House Training A Puppy Or Rescue Dog

This video is about house training the biggest concern of dog owners.

There two two concepts to house training where you want your dog to go and to prevent them from going in places you don’t want them to go.

Training where  to go is easy. You just take them to the place where you want them to go to the bathroom and at the some point they will go and you give them high praise and give them a treat.

The key thing about house training is prevention. You don’t want to reinforce them using the bathroom in the house at all and really reinforce using the bathroom in appropriate areas so the dog will learn where to go. Every time your dog has an accident in the house he is learning to go inside the house . It is highly reinforcing if they have had a history of using the bathroom in the house. They will choose the house over the yard. You will have to make going to the bathroom outside a  pleasant experience and remove the reward of going inside the house.

To prevent the dog from going to the bathroom in the house for the first few weeks you must watch your dog at all times. Any moment you are not watching your dog he may be going to the bathroom and learning to go the bathroom in the house. You must use prevention. You can keep your dog in a crate where there is a bathroom, outside where it is safe or on a leash by you. Now you can see when the dog needs to go to the bathroom. They start sniffing, you interrupt them, say to them let’s go outside, rush them outside and if they go highly praise them and give a treat. This way they will learn where to go. Most likely they won’t go because you interrupted  them and they forgot they  had to use the bathroom.. Wait a few minutes or go back to the prevention method.

Do not use punishment when house training a dog.The dog can learn you don’t like when he goes to the bathroom so when you take the dog outside on leash they won’t go to the bathroom. The dog can also learn it is okay to go when you are not present but not when you are present. So they learn it is reinforcing when you are not watching and punishing when you are watching. If the dog is comfortable around you they will let you know when they need to go the bathroom and you can take them straight outside. As the dog gets better house trained you can give more access to the house.

If the dog has had multiple accidents get rid of the things he had had accidents on. If it is something cheap throw it it away. If it is something expensive or a rug use enzymatic cleanser and clean it well.

Now next time you do training sessions do it where the dog went to the bathroom. Do tricks, put the water bowl or bed there if they don’t use the bathroom on it so they can learn this part of the living area and not where to go to the bathroom.

Also when you just get home and your dog has a full bladder take the dog through the area where they use the bathroom so that when they are in that area where they use the bathroom they can learn the route to the bathroom.

Some dogs pee more than one time. It doesn’t matter if they have used the bathroom and you have praised them that you let them loose in the house and not watch them. Some dogs will use the bathroom within a minute. This is where you set yourself up for failure thinking just because the dog has gone they will not go for awhile.The first few weeks will be very stressful. Puppies cannot hold their bladders until at least twelve weeks.

Here are some more tips. When you first begin take your puppy out every hour or two, keep notes on how many times your dog needs to go in a day. the times a puppy will most likely need to go to the bathroom is after being fed, after playing, after naps and any time there is lull in activity.

House training is possible. It just means they have less access to your house.