Puppies generally have full bladder control between 4 and 6 months of age. This means that there is light at the end of the tunnel—with a little patience, you can teach a puppy to stop peeing in the house.
You need to teach your puppy how to behave one room at a time. Allow your puppy to learn potty behavior in only one or two rooms at first. Keep the rest of the house off limits. Then once your puppy is no longer having accidents in those first rooms, you can start giving them access to a few more places.
The reason puppies hold on outside and then pee immediately once they get back in is that the house is their happy place and the yard is not. As soon as they come inside, their parasympathetic tone increases and only then do they feel the urge to urinate. Your job is simple in theory: make outside a happy place too.
Baking soda naturally neutralizes odors. Sprinkle it liberally on the damp area or even an old urine stain, and work the powder gently into the fibers of any fabric, rug or carpet. Let the baking soda sit overnight for maximum odor absorption, then vacuum it up to remove the smell completely.
Traditional household cleaning products such as vinegar, baking soda, soap, and the like seem to work at first because they eliminate some of the components of your pet's urine. White vinegar in particular is highly alkaline, which means it can act as a deodorizer for spaces marked with dogs' urine.
Anxiety or Fear: Going indoors might be a response to any number of fearful stimuli or anxieties. If your dog is going in the house while home alone, this could be a sign of separation anxiety. There could be something in your dog's environment, such as a loud noise, that is making your dog fearful of going outside.
If you've house-trained your four-month-old puppy and he suddenly has some accidents, don't panic. He may have normal house training regression, which often occurs between four months and a year old. Normally you can just take a step back and re-train him. And he'll become the same reliable puppy you knew.
Punishing your dog by rubbing their nose in urine is an ineffective and outdated method that can cause more harm than good. Dogs are much more likely to learn and respond to positive reinforcement, rather than punishment.
Spay (or neuter) first
The longer a dog goes before being spayed or neutered, the more difficult it will be to train them not to mark in the house. Spaying or neutering your dog should reduce urine-marking and may stop it altogether.
Puppies can also experience accidents in the house because it has been too long since their last break. Given their young age, puppies do not have large bladders. Like much of their body, a puppy's bladder isn't yet fully developed. Many puppies can only hold their urine for short periods.
In a clean spray bottle, mix one cup of distilled white vinegar with one cup of water and 2 teaspoons of baking soda. Shake it up to mix the ingredients, and then spray on the stain. Let it sit for a few minutes, and then blot with towels until clean.
When you clean or treat the spot, it may seem like the urine is gone because the stain and odor disappear. But the urine salts are still there. In their dry state, urine salts have no odor. But when it gets damp or humid, moisture reactivates the crystals and urine odor comes back – with a vengeance.
WHITE VINEGAR AND GRAPEFRUIT OIL
Mix one cup of vinegar into a warm water-filled bucket and the add some drops of grapefruit oil to the solution to get rid of the odor. Scrub the floor with this safe cleaning solution, concentrating on the most prominent spots. As you scrub, the odor and stains should be disappearing.
Because the vinegar is acidic, it will neutralize the bacteria in the dog pee, offsetting its odor. Vinegar is pet safe, effective, cheap, and eco friendly. Let the vinegar solution sit for 3-5 minutes or carefully follow the instructions on the cleaning product's label.
Your pet may be urine-marking if:
The amount of urine is small and is found primarily on vertical surfaces. Dogs and cats do sometimes mark on horizontal surfaces. Leg-lifting and spraying are common versions of urine-marking, but even if your pet doesn't assume these postures, he may still be urine-marking.
Watch your dog when he is indoors for signs that he is thinking about urinating. When he begins to urinate, interrupt him with a loud noise and take him outside. If he urinates outside, praise him and give him a treat. When you're unable to watch him, confine your dog (a crate or small room where he has never marked).
Spay or Neuter Your Dog
Spaying or neutering your dog will reduce or eliminate urine marking in many dogs. According to the North American Veterinary Community, as many as 50% of male dogs stop urine marking, or at least do it significantly less often, after being neutered.
Take your pup outside routinely — every half hour or hour for very young puppies, every couple of hours for older ones. Set a timer, and about 15 minutes after they eat or drink, head outside.
Attracting dogs 8/10 times, the PoochPad Potty Training Attractant Spray is our runner up recommendation. Out of all the potty training sprays we reviewed, the PoochPad Attractant Spray was by far the most pleasant smelling – a light floral scent. And most of our dogs agreed.
Dogs really don't like the smell of orange or vinegar, so this works perfectly for deterring them! Other scents that deter your dog from peeing on the furniture include citrus scents like lime, orange, and lemon, and you can even use a little bit of alcohol and, of course, vinegar.