Excellent Puppy Potty Training Tips
Posted on November 29th, 2009 by Geraldine Dimarco
Everyone loves a doe-eyed golden-haired puppy, who doesn’t? You bring them home and everyone is vying for the most puppy time. Then after a few weeks when you need to house train the little guy you look around and nobody is there. Yes, it’s time for the less than popular puppy potty training.
This special time will also be the beginning of many unique bonding moments you will share with your furry friend. Sure, potty training can sometimes be inconvenient, but it is small change compared to years of cleaning up the surprises your dog will leave in the future. Here are some puppy training tips to help you and your home stay poop free.
Understand that puppies have yet to fully develop their bodies. This means that you need to closely watch when you feed and water them. Meals should not come right before bedtime or expect to rise up every so often to take your dog out to eliminate. In the beginning, you will have to wake up a couple of times at night to cater to his toilet needs. As he matures and you train him successfully, he will not need to go late at night anymore. For now though, setting good habits early is the most important thing.
Schedule the puppy’s intake of food and water and follow it as closely as possible every day. You want to train his body to remember certain periods in the day when to eat and eliminate. Take him out for a walk and potty first thing in the morning and before you sleep at night. Fifteen minutes after meal times bring him outside in a designated area to do his business. As you walk around the spot keep saying a phrase you want the puppy to associate with toilet urges like ‘go potty’ until he does.
Immediately after successfully eliminating, reward the puppy with enthusiastic accolades and a treat. Play with him for a few minutes before walking back indoors. The puppy should realize that ‘going potty’ at that particular spot was a pleasant and satisfying experience for him. After an hour go back to the spot and wait to see if he wants to do it a second time. Establishing good habits is the most important thing in puppy potty training.
After setting a pattern of toilet practices he is learning to follow, you can now teach him how to ask to go outside. No, not audibly with words but with a bell. Tie a rope by the door with a bell dangling at the end of it. Give the bell a light push and say ‘go potty’ loudly for the puppy to hear on your way out for your special walks. After two weeks of doing this consistently, say ‘go potty’ by the door but don’t do anything. If all goes well the dog will nudge the bell himself and when he does, be sure to praise him well. If he doesn’t understand fully yet, gently guide him to move the bell and say ‘go potty’.
Repeat this process every single time the puppy uses his toilet privileges. Your dog will catch on and understand this as his signal to want to go out. Before long, he will know enough to tap the bell or door by himself whenever he needs to unload.
When done properly and without fail, these puppy training tips will have successfully potty trained the dog. Enjoy this moment”before long its time for another episode of you and your puppys adventure!
Geraldine Dimarco enjoys watching puppy training tips that has helped her tremendously in raising her dogs. Find great articles on Puppy Potty Training today.
