside, because sometimes when I'm ready to bring her back inside, she won't go in until she has peed an additional time.  I really hope adding the treats and thoroughly cleaning the floors will help.

[Debbie and Belle]

After thoroughly cleaning the floor with Nature's Miracle, Belle has only had one accident Tuesday night and none since then! She has started going to sit by the door when she needs to go out, but she still doesn't ring the bells. My trainer suggested that another reason the housebraking may have been so difficult is because my townhouse back yard does not have grass so I was training her to go on the deck.

[Vicky loves Chachi]

That's great. Just keep ringing the bell for her and even dangle it in front of her when u take her out and give her a treat if she touches it at all, she'll get it.

Funny story - I took my bells with me when we went to visit my mil and forgot to hang it back up when we got home. Chachi needed to go out so he grabbed his leash, which was hanging off of the counter, and brought it to my daughter. She took him out and he did his thing. I think I can say with a 99.5% certainty that he is potty trained. He's 5 months.

[Debbie and Belle]

Oh that is such a cute story! 

I will keep trying the bells like you are suggesting.  While I'm so relieved Belle is sitting by the door to go outside, it would be great for her to use the bells so we can hear that she needs to go out.

[Rosemary (Ro) and Enzo]

Great news!
I'm guessing the "deck training" could be part of the problem too. I have a friend who purchased a few pieces of sod and puts that her balcony. She didn't bother with watering it or anything....the puppy was completely happy with the soon to be dead sod!