Easiest Way to House Train Your Puppy

September 7th, 2009 at 9:23am

Bringing home a new puppy is always an exciting and fun time for the family. The whole family loves playing with the new puppy. One thing no one seems to like about the puppy though, is his using the house as his potty. Crate training puppies is the easiest and best way to deal with the whole house training process. I used to do it the old fashioned newspaper on the floor way (with predictably “crappy” results).I can tell you that the paper method beat doing nothing at all, but it was still at first a hit and miss proposition, and I hated cleaning up the misses. The dark night I stepped on one of these misses, deviously hidden on the way to the bathroom by my sneaky puppy, was the night I decided to give crate training a try.

The crate training method for puppy house training is a system that greatly reduces the number of “accidents” that will most likely happen around the house before your puppy has been thoroughly house trained. To properly use the crate training system the puppy must stay inside his crate unless someone is paying attention to him (for example during playtime, or feeding he should always be supervised). That’s because it seems that if you aren’t actively watching him, that is when he is most likely to leave a puddle or drop a bomb on the carpet.

When crate training your puppy, try to keep his crate in the room you are spending most of the day in. For someone who works at home, keep him with you in your work area. By being close to the puppy you’ll know when it is time to take him out for relief. Except for potty breaks or when you have a couple hours free for a supervised play time you’ll want to keep him in the crate-don’t let him out just because he is bored and whining .

Your puppy will always need to go potty very shortly after waking up from a nice nap, so be alert for when you hear him wake up and make some noises. Remember, after a puppy eats and drinks, he’ll need to go potty within the next 30 minutes, so don’t return him to his crate till after that occurs.If you always bring him to the same area to relieve himself and reward him for a job well done, you will be positively reinforcing him to go where you want him to learn to go.

When it is time for the puppy to have a nice break, you can feed him, play with him, and make sure he gets enough exercise and maybe a little early training that he is tired out when he gets back in the crate. This way, he’ll take a nice long nap-up to a couple hours, and he won’t be bored in his crate.

Make sure you are staying consistent with the crate training method as that is a key factor for a quicker success. If you are lax about leaving him out of the crate until he is house trained, he will surely have some accidents. You don’t want any accidents at all to happen, because once they do, the puppy will be able to smell that spot even after you have cleaned it up, and may want to revisit it again. If you find the occasional pile or puddle, do not yell or hit your puppy-he won’t understand why you are doing so. If you catch him just starting or about to start, say “no” to get his attention, then quickly lead him outside to the spot he uses. Stay consistent and positive with the house training. Like anything else, the closer you adhere to the crate training system’s methods, the quicker and better the progress you will see.

I found the crate training method worked much better than the old newspaper on the floor technique. Maybe my pup was a quick learner, but within a couple weeks or so, he was house training. The puppy whined some the first few nights, but because I didn’t feed it or give him much water before bedtime, I knew he was just bored-only let them out for potty breaks at night or they are training you to let them out when they whine. Don’t use the crate as a punishment tool-you want him to view the crate as his safe and comfortable den, and for him to have only a positive attitude bout being in there.

For your new puppy, be smart and use the crate training method for house training your little buddy. I read the Ultimate Guide to House Training from Kingdom of Pets, and I recommend it highly to you. This excellent book gives you a very thorough blueprint on how to overcome the house training hurdles new puppy owners must face(check out my review).The Ultimate House Training Guide Review.

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