Best Dog Training Methods

He is a rot mix. He is about 1 1/2 years old. He has been house trained for quite a while. About 2 months ago, he decided he was going to start peeing and pooping on the basement floor. We started locking him out of the basement and the behavior seemed to stop. About a week later, he started peeing upstairs in the bathroom. He will come in the house and 15 minutes to a half hour later, he pees on the bathroom doorway or the toilet. The problem behavior seemed to go away on its own. My boyfriend scrubbed the bathroom and the toilet with baking soda and then with murphy’s oil soap to get rid of the smell. There hasn’t been a problem for about 2 1/2 weeks. Today I heard him peeing upstairs. I closed my laptop and stood up to go up and yell at him but before I could even get part way up the stairs, before I yelled, he came running down and hid under the table. He knows what he did was wrong. Short of getting rid of him, I don’t know how to make him behave. Why is he doing this?
there haven’t been any changes in the house. no new pets or visiting pets. no roommate changes recently. so i don’t see stress as a factor. he usually doesn’t do it when we are not home. the dogs were alone for about 18 hours last weekend because our friend forgot to let them out – but there were no messes.

Male dogs mark with urine…and that has nothing to do with him being housebroken or not. At 1 1/2 the dog is still learning, and will make mistakes. Some dogs learn quicker than others, at various ages.

If other dogs are coming into your home, or the scent of other dogs that can drive him to mark.

Make certain that you are available to him if he needs to go to the bathroom in the correct place, and that you are paying attention to the signs that he is letting you know he has to go. Dogs are like humans, they can only hold it for so long.

Also check with your vet that he isn’t having any urinary problems.

If he’s hiding under the table, he’s becoming too submissive. Do not yell at him to correct him, take him and lead him to the area he peed, make him smell it, then lead him to the correct place and rienforce the command word you use. Then praise him and give him a treat reward when he goes in the right place.