house breaking

Question
hello, we just became the proud parents of a well he is 10 weeks old now.he is extremely loving and playfull, and just an allaround sweet boy. we are having trouble house breaking him though. during the night he lets us know he has to go out and doesn't usually have any accidents but during the day i will let him out when i know he has to go pee or poop and we will be out there for around 5 minutes or so. sometimes he will go and others not. or he will pee and than come inside and go poop. we praise him when he go's outside and give him a treat, so i don't know what we are doing wrong. we have had him for about a month now. do ytou have any good advise?

sincerely,
elisa haines

Answer
Hi Elisa,  You need to setup a very strict schedule of potty training.  Feed him twice a day, give him 20 minutes to eat & then lift the food.  He will have to go within 15 minutes of eating, so it is a good time to start him on the potty training schedule. When you take him out to go to the bathroom, make him run instead of just walk.  Throwing a toy or ball, can help to get him running.  Running causes nature to work to your advantage more than walking does.  At night or whenever you are not home or able to watch him, you will want to keep him in a crate to teach him self control.  If he does not go to the bathroom when you take him out, then put him back in his crate, and then take him out again in a half hour.  If you do not have the time to be back in a half hour, then he just has to wait until you are back again to let him out.  Start at 4-5 hour intervals as far as getting them outside.   If you discover him having an accident at a certain time of day, make a mental note as to the time and try to get him out at that time everyday or have him crated at that time so he will learn more self control.  Basically get a very strict schedule of eating, crating & walking/running, and you will be able to control what is coming out the other end.  Then you just start to work on imprinting the lengthening of time inbetween intervals of going outside.  Hope this helps,

Dawn