5 Easy Steps to Housetrain Your New Puppy

You can easily teach your dog to go potty in an acceptable location by keeping a close eye, recognizing their signals, understanding their instincts, and rewarding their appropriate behavior.

1. Prevent undesirable elimination by not allowing your puppy to wander all over the house without supervision and by keeping your dog confined in a small area when you cannot observe them constantly.
2. When your dog sniffs the ground or circles around, quickly but calmly take them to the desired elimination area. Ideally, don’t wait for these behavior s. Take your dog outside regularly as described below.
3. Feed your dog a measured amount of food at the same time every day. When your dog walks away, or after about 10 to 15 minutes, take them outside.
   • Be aware that puppies instinctively desire to eliminate after eating, drinking, playing, resting, sleeping, or being con fined. These rules apply to most adult dogs as well.
4. Five to 30 minutes after any of the above activities, take your dog to the selected place for elimination.
   • Use a specific verbal cue that you want your dog to associate with desirable elimination, such as “Go Potty” or “Do your business.”
   • When your dog begins to eliminate, quietly praise them.
   • When your dog is done, praise enthusiastically, pet them, and reward them with praise immediately. Do not wait until they head for the house. If they don’t eliminate, return them to their confinement area, and take them outside again in about 15 minutes.
5. Reward each time with praise, but as your dog learns, give food rewards intermittently or not at all – enthusiastic praise of your puppy is more valuable and leads to them wanting to please you versus getting a treat.

Remember, it is your responsibility to prevent accidents! Prevention is the key to success, but if someone fails to prevent your dog from having an accident, don’ t scold the dog, and quietly clean up and deodorize the soiled area. Preventing accidents requires that you become aware of how often your puppy needs to eliminate. Young puppies (8 to 10 weeks of age) may need to be taken outside every 30 to 60 minutes.

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