Samoyed Forum:
Adult Sammy with Behavior Problems

Can anyone help me? I have an adult Sammmy I adopted from another family that couldnt keep her anymore. According to them, shes had three families in her 2 1/2 years of life. I am her fourth family. She is very untrusting of anyone at this point(understandable) and therefore hard to train. I have a small terrier dog that gets along very well with her. She tends to immitate the small one at times so I know shes trying. She gets plenty of exercise in our gated back yard. Lately she urinates in her crate when we leave for even less than an hour. (We have to leave her crated because she tears up everything if we dont). She has no problem sitting in her feces or urine. I dont know how to break that habit. Any ideas? Thanks!

The first thing to do is to rule out any medical reasons for the change in behavior. She could have a bladder infection. Sometimes dogs (usually females) develop a condition where they leak urine while sleeping and they do not realize that is is happening. This condition easily treatable with medication.

Rachel