How To House Train A Young Puppy

Has a new puppy just joined your family? If you are like most house-proud families your first and biggest concern is how to house train your new young puppy. The reassuring news is that dogs do not naturally soil their den. If they can they will go outside and away from it instead. Your puppy's mother will normally have taught these basic hygiene habits to your puppy during its first 2-3 months. Some dog owners interfere with this natural habit. A dog that is chained up for lengthy periods may not have the option to leave its kennel, which is why a dog should be allowed to run free several times a day to help keep its living quarters clean. To house train a pup kept indoors, the first step is to limit its sleeping quarters to a small area that is the equivalent of its "den". It will naturally wish to keep that area clean. Some people use a crate for this purpose.

You can take two approaches to your house training from that point: training your pup to hold on until it can obtain relief outside, or teaching it to use a dirt tray inside. Either way, the main aim is to have the puppy relieve itself in an acceptable place, not just anywhere in your home as if it were the great outdoors. Personally I prefer training a dog, especially if it is a larger breed, to go outdoors, but this may not be practical if you live in an apartment situation, have no outdoors kennel or you are very busy or often absent.

If you can, take your puppy outside onto grass as soon as it wakes or soon after it is fed, and several times through the day. Every 3 to 4 hours is a practical guideline, beyond which the risk of an accident rises. Success should be praised. As this becomes a routine, the pup will eventually begin reminding you when it is time for it to go outside. Once it gets the idea it will be able to let you know when it needs to go outside at other than the routine times. Expect that reaching this stage will take several weeks. Accidents will happen, and should not be punished. Rewarding positive behavior is a more effective training method. You would be well advised to have the puppy live initially in an area with a hard floor that is easily cleaned, such as in your garage or laundry.

Keeping the puppy in a run outdoors during the day, so that it will be asleep for most of its time indoors through the night, will reduce the demands on your time as its temporary "nanny" during this process. If you have a dog door giving the puppy access to the outside, train the puppy to use it when required. This is much less labor intensive for you, and speeds up the learning process. Ideally the "den" area where it sleeps should initially be adjacent to this door. Of course, free access outside should not mean freedom to roam beyond a secure yard. Access to the outside may not be practical for you. A dirt tray inside the house is an alternative. You can obtain absorbent materials to use in your dirt tray, which reduce your concerns about the smell. The tray should initially be located a short distance away from where the puppy sleeps so that it is clearly separate from its "den". Take the puppy to the dirt tray when it wakes and after it is fed, and reinforce success with affection, until it gets the idea of how to use it. Be patient. Some trainers advocate an initial paper-training stage to better communicate the idea. This is simply the use of newspaper laid on the floor as a place-to-go as an initial alternative to a dirt tray. A little "starter" urine scent on the paper from last time helps the pup to get the idea. The advantage of using paper is a broader target-zone, and paper is cheap and easily cleaned away. You gradually narrow down this area over a couple of weeks to just the dirt tray. Once the habit of using the dirt tray is firmly imprinted, you gain some freedom to move it step-by-step further away from the den or sleeping area, perhaps to a utility room or attached garage, where the family spends less time.

In effect, this means the clean "den" area is extended to encompass as much of the house as the puppy may access. You would be wise not to include access to any dark secluded corners too quickly in case they prove a temptation, should the routine visits outdoors or access to the dirt tray be disrupted for some reason. Your patience during this time will be rewarded by the house-proud habits your puppy will learn.

Shelby Wright grew up working with sheep herding dogs, and later bred and showed gun dogs. For more information on easy and effective ways you can train your dog at home see how to train dogs. Shelby also writes for another website with helpful tips on how to train a dog.