Expert: Jill Connor, Ph.D. - 1/2/2008

Question
I have a bijon (sp?). He is about 1 year old. I have successfully crate and house trained him and he almost never goes to the bathroom in our large kitchen area which has a perimeter invisible fence. I keep him on a regimented schedule.

Occassionally we let him roam the rest of the house or he escapes the perimeter and does not have his invisible fence collar on. Left unsupervised, even for a moment, he invariably poops (even if I have just taken him out and he has gone to the bathroom).  He often poops in somewhat out of the way places but it is repetitive. I don't scold him when he does it.

Any thoughts???

Answer
Your dog appears not to be housetrained.  Your "invisible fence" perimeter is a strong aversive ingredient.  Instead of being rewarded for eliminating "appropriately", he is effectively being prevented from marking his territory, which is (when he is loose in your home) within his immediate sight.  "Pooping", when biological urge is not the main ingredient, is "marking".  The fact that he does it in "out of the way places" might mean (I have no way of questioning you) that he has been "corrected" -- either verbally or by the shock collar -- from doing it "inappropriately."  The trick of housetraining is not to eliminate the dog's inappropriate toilet behavior in your home.  It is to reward the dog's appropriate elimination OUTSIDE your home, every single time.  Confining a dog to the kitchen, outside the rest of the "pack's" living areas, with the use of shock aversive tools, is inhumane.  The Bichon Frise, although visually a powder puff companion, is actually quite a tough, independent and (can be) dominant little dog.  He needs to be part of your household.  You need to retrain him using positive reinforcement whenever he eliminates outside and put him on house tab (lightweight nylon lead) when he is in your living space with you and the family, so you can interrupt any inappropriate elimination he begins and take him outside where he can be appropriately rewarded.  Dogs are NOT solitary animals.  They need their people.  There's no excuse for obtaining a dog and then confining him in isolation, wearing a punishing aversive object when he attempts to join the rest of the family.