Training Your New Puppy

Housetraining

New puppy owners seem to invite advice. Everyone has a method of housetraining that works better or faster and is more reliable than anyone else's method. Ignore your well-meaning friends.

Housetraining your new puppy is not as hard as you think, as long as you follow a few basic rules. Your puppy needs time to grow up and develop bowel and bladder control. Establish a routine that works well for you and stick to it. Your puppy will progress. However, don't let apparent success go to your head, don't assume he is housetrained. Too much freedom too soon will result in problems.

One of the most common methods of training a puppy is paper training. The puppy is taught to relieve himself on newspaper and then, at some point, is retrained to go outside. Paper training teaches the puppy to relieve himself in the house. Is that really what you want your puppy to know? Teach your puppy what you want him to know. Take him outside and tell him to "Go Wee Wees" (use any command that you feel comfortable with). While he is relieving himself tell him "what a good boy, wee wees" and when he has finished give him lots of praise.

Don't just send your puppy outside and hope that he does what he needs to do. You may let him back into the house just to see him swat on the rug! You need to go with him to see that he has relieved himself and so that you can praise him for doing so!

Successful housetraining is based upon setting your puppy up for success rather than failure. Keep accidents to a minimum by anticipating your puppy's needs. When you're sat watching the television, keep one eye on your puppy. If he starts wandering around the lounge sniffing the floor, the chances are that he is about to relieve himself. Take him outside before it happens.

There are certain times when your puppy is always going to need to go outside. These are as soon as he wakes up (any time of day or night) and after he has had something to eat and drink. Take him outside straight away or risk an accident.

If you try to housetrain your puppy by punishing him for accidents that happen in the house, either by rubbing his nose in his mess (a commonly used correction) or by sharply scolding him, you run the risk of confusing him more than teaching him.

If you correct your puppy for housetraining accidents, he may feel that relieving himself is what's wrong and he might start being sneaky about where he goes so that you can't catch him. You could start finding "surprises" in strange places around the house.

Try to remember that it's not the act of relieving himself that's wrong, he has to do that, it's only relieving himself in the house that's the problem.