8 Week Old Husky Questions!

[Cfirgens]

Hi, my name is Chris. I recently, labor day, just got Leo, a 8 week old husky. Now, unfortunately I've had some issues with him regarding house training and crate training. Most of it I assume is my fault and I will get into why in a minute. 

We got Leo kind of last minute, he had a deposit on him but we went to look at him anyway, well when we got there the breeder said that the person cancelled and that he was available so we just got him right then and there. Now we had most of everything except a crate, which my friend was bringing the next day. So Leo slept in bed with us, now when we got the crate we introduced him to it and fed him treats in it and the process that is described in most crate training websites. The 2nd night he slept in his crate for 2 hours in our bedroom next to our bed so he didnt feel so lonely, but after the two hours he cried and wouldnt settle down in 5-10 minutes, so I took him outside and he didn't go or anything, put him back in the crate and he wouldnt stop whining/crying for 1 hour. So we took him out and put him on bed and he was instantly sleeping. So he's been sleeping with us, he hasn't had any accidents in bed and usually holds it for hours rather than go in our bed. We continue crate training during the day, but we left him in there for 10 minutes today, the most he had been in there before was 5 where he didnt cry or whine, and he was crying very loudly and I honestly thought that he was hurting himself. So we waited until he settled down and let him out. I found crate training websites and am putting them into practice. As a college student he doesn't have to be in there for any more than an hour, and he has yet to be by himself in his crate. So I'm wondering if I should start making him sleep in his crate and put up with the crying, hoping he'll eventually settle down and go to bed, or just continue what we're doing and when he becomes more comfortable in the crate then move onto sleeping in the crate. 

 

His potty issue has me confused and I can't find anything on the internet for it, so we'll take him outside and he'll go pee and/or poop, and then we'll let him be outside for 5 more minutes just to get familiar with the area and all the people that want to meet him. We want to socialize him with people and other dogs as much as possible early. However, he'll just go pee for quite a while, then be outside for 5 minutes and when we bring him back up to the house he'll immediately, within 5 minutes, pee in the house, just a little bit but we catch him, tell him no, pick him up and take him back outside, where he won't go to the bathroom no matter how long we are out. My girlfriend thinks it's him asking for attention, I don't think thats it because we always play with him when he's not sleeping. I thought maybe he was doing it to go back outside, but that seems a little too intelligent considering it's only been for the past 2 days, and I just put it off as him being a puppy.

 

What do you guys think or suggest?

[Elyse]

Welcome to the forums!

 

I don't really have anything to suggest, as I've never had a puppy, but I just want to point out that...well...he's a puppy. They won't learn crate training/potty training overnight...for some its taken months. 

For the crate, I think you're supposed to introduce it as a happy place (put treats in there, food in there, etc) Make sure he isn't locked in until he gets comfortable with it. But, I'd wait for more answers...mine isn't crate trained.

[Tatipu]

I would suggest getting him used to it now rather than later.  As they grow older, the more stubborn they get ._.  ...  I made that mistake by letting mine out while she was still ~8-9 weeks and when I started making her go back to sleep in the crate when school started, she would cry for HOURS before going to bed and it drove my parents crazy.  

 

As with the crying issue you're having, you're going to have to let him cry it out so he knows that crying will get him NOTHING.  You letting him out just lets him know, if he cries, he'll eventually get what he wants.  (Just like a 2 or 3 year old kid begging their parents for candy, they'll start throwing fits and screaming in the grocery store until the parent finally gives up and says, "FINE FINE JUST BE QUIET AND I'LL GIVE YOU WHAT YOU WANT"  ) Same case .

 

As much as it hurts to hear a puppy cry, you're going to have to let him learn that he doesn't get what he wants by annoying the crap out of you//making you feel sorry for him.  What some people do is they put one of their shirts in the kennel/crate with the puppy so the puppy feels like you're with them or something like that (didn't work with mine) and cover the crate with a blanket/towel/etc .  (<- this one worked for me)

[ But just so you know, he may still cry the first few nights or even weeks, you're just going to have to be patient because he eventually will quiet down.  Mine would still cry for an hour every day when I started it and slowly within the next week or two she would cry less and less every day until it just stopped. ]

 

I think for the first few weeks you should only let him out to go potty.  Just until he learns not to potty inside.   You take him outside to do his business and as soon as he's done take him right back in.   Introductions to a puppy should be made slowly and gradually where there's a calm environment, not where people gush over how cute he is and squeal over him.  As soon as you finish getting his shots Up to date, feel free to bring a well behaved dog to meet up.  You don't need to do this all at once of course.  With people, you can bring people by but remember to keep the environment calm and quiet. (The reason for this is, dogs react to how people react, if he sees people being excited by him being there, later on, he's always going to be excited when people come which sometimes is a bad thing-- my dog will bark and woo and people that come into the house because they're always OMGOSH SHE'S SO ADORABLE and this excitement in their voice gets her excited and she ends up jumping everywhere and it's so hard to correct now because I can't control how other people come up to my dog (I can in my home, but in the public  I can't))  Dogs I'm not so positive about when to introduce them to your puppy but for sure not a rough houser the first few times.  I didn't introduce my dog to another dog until she was maybe 5 months old but she was scared the first few times and over the course of a a few weeks to a month she was busy playing around with most of the dogs (I did it at a dog park but I actually wouldn't recommend it because I now know, many dog owners are irresponsible people that know nothing of dogs and own a dog just because they can.  They told me all the wrong things but if your dog park has friendly dogs, then so be it.  If there's a lot of dogs there, it may be overwhelming for your dog at first so I would just do things slowly.

 

Good luck with your fur baby and congrats on getting one!  Hope this helps a bit x_o.  Not the best at explaining things lol.

[BingBlaze n Skyla]

Depends if you want him to sleep in his crate eventually or not , mine get to sleep where they want but we managed to crate train skyla for when we went out (she was a chewer) I just set the crate up let her investigate it give her treats in there n built up to pushing the door closed but not locking it to locking it n unlocking it , building up the time n then leaving the room for a few mins then building that up too ,, you could try putting something in there that smells of you to help comfort the pup n settle him down

With the peeing your on the right track just keep up with what your doing n he'll get there

Also with regards to socialization . Has he had all her jabs yet? If not wait will he's fully vaccinated till you let him interact with other dogs unless u know they are vaccinated and healthy