Tips on House Training your New Puppy......
House-training a puppy is simple. It consists of knowing that the puppy has to relieve themselves before they know it. Fortunately this is almost as easy as it sounds. If you understand a puppy's behavior patterns, they (and you) can be house-trained almost before you can say, "Oh rats! Did you make a mess on the floor again?"
The younger the dog you acquire, the less likely they is to be house-trained; but no matter how young they is, they probably has been paper-trained by the breeder. Paper-training begins when a puppy is about three weeks old, the age at which puppies start to eliminate spontaneously. Before then, they didn't eliminate until they've been stimulated by their mothers' licking them. At three weeks, however, a breeder usually puts newspaper at one end of the cozy, blanketed nest the puppies share with their mother. Young as they are, puppies will take themselves to the newspaper most of the time when they have to eliminate. That is how puppies, which are born with an instinct to eliminate away from the nest, get the idea that newspaper is an appropriate surface for elimination.
This idea is reinforced when puppies are old enough to start romping around out of the nest -- at four to six weeks of age -- but not old enough to go outside yet, because they haven't been vaccinated yet. By spreading newspapers over a large area of the puppy nursery during playtime, the puppies' breeder encourages them to continue using the paper for conducting personal business.
If your puppy isn't house-trained when you get them, you'll have to take them outdoors several times a day to the area where you want them to eliminate. If they're old enough to go outside on them own, don't carry them. They might get the idea that every time they has to eliminate someone will come along and carry them to them toilet.
The first trip outside should occur immediately after the puppy wakes up in the morning. Make sure they has urinated and defecated before you take them back in the house, and make sure you praise them as if them delivery were an envelope with a message on the outside declaring that you are a sweepstakes winner.
In addition to their morning constitutional, your puppy will need to go outside about 5 to 10 minutes after each meal, immediately after waking up from a nap or engaging in spirited play. Sometime while they're engaging in spirited play -- and any time they've been awake for more than two or three hours since the last time they was outside. They also ought to be taken outside the last thing before going to bed for the night and, just for good measure, whenever they begins sniffing the floor and/or pacing about in a preoccupied manner. All in all, this amounts to eight trips a day or so, some days more. Finally, very young puppies cannot defer elimination for longer than roughly four hours, so you'll need to take your puppy out once during the night until they're three or four months old.
Don't expect your puppy to urinate and defecate every time they go outside. They ought to do one or the other on most trips, however, so don't take them back in until you've given them five minutes or so to perform. If they do draw a blank -- or if your rapidly developing instinct tells you they really do have to do something but simply doesn't know it yet -- take them back into the house, put them in them crate with a toy, and try again in about half an hour to 45 minutes.
As your puppy and their muscle control mature they'll need to go outside less frequently. After they is six months old, they'll be eating twice a day instead of three times, so that's one less trip, and they probably won't have to go out right after breakfast if they has gone out just before eating. In general -- as far as one can generalize about such matters -- most adult dogs go out upon rising, around midmorning, mid-afternoon, following dinner, and before going to bed. These trips, rather than being an imposition, add an underlying rhythm to one's life.
Although dogs should be afforded these comfort breaks on a regular, set-your-watch-by-it basis, they are capable of going without going for longer periods of time if necessary. It's not unusual, as the song begins, for dogs to be left alone as many as 10 hours without incident, though you shouldn't tax your dog's patience, good nature or muscle control that often or without good reason.
No matter how frequently you whisk your new (or old) dog outside, accidents will happen, and quite often they're the dog owner's fault. If, for example, you notice that your puppy hasn't defecated on them first-thing-in-the-morning walk, but you've got such a need for that first-thing-in-the-morning cup of coffee that you take them back inside anyway, don't be surprised is they soils the floor not long after breakfast.
When accidents do occur, there's no point in making a federal case out of them -- and there's certainly no point in striking a dog, pushing them face into their waste or putting them in them crate for punishment. After all, the damage has been done already. These ill-conceived reactions do nothing to further house-training. Scolding or striking your dog only teaches them that you are unreliable and sometimes frightening. Stuffing them into them crate will make them associate the crate with negative feelings. These outcomes, as social scientists would say, are counterproductive. The secret of house-training -- indeed, of all dog training -- is to elicit the desired behavior from your dog, not to beat it into them.
Don't expect your puppy to run to the door and bark intelligently like Lassie -- one bark for No.1, two barks for No. 2 -- whenever they needs to go out. Most puppies do, however, communicate their intentions, albeit in a less dramatic fashion. Some begin sniffing the floor as if they've misplaced the key to the yard and need to find it in a hurry. Others pace in circles. Still others stop dead in their tracks and get a worried look on their faces, like the guy in the commercial who takes his wife aside and tells them that perhaps this isn't such a good time for the donkey ride into the Grand Canyon.
After your puppy has trained you to recognize these signals, move quickly whenever you see them. If you miss a signal and look up from the newspaper to find your puppy in flagrante delicto, say No or clap your hands loudly. If they’ve got enough muscle control to stop what they're doing, take them outside quickly. If not, take them outside after they've finished in case they had more than one thing on them mind.