House Dog Training Question

[10,000 Casts]

My Lab turned 1 Year a week ago. She has been awesome so far and we couldn't be happier with her.

Two days ago, she went to the bathroom by the door. (Diarrhea)

I scoulded her, smacked her took her straight outside. Then Yesterday she did it again. I scoulded her again and took her outside for a while. Well I got to thinking and the reason that she went by the door is because she was sitting there waiting to go out for so long and couldn't take it anymore and had to go. She is totally housebrocken and when she needs to go out, she goes and sits at the door. The problem is that she doesn't give us any signal like a bark, a whine or a scratch.

I was wondering if you guys have any advise on how to get her to signal that she needs to go out.

A little background info on her is that she is the quietest dog I have ever seen, she does not bark, I have only heard her bark when she was a puppy a few times and when someone is at the door which is very seldom at our house. I can't get her to bark when I play with her or any other time. She is also very emotional and when I scold her, she goes into a deep depression sometimes for hours.

All in all, I just want her to signal somehow. Today, I have had to take her out every hour since I got home from work.

Thanks

[Pyrex]

If she has diarrhea, she might not have had enough time to warn you. What I did is let my britt out at the same times throughout the day, after a few weeks she would come to me and stare at me until I asked her if she wanted to go out, seemed to work, but when she was sick, she had some accidents also, part of owning a dog. Now if I could only teach her to open the door....

[Jarrod32]

I was thinking the same thing. The diarrhea indicates that the dog is sick. Sometimes when we get sick, we have little warning when we need to get to the bathroom...

[kkahmann]

I got the opposite problem on barking. I got a real open black and tan hound that barks at anything and sometimes at nothing. When she needs to go out she stands by the door and doesn't make a sound. Just sits there. Took her a good long while to train me. Lol

[firfyter]

We use a bell attached to the door for my Springer.

[10,000 Casts]

Thanks for the posts guys,

It was in the same place 2 nights in a row and I am positive that she had been sitting there for a while. It hasn't happened since and I have been letting her out every hour. Great idea on the bell. I will try it and let you know how it works out. I suppose for the first few times I will ring it, then force her to ring it and hopfully it catches on. This spring, I am putting in a fence and I want to put in a dog door but the wife says no. We'll see... For now it's the bell, if anyone else has any neat ideas please let me know,

Thanks for the help!

[11-87]

Tell your wife the fence is to keep kids out of the yard so they don't hurt the dog.

Or

Tell her that if she lets the dog out she can put her in the fence and not worry about the dog running away when your gone.

or

Tell the dog it's to keep the wife out of the house.but close by.

[11-87]

take a look at an invisible fence.. easy to install and use.