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Any puppy parents...
Whom can help us? So, we're first time pet owners, aside from roommates in college whom had dogs, cats, hamsters, etc, and aside from us both having dogs in the family. Our sweet puggle puppy was such a terror tonight. I don't know if it the wind driving her bonkers, but she clearly had to do her business, but was so super distracted it made her go nuts!
We just put in a grass area for her to do her business in, but she is super into digging it up, eating the grass, which plays in her distraction as well, and I know she is so young, we're just trying to figure out best practice. Any advise for anything we can do to help her focus on doing her business? After putting it in this weekend, we're thinking of ripping it out, its only been 4 days as well. We have gravel in the side yard, and she uses the gravel, tries to eat the rocks, but we're running out of ideas. DH believes putting her on a leash, but I don't think so, she needs her space to eliminate and her freedom.
We are having so much fun with her, she is sweet, but she has her crazy moments, which include biting us, whether its through clothing, shoes, and loves our toes!! Her kisses and sweet moments, and her adorable face are worth it all, we just need some puppy parenting tips, if you have any! TIA!
Here's another pic of her for your viewing pleasure, this one in her sleeping sweetness.
Re: Any puppy parents...
It just takes a lot of time and patience, especially when it's an only dog. We had an older dog to set an example for our puppy, but it still tooks months to potty train him. One thing that has worked for us is attaching bells to the door- every time we took him out potty, we would ring the bells. Now, he rings the bells when he wants to go outside. Lots of praise and repremand is good, give her treats for good behavior, a stern "no" for bad.
It definately doesn't happen overnight- it wasn't until Cash was 2 years old before we had him pretty well trained.
I certainly understand what you're going through! We have a 1 year-old Shih Tzu who is very sweet but also goes completely nuts at times. She was horribly difficult to potty train. It is really just trial and error on what will work for you and the dog.
Having her on the leash did not work at all for us, she would sniff and turn around and get all tangled in it. We lived in a 3rd floor apartment when we first got her and she could never make it downstairs, so we got this small peice of grass in a tray like thing called a "pup potty". Basically it is fake grass and it was scented to make them want to go there. We would take her out frequently and put her on it, and tell her "go potty". If she tried to run off, we would just keep putting her back on. It definitely took time but she learned. When we moved into our house it was almost back to square one, but we put that little peice of grass down in the side yard and that is mainly where she goes in the backyard. You can spray it off with the hose when it gets stinky. Maybe that is something to try? It would be much more difficult to chew up than real grass!
I definitely would not do puppy pads at all once she is a bit older and able to hold her bladder longer. They think then that it is okay to go inside. We used to leave a puppy pad for her when we left because we felt bad and she would use it, but we had terrible problems with her going in the house other times and places as well. Once we stopped leaving one for her, it was much easier to correct her going in the house.
Sorry this is so long, I hope it helped a little bit! Just know that the first year of puppyhood is really fun and cute but also exhausting and frustrating! Now that she is a bit older we are really enjoying her more and more
Good luck!!
Awe- you'll get there
Our dog, is not a grass "reliever". We replaced the grass with sand- HUGE results. For whatever reason, sand does it for her, so she has a big sand area thats bricked in that DH built for her.
Good luck!
I know exactly what you are going through. We have 2 puggles! You might want to try some of that potty spray they sell at the pet store. You spray it where you want them to go. It worked well with our little boys. Once they smelled it they would go right away. Might help her pee when she needs to. I would try to keep her off the grass for a while until it takes. When we put ours down we had to keep our boys off for about 2 weeks. As for the rocks, my boys did the same thing for a while. They would just chew on them. Drove us nuts! We would give them a stern no and if they continued, we would fish them out of their mouths (didn't want them to swallow them or break their teeth). After a while, they stopped. I would give the leash a chance, who knows it might work. If not you can try something else. I know how frustrating little puppies can be. You almost get to the point where you question your decision but you look at that little face....
It will just take patience and hardwork. But they are worth it!
