Saucy Pet

Posts Tagged ‘How To Crate Train Your Puppy’

Bringing home a new puppy is always an exciting and fun time for the family. We all love playing with the new puppy. I know the one down side of a new puppy that no one likes-cleaning up after him. Try using the crate training method for house training your new puppy-it is definitely the easiest and best way. 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. One dark night on the way to the bathroom, I stepped right onto a steaming accident my puppy had just deposited quite distant from his newspaper, and made up my mind to buy a crate the next day.

If you use the crate training method, you won’t have nearly so many opportunities for “accidents” to happen prior to completely house training him. When I first started hearing about crate training puppies I thought it seemed sort of cruel to keep the puppy in a kennel most of the time .You are asked to keep your new puppy inside his crate all the time unless you are actively supervising him-such as it’s playtime  or dinner time or time for some training. I have found that if I don’t supervise  my puppy pretty closely, I’ll be giving an accident an opportunity to happen. I learned that instead of feeling sad when I put my puppy in his crate, he felt comfortable and secure in his little den.

When crate training your puppy, try to keep his crate in the room you are spending most of the day in. If you work in a home office, for instance, place the kennel in the office with you, so your puppy feels more secure.  You can also keep an eye and ear open for any whining that might indicate it is time for a potty break. 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 .  You can be sure he will need to have a bathroom break after he wakes up from a nap, so listen for sounds of activity in the crate, and be ready to take him out to his spot.  Remember, after a puppy eats and drinks, he’ll need to go potty within the next 20 minutes, so don’t return him to his crate till after that occurs.Training him to use the same area you have determined as his spot every time you take him out reinforces the idea of going then and there.

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. The key to making the crate training work best for your puppy is to be very consistent with the training. It is very likely that you’ll find some accidents happening if you don’t keep him in the crate unless he is supervised. 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 happen to see your puppy about to squat, try to stop him with a firm “No” command, and take him outside to the regular spot.  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.

After using the crate training method the first time, I could tell it kicked butt on the  old fashioned newspaper technique. I was happy to see that within a couple weeks, more or less, my puppy already had the idea and was pretty much house trained already.  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. If you always make the crate seem like a den, rather than a place to put your puppy when you are mad at him, he will have a good attitude about going in there, and you shouldn’t have the whining problem some puppies have when in the crate.

So, if you are about to get or just got  a new puppy you will be smart to use this crate training method for house training your new pet. I read the Ultimate Guide to House Training from Kingdom of Pets, and I recommend it highly to you. This book is a very complete course on house training and caring for your young puppy-check out my review to see if you might want to get it .The Ultimate House Training Guide Review