We just got a French Bulldog for the kids for Christmas. She is now 4 months old. She is potty training during the day fairly well, but when we leave her alone she poops and pees all over. I left her in the car to go pick my daughter up from school and she pooped in my car. Other times she poops in her crate and smears it all over the place. We are so frustrated. Any suggestions on how to make her stop?

Dogs will rarely poop in their crate unless they really have to go. When we were housebreaking our Eskie, we got a suggestion that we should write down what times during the day we took him out, and whether he peed or poohed.

We didn't really think there was rhyme or reason to what he did when, but there definitely was. We found there was a regular pattern and adjusted our take-out schedule and our own travel schedule accordingly. Four months is still very young, and you shouldn't be surprised if you leave her for a couple hours and she has to use the bathroom. Keeping track of what comes out and when for a week or so will help you schedule better for her.

It does get better. :)

If you page through the dog forum here you will find many others have the same problem. I don't think I see as many such questions on other websites. Maybe AMHD is paying Google to dump everybody here. I am not sure exactly what the problem is, but being left alone is an unnatural thing for dogs. It is only natural that a puppy resists its crate at first. What the puppy wants more than anything else is to be with others, you, anyone else in the household, and any other pets. In our modern society, even if we are home,
Other things distract us from the attention an uncrated puppy must have. The
Only real solution is to crate the dog when you aren't around. Leave it some toys. Perhaps a Kong filled with peanut butter. Don't leave anything in the crate the dog might chew up. Rather than relaxing and catching a nap in their den, some puppies foul the crate. I am not sure if it is stress or a protest. I haven't had this problem. As I said, I see many questions suggesting it, and saw my daughter fight the problem.

A wire grid in the bottom of the crate will help keep the puppy up out of urine and to a lessor extent stools. They are available with the crates, but expensive and hard to find. A piece of closely spaced wire closet shelving from a home supply place is cheaper. This reduces the mess, making the protest much less effective. The longer haired the puppy, the higher it needs to be. In warmer weather, you can just haul the crate out and hose everything off. When the puppy sees you coping with the situation, and you stand your ground, most of them learn to relax, and that you will return. One more thing that may help is using a smaller crate, or blocking off part of a larger one so the puppy can't fouled one spot and retreat.

The "shut the puppy in a safe room" is a fallacy. Very few houses even have a
Safe room. How many of us have a room with a hard surfaced floor and nothing
Else? Most rooms have electrical cords to chew if nothing else. In addition
To destroying anything a bored puppy finds to chew, it may choke or have
Intestinal blockage from the pieces. I had a friend that left her dog in a
"safe" room. It ate a hole in the floor covering. The safe rooms fail to
Give the dog the comfort of the enclosed space their instinct requires. Nor
Do they restrict activity extending the time the dog can go without relieving
Itself.

The same technique as I use the puppy's first nights in our home may help too. I have never had much luck with the old clock or radio tricks. What I do is lay down by the crate like I was going to sleep there. Usually a puppy may fuss a little, but then settle down and go to sleep. Once it is asleep, you can get up and go to bed.

Here is a picture of our Holly in a vegetable bin in her crate:



The bottom was solid, but I drilled plenty of holes in it. It worked very well on the few urinations she had at first. It would not do well on stools.