Cockapoo Toilet Training: House Training In 7 Simple Steps

Toilet Training A Cockapoo Puppy

…or newly adopted Cockapoo can seem daunting and often is frustrating.

The good news is, many puppies and Cockapoos can be housetrained in around two weeks, as long as the owner has the discipline to stick with a good, positive toilet training programme.

I’ve summarised the most important points below:

Give him as many opportunities you can manage for him to get it right. It really is that simple! The more times he is rewarded for going to the toilet in the right place, the quicker he will learn.
It’s equally important that you must never punish any mistakes that he makes during this learning time. If he thinks you are going to punish him then you’ll only confuse and worry him and the training will take much longer.
Find a place you can keep your Cockapoo where it’s okay for ‘accidents’ to happen – but this is only for brief times when you cannot supervise him during training. For example, an indoor kennel or crate or an area penned off in the kitchen (baby gates work well). It has to be a relatively small area, which will discourage him from going to the toilet there. Place his bedding and water in his safe area and also use this space to feed him in. (Please note: if a Cockapoo or puppy is shut in an indoor kennel or pen for long periods of time, this can become a serious welfare issue and is not something that we recommend.)
First thing in the morning, take your Cockapoo outside, stand with him and wait for him to go to the toilet. When he ‘goes’, give him lots of praise as he finishes (being careful not to interrupt what he is doing) and give him a treat. He should need a wee and a poo, so wait for him to do both.
When he has gone to the toilet, you can take him back inside and have a play or cuddle. Let him have full access to the room that you are in – but only as long as you can give him your full attention and watch him – otherwise return him to his safe area.
Take your Cockapoo out every hour on the hour from morning to last thing at night, to give him the opportunity to go to the toilet. You will also need to do this after exercise or play and after meals.
When he goes, praise and reward him with a favourite treat (and write down the time of day that he went and what he did). If you keep a note of this every day, you will find that a pattern of when he goes takes shape. You can then use this to predict when he’ll need to go to the toilet. After about a week you shouldn’t have to take him out as often as every hour.

TIP: There will be times you can’t watch him, so place him in his safe area with a chew toy. It’s kinder to put him in his den area when you cannot watch him, than him sense your disappointment if he toilets in the wrong place.

When ‘accidents’ happen

There will be accidents. You must be prepared for this.

Remember Humans take at best three or four years to get this right; dogs take only two or three weeks!

It’s important to clean up any spray or odour left by accidents. Try cleaning the area with a one part non-biological washing powder / four parts water, or a branded product. This will take away any smells and stains. Make sure you do not use cleaning products that contain ammonia, as this smells like urine to Cockapoos, and will encourage him to use the same spot again and again.

Don’t make a fuss – your Cockapoo has not done it on purpose. If he is still going in the wrong place, then it may be because you are not watching him carefully enough. If you can’t watch him, he should be in his safe area. It’s not fair to keep letting him get it wrong.

Calmly place him in his den, whilst you clear up the mess (well enough it doesn’t become a sniffing place), then let your Cockapoo come back out and it’s all forgotten.

Don’t make this housetraining mistake

If you tell your Cockapoo off when he has accidents you will only cause him to worry and be afraid to toilet anywhere near you. It’s a common training issue that he may accidently learn to go inside but out of sight, in order to avoid the owner’s telling-off he is expecting.

This behaviour can spiral as it makes it harder for you to praise and reward him for toileting correctly, in the right places, because he won’t want to do his business in front of you anymore.

Toilet Training a Cockapoo Puppy

Some puppies may be too young to hold on for too long, as their bladders may be too small to cope. If this is the case, then you will need to take him out more often until he is a little older.

If a Cockapoo has diarrhoea or soft, runny poo and needs to go very often, then you may need to change his food, so it becomes more solid. Ask your vet for advice about this. Infact, if toilet training problems aren’t resolved in a few months, ask your vet to check your Cockapoo hasn’t got a medical condition that is behind the accidents.

Remember, some young puppies find it very daunting to toilet outdoors. They have developed a preference for, certain types of indoor surfaces during early accidental socialisation with their early environment.

Summary

Make it easy for him. Make the effort to take him outside as often as you possibly can to give him the greatest opportunity to toilet in the correct place.
Don’t leave him unattended for too long because he will pee when he sees you in excitement.
By rewarding your Cockapoo at the right time and ignoring mistakes, your Cockapoo will soon get the idea and be ‘accident’ free in no time at all.
If you put him in his indoor den or in your bedroom overnight, he’ll let you know when he needs to go out and this will help speed up the process.
Find a friend – having a fully vaccinated, friendly older Cockapoo to visit and ‘show him the way’ can be very helpful and speed up the process.

Good Luck!

January 23, 2015July 28, 2019

How Do I Stop My Cockapoo Puppy From Biting?

