Puppy House Training - Some Common Approaches


Question: What is the most commonly known method for house training a dog?

If you have spoken to any puppy training expert, they would have recommended these 2 approaches to you. One takes longer than the other, but both have been proven to be effective.

Approach 1 - Puppy house training from the inside.

This means that you will be starting the house training from the inside of your house. Place some papers where you want the puppy to urinate or defecate. You can use special liquids that can be easily bought from your local pet store. These liquids contain a special odor that puppies recognize naturally. They will be lured to the place where the papers are placed.

You continue to do this on a daily basis, but bit by bit, you reduce the reliance on the odor. Soon, you start moving the papers towards the door. You then place another set of papers outside the door, and encourage the puppy to go there when it needs to let go. If it's doing the right thing, remember to praise the puppy! When you see the puppy going to the outside more often, you eventually remove the papers on the inside altogether.

This approach may take a little more time and patience, but it has been proven to work well.

Now let's consider the second approach.

Approach 2 - Crate Training

This is another commonly known approach. Crate training basically means placing your puppy in a small cage. The cage should be just about the size of the puppy. The rationale behind this approach is that puppies hate to dirty their own dwelling place. So when you keep it in a crate, they will naturally try to hold their urge to urinate or defecate. When this happens, the puppy is actually training itself to control its bladder. This is important because puppies, being young, don't have very strong bladders. That is why you often see young puppies urinating frequently. Don't worry. Now you know how to house train your puppy.

Also, when you keep the puppy in the crate, try to do it within specific time slots. This is the time you don't want your puppy to urinate. After some time, the puppy will get accustomed to the time periods, and will adjust accordingly. For example, you don't want your puppy to be urinating during morning. That's when everyone is busy getting ready to go to work or school. Your puppy urinating at the wrong time may just spoil the day for everyone!

Finally, remember to use verbal cues whenever possible. Most people like to use the word "outside", but this can be confused with the command that you use for getting the dog to just go out. You can choose another word if you like, that has a more specific tone, like "out poo" or "poo poo outdoor". It's up to you what you would like to use.

Notice that we didn't mention anything about punishment? Some dog owners get angry with their pups when they urinate or defecate at the wrong place and at the wrong time. That is understandable. But dog owners must also understand that in order to train a puppy quickly, it is important to have a good relationship with the dog. There are other ways to let the puppy know that it has done the wrong thing. But you have to give time to the puppy to adjust and modify its own behavior.

To make things worse, some owners even punish their puppies the first thing they get home - even before they confirm that the puppy has done something wrong. Eventually, the relationship between the puppy and the owner becomes a sour one. That is certainly not a pleasant experience for anyone.

So always strive to be patient. Remember, remember, remember - the puppy is still young, and it's just a baby. Shower it with love and give it your fullest attention whenever necessary. Don't let a little obstacle like house training come between owner and pet. Your puppy will give you back what you have put in 10 times more.

Related Posts: