# How long can they hold, 5mo, housebreaking



## Pepe (Aug 14, 2013)

Hi it's my first GSD so I'm trying not to set expectations too high or low.

Pepe, 6 months old, male, desexed puppy, is doing well at housebreaking. We haven't had accidents indoors or in crates for nearly 2 weeks. Here's our routine: he sleeps in crate, gets up at 7-7.30, drink water, then out to exercise and pee usually once, poop 1-2 times, back for breakfast, drink some more water, then before work, he goes out to pee at 8.30 then crate.
During the day, he's out at 11.30-12.30 once, drink some more water and pee, then crate, then 3-4pm again, water and pee. 
Then he gets exercise at 6-7pm, then back for dinner and water.
Then the water cuts off at 8.30, he goes out one last time at 10.30pm then crate for sleep.

He could urinate for 30+ seconds when he drinks half a bowl of water and holds it for max. 2 hours and other times only lasts a few seconds if he doesn't drink much water prior. He gets crated for no more than 3-4hours at one time.

Here is my question: can I stretch that time to say 6 hours? Is that too much for him? I am home working some times and he is crated when I'm working. I need to tell whether he's whining to go peeing or he's just whining to get out of the crate and play.
He doesn't whine if no one's home. He does sometimes knowing I'm indoors and he's crated outdoors. He can see me but not free run of the backyard. I need to make sure I don't get outsmarted by him and tricked into more toilet breaks simply because he wants to go out. 

Can someone with experience of GSD at a similar age tell me how long they can hold and not have an accident in crate? Just so I have a rough idea? I definitely don't want him to have an accident to step back on our progress so far.



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## Pepe (Aug 14, 2013)

Oh before I forget, here's a picture of our little guy.









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## Vagus (Oct 7, 2012)

Gorgeous dog! I would say 6 hours should be alright for a 5 month old puppy, but that's from my very limited experience. There's apparently some old rule of thumb: *their age in months + 1 (I think?) = number of hours you can expect them to hold it*. I'd hear some other opinions though so you can get a general idea on everyone else's experiences


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## Pepe (Aug 14, 2013)

Thank you Vagus!

I'm going to try stretch it to 6 hours tomorrow. 

Small setback: He just had an accident in crate. Not sure whether he did it on purpose to get our attention.

The scenario is we were having dinner and we crated him. He had just had his dinner and water. This was after his exercise. So he pee'd and pooped outside already. He was whining in crate and we ignored him as our instructor told us to. After dinner, we went to check on him and he just did a tiny little amount of urine on the other side of his crate. 
So we just cleaned the crate, and put the divider back in. 

We'll see what happens tomorrow after a trial of 6 hour stretch.

Again photo of him in the park.









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## MrsFergione (Jul 7, 2013)

My girl is 6 months and she is in the crate from 10pm-730am and had been since a little after 3 months with no accidents. I think the hours by age + 1 is what I've heard also though


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## Bequavious (Mar 9, 2013)

Pepe said:


> Thank you Vagus!
> 
> I'm going to try stretch it to 6 hours tomorrow.
> 
> ...


It sounds like a excitement pee to me. Beware of its messy older brother, the excitement poo!  But yeah, when dogs get really wound up about something they tend to go. He's young, so he probably just couldn't contain himself.


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## alessandro (May 13, 2007)

Gorgeous pup, are you restricting water? 
I never restrict water from any dog/pup, if you are crating outside why not get a kennel/run


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## Montu (Oct 9, 2012)

I also used the age in months + 1 rule of thumb ..but personally found that that can even be conservative..but my experience is very limited


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## Jlmaiorana (Nov 25, 2013)

*Puppy training*

My trainer says for a puppy they will pee 12 minutes after drinking and poop 20 minutes after eating. I found this to be pretty accurate.  I notice also that my little girl will start to sniff around and/or scratch at the floor when she needs to go out.


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## KathrynApril (Oct 3, 2013)

What a handsome boy!


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## JayRo (Apr 14, 2013)

My puppy is a little over 5 months and we have not have any accidents for about a month. Generally, he is in his crate from 10:30PM-7:30AM. It is nice not cleaning up pee every morning. There is a light at the end of the tunnel


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