Toilet Training - Sort've?

[Wolfhound Lover]

So I noticed on the weekend that my great dane cross pees in the backyard verandah =/

we have a closed off verandah-type section next to the back door, where they spend most of their time. after feeding her one morning, i noticed she moved abt a metre away, just in front of the table where our bbq sits, squatted and proceeded to pee. i was quite shocked.

i'm not 100% happy that 1. she's peeing in covered areas, and 2. that she does it next to a 'food source' of sorts.

my bf argues that i can't do anything abt it, because well, she is technically 'outside'. and 'good luck' trying to train her.

but my wolfhound goes out into the yard to do his business. least i haven't caught him doing it under cover yet.

she's abt 14months old, so she's no longer really a puppy.

since we're both hardly home during the day it's not like i can catch her on a constant basis to correct her.

does anyone have any suggestions about what i can do to discourage this type of behaviour? or am i just getting too prissy? LOL.

any thoughts? any advice would be appreciated.

she is a bit of a troublesome one. i think being naughty is in her nature. she managed to disappear for a day when we took her off her lead during a walk, and we had to collect her from the pound =/

then there was the time we took a walk in the bush and she disappeared. ended up finding her on the way back - she'd gone across the other side of the fence, and refused to walk back. I had to go over and collect her. grrr.

she's a pound dog that's been in foster care for abt a month before we got her. and so far she's been with us for abt 3 weeks. i'm going to take both dogs to group obedience classes soon, and i half look forward to, and half shudder at the thought at how sociable (or anti-social as it may turn out to be) my dogs might be.

[Her Majesty Dogmad]

Not quite clear on this - can she get out of the covered area into the garden to wee? If she can then you need to put some more work in on training her to go there plus remove the smell in your undercover area (you cannot just use disinfectant for this, it needs to be something that will properly take the smell out such as vinegar etc).

This is a common complaint actually, a lot of people don't want the dog going on the paved areas of a garden, what I normally suggest with that is to sprinkle some citronella oil (sparingly) around the edge or the area they are going in, most dogs will avoid that smell.

If she cannot access the garden then she maybe cannot wait all day. Have you seen my posts on toilet training in the other threads? Try teaching her a command and then you can take her into the garden and give the command, she should get the idea.

[Wolfhound Lover]

thanks for the suggestions and advice dogmad!

yes she can access the rest of the backyard from the covered area.

unfortunately i'm not always home during the day, so i'm a bit worried that my rules won't stick so much?

she's basically house trained, but i think she just doesn't realise that the paved area isn't 'pooable'.

i came home today, and there was a little 'present' sitting in the said area =S

i think i might give the citronella a try and see if that discourages her.

in general i don't mind the dogs sitting on the verandah, i just don't want them doing their business there.

and thanks for the tip on the vinegar! =D

i will go look up your toilet training tips now =D

thanks so much!