My Cockapoo Puppy bites – what can I do?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjkkHsOKYPI

If you have spent some time reading dog forums you will know the subject of puppies biting is often bought up. On one hand it’s to be expected but on the other… IT HURTS!

New owners are quick to question their Cockapoo puppies temperament but this really is not necessary. All puppies bite. But a sensible owner will teach their puppy soft mouth behaviour a long with other essentials like toilet training. As a puppy grows up you will find that they learn bite inhibition naturally as they notice that their playful bites cause pain and draw a negative reaction from their owner. After all, all puppies are looking for signs about how to please their owners.

So teaching bite inhibition is doing what most owners do in an accidental way by withdrawing when the bite becomes painful. By making the process into a intentional structured program you can encourage soft mouth behavior to happen sooner rather than later.

Why wait for your Cockapoo just to grow out of biting? What if there are children at home?; what if those sharp puppy teeth break the skin and a dressing needs to be applied?

Early Socialisation

If your puppy has had a normal start to life early experiences naturally teach bite inhibition while the puppy is nursing from the mother. If the puppy sucks too hard and uses teeth by accident the mother will push the puppy away or get up and leave. Also, when puppies begin to play with their litter mates, they learn to use their teeth softly or their play mates soon stop playing with them.

For this reason if your puppy is an orphan it may have a harder bite than other puppies who have had normal socialization with the mother and siblings. Also, for puppies that have not had this normal early socialization they don’t have a “tolerance for frustration” since they are not used to having to wait when siblings compete for attention.

Another factor that makes the cockapoo a good candidate for teaching bite inhibition is that genetically it has not been trained to bite down hard like some breeds. However, if you find your cockapoo puppy is biting down harder than expected you need to begin the process of teaching him/her self restraint straight away.

You can start lessons as soon as you like in fact after 5 months your puppy will start to grow adult canine teeth and have a stronger jaw so that is another incentive to start training early.

Anyone can teach their puppy bite inhibition

Start the process – The 4 Rs

Remove – When you are bitten severely enough, let him/her know it hurts and say “Oowww” as calmly as possible. Take your body part (hopefully just a figure) out of its mouth and look away. This is showing your puppy that biting hard means he/she will lose your attention and of course that is not desirable for any puppy.

If he/she keeps wants to continue biting move to a different room until the puppy is calm. Then re-engage their interest.

Repeat – This is a process but keep being consistent and you will begin to notice that the bite intensity becomes less hard.

Your puppy won’t stop biting. They have such a strong urge to bite and chew you won’t cure this. But repetition will lead to increasingly acceptable bites over the coming weeks and months.

As the bite intensity decreases you can increase your sensitivity to the bite. Still “Oowww” and remove. This will encourage softer and softer bites that slowly shape the puppies bite inhibition.

Reinforce – As with most training positive reinforcement is key. Softer bites should be rewarded with praise but keep withdrawing yourself as a negative consequence for harsh bites. Eventually soft mouth behaviour will be more common.

Redirect: You will probably notice times when your puppy is just in a rambunctious mood. Spare yourself some pain and have some chew toys to hand and leave the training for a calmer time.

How not to do it

Physical punishment is not the way to go. Firstly because it won’t achieve your goal. Hitting a dog on the nose with a rolled up newspaper will just make your dog cower and suppress anger. This suppression can then come back at stressful times and result in severe biting. It’s also worth saying that it’s never a good idea to push your dog’s patience level to the point its good behaviour is stretched to the limit. Dogs growl for a reason, it’s their way of saying, enough is enough please don’t continue annoying me or something worse might happen. This is a particularly good point to teach children as they love play with puppies but do not always understand where the boundaries are. (See “The Gift of Growling,” Whole Dog Journal October 2005.) For a full discussion on physical punishment read this discussion thread.

Teaching bite inhibition to an adult Cockapoo dog

Teaching bite inhibition to an adult dog is much harder as we all know old habits are hard to break. You can however, use this variation of the “Oowww” remove technique.

Have a treat in your gloved hand and only open it when your dog starts to bite more softly. Gradually they learn hard bites mean no treats!

Thick gardening gloves are recommended if you are teaching adult dogs bite inhibition. Be careful, an adult canine jaw has much more strength and a harder bite than a puppy!

Wrapping it up

With puppies and adult dogs you will find that biting down hard comes back at times of high emotion but gradually this will lessen if you keep on with positive / negative reinforcement.

Do continue to reinforce bite inhibition with your adult cockapoo dog, and guard against putting your Cockapoo puppy in stressful emotional situations where his/her tolerance might be tested. A dog is an animal and biting is natural to them even when they are part of a human family. It’s rarely a questionable temperament cockapoos have but environments that cause anxiety or over exuberance owners need to be mindful of.

