Goldendoodle puppy outsmarting us for going outside / coming in?

Question

Background

So we have a Goldendoodle that is about 8 months old now and has learned many things so far. She knows that if she goes to our side door, we will open it, and she gets to go to our fenced in yard to goto the bathroom. When she wants to come in she does the reverse, where she goes to the door and barks a few times to be let in. This is great so far!

First Problem

This part is good for bathroom training but she also realizes that outside = play as well so she will constantly go by the door and bark many times a day to go play outside. The actual play itself isn't really a bad thing but more of an annoyance that she will go there so often. We can usually tell based on when she eats or drinks if she truly needs to go out for bathroom or just wants to play. If ignored at the door she will eventually go find something else to do inside.

So how can we curb this so she still goes to the door when needing to goto the bathroom but not constantly all the time? Is it bad that we ignore her whens he goes there if it is just for play?

Second Problem

For the same process, if we want her to come inside (like if we are heading out or something else) we will call her name followed by "Come". She will come to the door and sit at the bottom (which drives me nuts). We have tried using high value treats to get her to come up the stairs which works about 50% of the time but now I think she may be waiting a the steps because she knows if she waits there, she will get a treat to come up. We do give her treats when she comes in by herself as well to try and show that she gets it either way for coming in. So I feel like she is a very smart dog here and am unsure how to get her to come in more consistently so does anybody have any suggestions?

Answer 1

To start, I apologize for my bad English, as I am not native and congratulate you for getting a dog with a character that may make you change your preferences i.e. you may increasingly start to prefer not to "head out or something"!

I fear that there are no solutions [vs. needs to intervene] to your [vs. our] problem [vs. dogs' behavior]

While I, as often, am too wordy, if I was limited to 3 points, I would say:

1. Congratulations for getting a dog!

2. Yes, dogs [some more than others] appear smart, and those who initially don't may eventually prove they actually are.

3. Dogs and humans have their character. I understand you saying "driving me nuts", but I hope you won't let that feeling influence the way way you treat your new family member!!!

My experience with dogs is also limited, but based on private empirical observations:

There at least seems to be some variance between how smart dogs are, or at least appear to be. We currently have 2. Both ca 15 yrs old [ages not precisely known as both are adopted]. The one who appeared smarter is unfortunately not as smart as he was at his peak. As background to the below behavioral talk, both regularly visit vets and are in good shape considering their age.

The dogs who appear to be more intelligent also may behave worse than the other dogs. But, in general, puppies do all kinds of things. [When we adopted the "smarter one", vets estimated he was 8-12 months old [At that age you can tell from the teeth]. Back then he bate [bited?] everything; I will need to check if I after a few moves can find my glasses with the tooth marks on the lenses; hopefully I won't as after he will in a few years be gone, I already have enough good memories of him. And esp the summers here in Japan are so hot that I won't any need extra dehydration through my eyes.

Here on thin ice, but, our female dog recently [at estimated age 14 years] started a part of the habbit that you described, i.e. she wants to go into our garden + back quite often. For her, at least it is not due to any physical need, so for your case, if she is in general healthy and visits vets, I think there is no need to worry. For us, the biggest issue is that we sometimes have "malfunction of the automatic door" [ref. next paragraph], as we e.g. during dinners may forget that we had let her out, and find her staring at us through the glass door.

We have put great efforts to "train" our dogs, so they know that our [manual] doors work as the automatic ones, i.e. just getting close to the door [inside or outside], will ensure that the door opens. But, interestingly, in case of a "door malfunction", the male one "knocks", i.e. hits the door, while the female one simply sits next to the door waiting until the "malfunction" gets fixed. I believe I am in general neither sexist, nor racist, but I do admit that while both our dogs are mixed race, the "smart one" is probably a mixture between a Shitzu and a Maltese (Malta dog?); both dogs which, to put it nicely, are not found on the podium after agility competitions, also for reasons other than their short legs.