My Mother for some reason impulsed-bought a Yorkshire Terrier pup. My Mum has two adult dogs and forgot what hard work a pup can be. My Mum is not in great health, so I have taken him on to house train him, etc. I have a couple of questions:

How long did it take anybody here to house train a Yorkie, because I read that they can be difficult to house train. Also how do I stop him whimpering at night.

At night I put him in a crate. I only shut him in there at night and if I needed to go out. I don't appear too successful at that one but I have had him only three days. What is the best method to get to stop him whimpering.

As for the house training I am doing the usual taking him out every couple of hours and praising him if he does pee or poo or if he starts to poo or pee inside I distract him, place him outside and give him lots of praise.

At 12 weeks he is a baby, he misses his mum and brothers/sisters.
I know when I had a young puppy once, I slept on the couch and had my hand hanging down to the pup, done that for a few nights.
Maybe put a teddy or such in the cage with him, or a clock wrapped in a towel/blanket so that he can hear the ticking.
For house training you are doing the right thing, it just does takes time, maybe some weeks/mths.

Saying that your mum has some adult dogs, it would probably be happier being with them to cuddle.
One of my pups liked to lay right next to my oldest dog when we got him first.

Unfortunately the pup didn't come from a great breeder, so has ear mites. I wanted to take one of my Mum's dogs to be here with me for company for the pup but they can't mix at the moment in case the older dog catches ear mites.

The breeder is another story!

The problem is I can't have pup wandering around on his own so needs to be crated at night. I do sleep in the same room and have his crate close to me. I also put some of my laundry in his crate so he has my scent close to him.

You can't really just put a pup into a crate like that, it's a slow training process and takes usually a week or so to get them comfortable with it, feeding them and playing games in the crate at first, gently half close the door for a few minutes, close the door but only when the pup is ready to sleep so it's happy to be somewhere enclosed and safe.

House training - we take a very young pup out every hour, after they are fed, after they wake up, when they stop playing. You soon see a pattern of when they need to go and can then drop the trips out to those times but even then there will be accidents as you have a baby who has a tiny bladder and very little control until he/she is older.

Thanks for that. I've been putting pup's food in the crate and getting him used to sleeping in it during the day but with the door open, and also hiding treats in there. At night I've moved to the sofa. I wedge the crate against the sofa perpendicular to it so that he can't escape but I can reach down to pet him. He didn't murmur at that. After a couple of nights of that, I'll try closing the door. I underestimated that one!

This his his fourth day here and now he's stopped following me everywhere I go and is quite content now to stay on the sofa without having to see where I am every two minutes.

Personally, I don't know why you would need to crate a little yorkie.

I've had 2 yorkies, the first I had for 13 years and the one I have now which i've had for 7 years. Neither one of them were ever put in crates.

Never felt it necessary.

Because he's a 12-week old puppy and I don't want to get up to piles of poo and wee and chewed things because he's had the run of the house at night. He is only ever crated at night. Not during the day. Perhaps you decided to shut yours in the kitchen or something when yours were pups. What's the difference?

You really shouldn't make assumptions about people you know nothing about.

And clearing up poo and wee is all part of owning a puppy i'm afraid.

No need to be so defensive, I have never wanted to lock any dog I have had in a cage but I know many people do.

If you are happy with it then what does it matter what anyone else says?

He's still at the stage were he is chewing on electrical wires and I have to tell him 'no'. I don't want to get up in the morning to frazzled pup because he decided a particular wire was tasty. He's very quick to learn. I'm able to be here at home with him all day and to have him locked up during the day would be counter productive because I couldn't toilet train him properly. When he is up and about he becomes my sole focus and I watch him like a hawk.

However at night I like my sleep

By being in a crate at night he can actually be near me, if I had to shut him up the kitchen or something he would be alone.

And the other day I was up at 4am cleaning up his messes because he escaped his crate.

Knowing he isn't up to mischief means I sleep at night. I'm on my own so I have nobody to share the house training with or anybody else to watch him. In that situation, a crate is worth it.

And you're correct. Why am I explaining myself to you?

I don't know about Yorkies, but at 12 weeks they don't really have full control. My cockapoo was quick to realise where she needed to go, but if you didn't get her out as soon as she asked she would have an accident.

You are doing the right thing by putting pup out frequently and giving lots of praise and it shouldn't be long now before it starts to work.

Personally I don't like locking an animal in a cage, that is what a crate is like for them and if little one is finding that stressful it won't help with training. It's early days and they havn't had the best of starts and the disruption of having a move to another home is bound to upset it.

Pup goes in his crate last thing at night 11 pm or later and I let him out at about 5-5.30 am. He's okay with that.

I disagree with that a crate is necessarily a cage. It depends on how they are trained with it I think. I hide treats in the crate during the day and he goes in and finds them. Sometimes he will just go and fall asleep in there. The door is never shut during the day. I think the trick is to condition the dog into thinking of it as a place of safety.

Many dogs sleep during the day anyway. Pup is still asleep most of the time so it doesn't matter if he is in his crate, on his cushion or on the sofa.

Crates can be a life saver if used properly I doubt our littlest would have been happy without her little safety zone and our biggest would have eaten the flat without hers. We approached it slowly as I described and have never had a problem, now we have them packed away as both can be trusted but when we go on holiday they prefer their crates as they feel safe in them I think.

I have to say that my little Yorkie was sick this week. I'll put that in another thread as I want to relay my experiences in a dedicated thread. I had to not put the little boy in his crate and as long as he was sleeping near me he came to no harm, so I am sleeping on the sofa and he now sleeps on a cushion by the sofa, but if I tell him not to do something. He will take himself off and put himself in the crate and sulk. So he obviously like it. I covered the top of it with a throw, so that it looks like a little den.

He likes to take his teething chews in there, and quietly get on with it. He comes over and starts using my hands or feet as a chew and gets disgruntled when I tell him off.