[NozOnyCalAur]

Potty training has been going exceptionally well today. Every two hours on the odd hour starting at 9 AM we go outside to do our business! Auriel, my Pekingese pup, has gone potty every time I've taken her out. I say, "Go potty," when she does, treat her like a million bucks afterwards. All of that is good behavior and we haven't had an accident in the house yet today.

Today I've noticed that after I've given her praise for her good deed, she then turns and immediately begins to pull on the lead back towards the house. I'm taking this as her message she is done and ready to go back inside rather than trying to wait to see if she'll do number 2 after a number 1. At the same time I don't want to encourage her by letting her pull on the lead back to the house. She is however 10 weeks old and a baby and I don't want to ruin our potty training experiences by also trying lead training at the same time. I don't want to overwhelm the poor thing.

Do I let the lead pulling go until she's a little older or intervene now?

 

[momtolabs]

From my experiences intervene now. If you wait until they are older it will just be harder to break the habit.

 

[elrohwen]

I would just start using the "be a tree" method. When she pulls, stand still and wait until she looks back at you or stops pulling, then start walking again. You don't have to say anything or make it into an ordeal, but gradually she'll get the idea that when she pulls she doesn't get to go anywhere.

 

[NozOnyCalAur]

Thank you, I'll start with that!

 

[Hambonez]

When our pup was younger (and it was winter!) he'd go out, do his business, and then immediately bound back for the door. If he still had to do #2, he would stay out until he did... THEN bound back to the door. (Now that the weather is nice he prefers to stall a bit before or after) I think as long as she isn't having accidents in the house, if she wants to come back in when she's done, let her back in. Of course it would be more polite not to pull, but I wouldn't force her to stay out either.

 

[Nev Allen]

You could try making staying out more rewarding by taking a toy with you and as soon as your pup has finished, have a game.

 

[ManyRoses]

At 10 weeks, you can be training on all kinds of stuff!! Our pup is now just over 3 months, and she is doing leash training, sit/stay, down, wait, and we have just started on her recall/come training as she is only a few weeks away from having her vaccines done, and we will start off-leash training and taking her to the dog park at that point.

In your situation, I would intervene, absolutely. You should be recording her intake as well as her potty times, so you should be able to figure out when she needs to poop, and when a pee is enough. If you KNOW that she doesn't need to poo, then after you have praised her, just walk back in with her. But if you think she may need to poo, then I would either just resist the pull, or bring her back to you and wait. Sometimes I find that my girl likes to walk a little to find a spot to poo, whereas she will just pee in her designated spot right away - you could walk her around a little, just make sure that YOU are in control.

 

[KBLover]

Do I let the lead pulling go until she's a little older or intervene now?

Never let anything you don't want to go. She doesn't know that you're allowing it because you don't want to overwhelm her. She just knows it's working (we're going where I want to). I would redirect and start to work on some basics of leash walking, even if it just praise/reward while there's no tension on the leash while we go where she wanted to go.

Just my view.

Then again, I never believed in 'too much training'. (Wally says, "tell me about it...")

 

[NozOnyCalAur]

Thank you everyone. We are working on everything now. Potty training (can't wait till she's older and I can get more than 4 hours of sleep at a time) leash training, fetching, her name, "drop it," Auriel has a tendency to pick things up and carry them while we're on walks, sit/stay, how not to bite the comb during daily grooming and bite inhibition. We're using puppy kibble as treats. I want to take her to puppy classes, but I want her to have all her shots first.