We started training our boys on wee wee pads in our apartment in NJ since we were on the second floor and there we two of them (yeah we are a little crazy! Two puppies from the same litter!!). Once we moved out here we trained them to use the backyard and it was pretty seamless. It will come, just hang in there. And we are here whenever you need us
How exciting we have a 5 month old Shih Tzu, So i feel for ya!
We are doing the puppy pad thing (With newspapper on top of that) and he is reallllllly doing good with it. I noticed a HUGE improvment in the past couple weeks! Not one poop on the floor, all have been on the pad. We have moved the pad so that its next to the back door, now we are just getting ready to start training to go outside.
We go to weekly puppy classes and they say that you SHOULD put them on a leash and take them to the same exact spot each time you take them out. You also need to give the same command every time you go outside. If they get distracted, you go back inside and then 5-10 minutes later do the same thing agian.
The puppy classes are totally worth it and not that $$. I think it was $110 for 8 weeks of training. We go to a Petsmart class but there are tons out there. We are first time dog owners as well, so the class is totally helpful.
Thank you everyone for the encouraging words. It seems each day is a new one, whether a step forward or a step back! Maybe the cooler weather today, and the cold wind, is making her only do her business, then she runs to the door to be let in-she's got that down at least! Now if we can get it to work from indoors out! She hasn't done number 2 inside, fingers crossed it'll stay that way.
What I have done, till we get things sorted better, is when I know she has got to go, and is acting crazy, I pick her up and take her to where she has done number 2, that sent in her nose sends her sniffing and she goes. DH waters the grass in the evenings to make sure sod and top soil merge to grow, and it doesn't really stop her. I like the sand idea if we get rid of the grass, as well the scented spray. We've put the cabosh on puppy pads, for now as needed. We did her a pet pen, it arrived yesterday, she's comfortable in it, yet she wants to pull out the bedding. Hopefully she'll treat that like she does the kennel, meaning she won't go in there either.
We are looking into the puppy training at PetSmart, that is a serious must do for us, glad that is working for you Kirstin!
It is exhausting, but we knew this, and the reward is her affection, her cute grunts when we wake her up, her "puggle" noises when she's playing and amusing herself, her snuggles.
Always something to adjust to. Thanks again!
I haven't read any of the other posts because I'm just running through the Nest, so sorry if I'm repeating advice.
Be patient. Puppies have tons of energy and don't know how to get rid of it. One thing to do is make sure he gets plenty of exercise. If he's expended most of his energy, he won't be bouncing off the walls every minute. Also, puppies need to be reminded and hounded over and over again before they learn something.
Have you ever seen any episodes of The Dog Whisperer? I love his techniques of distracting the dog. Everytime a puppy bites/chews/does something bad, Cesar makes this loud "Cht!" sound, and sometimes touches the dog on the neck. It just distracts the dog from what he's doing that's bad, and reinforces that it's not acceptable behavior. I'm sure you're doing fine. Just keep at it and he'll get there!
Julie, Our puppy teacher actually discourages te dog whisperer method. What ceasr does when he touches them, is this weird little pinch snake bite thing, which she said is teaching the dog to listen to you out of fear, not out of respect.
When ladmo does something bad, we do do a loud EH noise and thats enough to stop him (sometimes) There is another show on animal planet with a british lady...and our teacher said her line of teaching will have the dog respect you out of love and want to listen.
Kirstin, thanks for the info. I have actually seen that other British lady you mentioned. We'll have to decide what we want to do when we get our dog.
To the OP, I think obedience school is a good idea. My family took our dog to that when he was a puppy and he really learned a lot! Such a good dog!
for potty training i usually hve the pup sleep in our bed with us. or a kennel net to the bed works too. puppies don't like to potty where they sleep. so i would feel or hear them wake up nd walk around them take them out immediatly and kept talking to them. praise them after they do their business and tke them back in. repeat this process every night and ater a puppy plays wakes up from a nap or after their finished eating. they have to pee after every one of those activities. you go with them outside and give encourgement and praise.
all my pups were potty trained in a month or two and after 2 week we never had accidents in the house.
hope that helps. as for the biting the grass give her toys outside so she an chew on them instead.