Has anyohe Litter Box trained their Doxie?

[Rrotz]

Bren is 6 months old and is quickly mastering the newspaper, I want to switch him over to the litter box and get him working on it. Any tips from other Litter Box Doxie owners?

[SandyLynn]

We bought a litter box but haven't set it up yet. It's for our little spoiled brats who don't like getting their feet wet if it's raining, so they find places to go in the house. Then they all give us that innocent, "who, me?" look. I, too, would be interested in hearing others' experiences with the litter box, especially regarding how you get the dogs to start using it.

By the way, I saw your pupper's pix - very cute!

[Rrotz]

Hi SandyLynn,
I got Bren started on Box training this weekend. He's 90% papertrained, although he hasn't started seeking out the paper on his own yet, when I lead him to the paper and give him is cue he'll go potty on cue. He's 6 months old but I've only had him 1 week so he's doing just excellent with only 5 accidents, all of which were my fault.

So, I got the Purina Dog Litter box and pellets then I cleaned up the bathroom (his bathroom too) and deodorized the floor where his papers were. I also have been keeping a plain white t-shirt on the floor where I'll sop up peepee, he started peepee-ing on it after a few days. The T-shirt is good and peepee soaked now and nice and stinky, I placed the box in the spot where he likes to go most and put 1 layer of urine soaked newspaper at the bottom then filled with pellets. Then I spread the T-shirt out on the top of the pellets.

Pupster went back on crate training refresher, that means he stays in all day next to my office desk while I work all day or physically leashed to me. At 2 hour intervals I took Bren into the bathroom and put him on the T-shirt and cued him to "GO Potty" and low and behold he's started peeing on the T-shirt in the box. Only once did he jump out and peepee out of the box, but I was watching him and distracted him with "HEY!" then put him into the pan to finish. He didn't get a treat for that half effort but he did jump out of the box and try to poop but I caught him as he squatted and put him in the box to do his duty, he got a treat for that. Other than that, I'm just reinforcing his good behavior when he goes potty where and when I want him to and ignoring when he messes up. He knows now that not pottying where and when I want him to won't get him a treat.

Only good news to report, I'll report back in on Monday.

[Mandy]

We tried the litter box a few years ago. I would recommend AGAINST using the dog litter pellets. Jake decided they were fun to throw around the house and play with. Of course, Henry was not a puppy by that time either.

OUr litter box now resides in the den with blankets and pillows as a comfy spot for them to relax while we work on the computer.