Help with Lab Puppy

[Nellasaur]

So let's say the dog chews a remote and poops on the floor at the same time. A noise happens that distracts him. He checks it out. Owner is coming home. All come back to the crime scene. "Whoa! Who did this!??" *sniff* "Oh... oh that's my poo. I did this... why did I do that?" *sad puppy*

Honestly, KW, even that's still not quite right, and the only reason I'm still harping on this is because getting it right is a big part of effective training and behavior mod with dogs. The pupper isn't thinking "I did this... why did I do that?" *sad puppy*; that still implies a certain amount of associative thinking that most dogs just don't have. What the pup is thinking in this situation is "Oh that's my poo. And my people are angry and yelling. What's in the room-- poo? Poo makes my people angry, so I must never poo around them again. *sad, anxious puppy*" He's not associating the ACT of defecating with the response, he's associating the very presence of the stool with the owner's angry response. Or, alternatively, he won't be able to consistently associate ANYTHING with the owner being angry or upset, and then learns that his owner's moods are capricious and unpredictable and that he should always be afraid around his owner.

Again, that's why it's super super important to avoid showing anger and upset after the fact when destruction or accidents are found. The only thing that could possibly do is teach the dog to be afraid of either random items or locations in the home, or of the owners.