Q: I recently became the owner of a 2-year old Golden Retriever. We have been together for about a month. She is a wonderful dog. I got her from a kennel where she was bred. She had a litter in October and after the litter was born became very thin. The kennel wanted to get her into a home environment, believing that this would help her put on weight. In the month that I have had her she has put on 6 pounds and is looking great.

As I said she is a wonderful dog and has bonded with me very quickly. The only problem we are having is housebreaking. When I am home she does not have any problems. I take her out every couple of hours and when she relives herself I praise her and usually give her a treat. However, when I am not at home she is relieving herself in the home. I feel like I have tried everything, but I don't know if I am doing anything right.

I started with putting a kennel in my basement. The size of the kennel was 10' long and 5' wide. While she was in the kennel she would have no problems with soiling the area. I felt that this would be better for her than a crate, due to the additional room. When she continually soiled the area within the kennel I felt that is was not effective and I went to a crate. She did not soil the area within the crate and things were going pretty good. Although sometimes I am unable to leave work to let her out and she would spend long hours in the crate. Being something that could not be helped, I continued with the crate. I did this until she (I have no idea how she does it!?) learned or figured out how to open the crate door. I have even tried putting bungy cords on the door to hold it shut. She just opened the door and chewed through the bungy cord and she was out.

While she was out in the house I would find pillows, that were on the couch, on the floor and other small things out of place, but she was not destructive. By destructive I mean chewing on things that she should not. However, I would find that she was going to the bathroom in my basement. Usually in the same location. So, I began putting paper down in the basement, in the location that she was going at. She has been doing a pretty good job going on the paper, but sometimes misses.

My question is should I continue on my current course or should I give the crate another try or am I missing something all together? Thank for any help you can give.

A: It's a shame she can get out of the crate. Once a dog does this, she may try very hard, to the point of injuring herself, to escape from any crate you might use. I would suggest you talk to your veterinarian about whether there is any type of crate that might be worth trying. The crate would be the most certain way to help her get housetrained, but there is a certain percentage of dogs you just can't safely crate, and many of them can still be housetrained.

However, there is another possibility. Carefully treat the areas in the basement under the papers with a bacterial enzyme product such as Nature's Miracle, to make sure that area is not smelling to her like a bathroom. Put some kind of waterproof barrier (be creative!) under the newspapers to stop urine from getting to the floor, so eventually there will be no residue down there.

Then keep the area cleaned up, not making a fuss about it when you clean it. I suggest you shut the basement door when you are home, so she has to use the outside during those hours. That will help her build some bladder and bowel control. It's likely that in the kennel where she lived before, she did not have to wait to relieve herself, but could just do it anytime the urge hit. It may take her body some time to adjust.

Years ago, I adopted a 9-month old Lab/German Shepherd cross from the animal shelter, and foolishly thought he was going to become an outdoor dog during the daytime. We started by keeping him in the garage when we were at work, with newspapers.

As soon as we got home, we had him in the house with us and I think he only had one accident in the house. That was one of the first few nights, when he tried to wake us up and we didn't get up and take him out. In about a month, he wasn't using the newspapers in the garage in the daytime any more, so we stopped keeping him in the garage when we weren't home, left him in the house instead.

We should have used a crate to prevent the chewing -- but he was in that destructive chewing stage, and it sounds like your girl is past that stage. Anyway, the housetraining was accomplished, and it might work that way for your dog, too. On the other hand, you may come home to a devastatingly chewed item, so that would be an argument for trying harder to make the crate work. Be sure to supply her with plenty of delightful chewables of her own!