# could use some advice for litter training!



## sklock65 (Jan 9, 2013)

Hey guys! So we adopted our baby about a month ago now and have been trying to litter train him. At night he goes all over his wheel which is fine by me since everything I've read suggests that they will do this no matter what as it is part of their instinctual nature.

It's when we have him out to socialize/play that we are having issues. When we first got him he would always go almost exactly 20min after waking up so it was fairly easy to make sure he was where he needed to be to go. But now he doesn't ever seem to be on the same schedule. Sometimes he goes within the first 5min of waking up and sometimes he doesn't go at all until hours later once we are asleep and he is back in his cage. It isn't always easy to know when he is about to go...sometimes he is just sitting, sometimes running around and a few times he goes as he is eating out of his bowl...no warning!!! Only once have I ever seen him walk into his litter box and use it completely on his own. Otherwise we just try to watch him closely enough that when he starts to stick his little tail out we know to place him in his box. Maybe it just takes more time (I'm trying to be as patient as I can!) but I feel like maybe there is more I can be doing to help him learn faster. Sometimes I place him in the box without warning and he will sit for a minute and then use it...so I wonder if he does understand somewhat what he should be doing in there but I'm not positive. I would love to hear ANY suggestions or feedback that anyone has with this.

We love our little guy so much but it's difficult to let him on the couch or carpet when we constantly have to clean up the unexpected and random bathroom mishaps!

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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Babies poop a lot, they grow out of it. When they're young there's virtually no way to avoid getting pooped on. Hedgehogs aren't "trained" like cats or dogs - even if they're using their litter tray perfectly while in the cage they're not going to "hold it" when outside the cage. If they have to go, you'll get pooped on. Fact of life.

Try a foot bath when you first take him out. The water usually stimulates them to go, and they'll pee and poop a few times. For an adult, after that they're usually good for a few hours. For babies it might help a little, but babies are poop machines, as with any other baby animal.

For in the cage, the best option is to put the wheel in the litter tray and position them both opposite the sleeping spot, which takes advantage of their prey-animal instinct to not go where they sleep. Some hedgehogs will never use perfectly, but in my experience most of them will use the tray 80-90% of the time with that method. But again, as babies they're messier and more indiscriminate, so it may not be used consistently right away.


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