Dog Obedience Training - Housetraining Your Puppy

I don't doubt that within a few hours of bringing your new pup into your home you will have a puddle on your carpet. To stop this quickly, use dog obedience training methods from the very first minute, along with the use of a crate and a confinement barrier.

You should never use violence on your pup to train him to do your will but I am going to tell you how I use the traditional rolled up newspaper. Take around 6 to 10 pages from a newspaper and starting at one corner, roll the newspaper into a tight tube. Holding the tube in one hand lift it into a striking position, up behind your head.

Now, with a flick of the wrist, hit yourself repeatedly, in the back of the head and say "I was not watching the puppy - I was not watching the puppy - I was not watching the puppy". That is as close as you need to get with physical violence in relation to your puppy.

The most important thing to remember is that pups need to pee as soon as they wake up and will generally poop soon after eating a meal. Get these two points right and you are well on your way to housetraining your pup.

First recommendation is that you need to have bought a dog crate before the dog comes home. A crate is a place where the pup will feel safe and where you should be making him sleep. Dogs will seldom mess in their beds. However pup's bladders take around 4 months to develop and for the pups to get some control and that means you may have some accidents in the bed in the first few days.

As long as you wake up early and get the pup outside immediately, the accidents will stop very quickly.

Bear in mind that you have taken the pup out of his birth home and away from his mom and his siblings. Getting the pup to sleep in the crate at night will help him settle in quickly as the crate becomes a safe place. If you sleep with the crate next to your bed, when the pup frets badly for the first couple of days, you will be able to put him at ease quickly and easily.

If there is going to be someone at home with the pup during the day, have a good game with the pup to tire him. Let him stop huffing and puffing before giving him his breakfast. If you feed any dog immediately after strenuous exercise, you have a good chance of ending up with stomach torsion.

You can stay outside with the pup, let him explore and investigate his world, but watch him and when his breathing is calm, feed him, and then, as soon as he is finished eating, take him outside again, and wait for him to poop.

Now put him in the crate and put the crate in an area where the pup can see you. He will settle down and go to sleep. When he wakes up, you will be able to release him from the crate and take him straight outside to pee and have another good game to tire him.

You are going to have accidents. Without a doubt. Simply because you will not watch your pup 100% of the time, and because when he goes outside, he may be over excited and he will not totally empty his bladder.

Until he has gained some control of his bladder at around 4 months old, I recommend you use the crate when you want the pup constrained, perhaps when you go to pick up the kids at school, or pop out to do some grocery shopping. At all other times you might use some form of barriers to keep the pup contained in an area that has floors that are easy to clean, such as the kitchen, whenever he is not in his crate. If you put newspaper on the floor, this will help with the clean up.

I mentioned that you should start using obedience training methods on your dog and the training method I recommend is the use of a clicker which you use to tell the pup he has just done the right thing by toileting outside. You need to introduce the pup to the noise of the click as quickly as possible.

Using shaping, along with the click and treat system, to teach your pup that toileting outside is the right choice, will very quickly teach the pup to listen for the click to tell him he has done the right thing.

What you are now achieving is a dog that gets a click and reward for toileting outside but does not get any reward if he pees inside. How quickly do you think he will start going outside?

Combine this with the crate, along with the confining barriers, and being very aware and observant, and in no time at all you will have a house trained pup.

Nev Allen has been training dogs for 30 years and wants to help you to make your puppy a good canine citizen. If you want to understand all that is involved with dog obedience training, clicker training and dog ownership then you can read articles and watch videos about these fascinating topics at http://dogobediencetrainingblogs.com

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