Source: http://www.whole-dog-journal.com/issues/13_6/features/Bite-Inhibition_16232-1.html?s=ShareASale

bite inhibition video (not a Cockapoo) but still useful to watch

September 23, 2014May 20, 2020

Socialising Cockapoos

Introduction

Cockapoo puppies need to meet a range of different people during their ‘socialisation period’ (between about 3 and 12 weeks of age) to ensure that they accept contact with people as a normal and positive part of life. During this period, puppies learn what is ‘normal’ in their environment and what to expect in different circumstances.

It is therefore important for all puppies to learn that contact with all sorts of different people is a normal part of life. They also need to learn about the various types of interaction that people have with dogs. For example, they need to accept being handled all over, picked up, their feet being handled and cleaned, ears examined, coat groomed, and nails cut. They also need to learn about the various things that people do, for example, coming in and out of the house / kennel area. They also need to learn that sometimes people interact and play, but at other times they may be present but not interacting with them.

The aim of a structured socialisation program is to give puppies the best chance of coping well with the various types of people, circumstances in which they appear, and ways in which they interact with dogs, before they are homed to a domestic environment. In order to ensure they develop a positive perception of people, it is important for the introduction of new experiences to be gradual and controlled. It is also important that puppies are not already anxious or fearful when they interact with people, as this will increase the risk that they will associate human contact with a negative experience.

Preparation

Plan in advance how you will ensure that puppies experience different types of people. All puppies should have contact with a minimum of four people. This should include at least one person of each gender. It should also include at least one person who is above retirement age. Puppies should also experience controlled contact with children. Ideally this should include at least one older child ( 8 years +), and also a baby or toddler

For safety, children should only have contact with puppies under the supervision of their parents or responsible adult. Where access to young children is not feasible, puppies should be exposed to the noises of babies and young children using good quality recordings

Prepare in advance any items which will help broaden puppies’ experience of people. For example, having a brightly coloured and rustling jacket (as worn by postmen or delivery people), a motorcycle helmet, a cap, a back-pack, a pushchair, a zimmer frame and an umbrella available will mean that puppies can people engaged in socialising the puppies can introduce puppies to items that they will commonly see associated with people as adults

Before you start

Make sure the puppy is in a place he / she knows well

Have plenty of toys and treats

You should be able to recognise signs of anxiety in a puppy before starting the socialisation sessions, so you can withdraw if the experiences you are introducing to the puppy cause him/her to be frightened

Socialisation to different types of people

Puppies should be familiar and confident with their main carer before the introduction of further people. This person should spend time playing and interacting with puppies until all of the puppies in the litter approach the carer voluntarily on entering the kennel / room. Where individual puppies show signs of fear or anxiety, such as cowering at the back of the pen, moving away, trembling, or pulling back on contact, they should be given additional attention. This should involve the carer being quiet and calm, crouching or sitting a short distance away from the puppy and encouraging the puppy to approach.

Approaches should be rewarded with food treats. Interaction with nervous puppies should develop with gentle stroking on the chest area: avoid putting the hand directly towards the puppy’s head as this may be perceived as threatening. With increased confidence, the puppy can be gradually stroked on the shoulder, back, flanks and head

Once all puppies in a litter confidently approach and interact with their main carer, a program of introduction to other people can be started. Puppies’ response to the introduction of one other person should be evaluated first. Signs of fear or anxiety in individual puppies should be addressed by the main carer. Once puppies confidently interact with the second person, further new people can be introduced. These should include adults of both gender

When puppies are confidently interacting with a number of adults in a familiar environment, they can be introduced to people in different circumstances. For example they should experience people coming and going through a threshold (e.g. door in a household), and meeting people when they are in an outside garden or run

The socialisation program can then be expanded to include contact with children where possible. Older children can interact with puppies, but should be instructed how to appropriately handle and play with puppies before the interaction begins. Contact with children should be supervised at all times to prevent the occurrence of negative experiences for either puppies or children. Where younger children or babies are introduced to puppies, they should be held by their parents. Should direct contact with children not be impossible, puppies should experience the range of noises made by babies and children through use of a good quality sound recording

Puppies should be given additional experience about the variation in the ways people might appear to them through the use of ‘props’. For example people can interact with the puppies wearing a florescent jacket, motorcycle helmet or backpack. They can also walk past the puppies using a ‘zimmer frame’ or pushing a push chair or trolley. These experiences will help puppies to learn that all these variations of how people appear are a normal part of life.

Conclusion

Many dog owners will think a puppy socialisation program is extravagant and not worth the time spent. It’s up to the individual how in-depth they want to make the program but at at the least, remember to introduce your puppy to people, noises, props, and new environments carefully and remember you have a delicate sentient being to nurture into the a very scary world!