Potty Training - Potty Training Your New Puppy
In this video we work on potty training with Fox. The key to potty training is to build on success and stay focused on your puppy. Follow along in this video to watch our full potty training routine with Fox.
Full Transcript
Hi Kat here from Standing Stone Kennels and we get this question a lot. How do I potty train my new puppy? We also get the question a lot. How do I keep my puppy from playing with all my baby and kids toys? So, we have a new puppy named Fox, she's eight weeks old as well as we have a new baby. He's three and a half months old. So, we thought what better time to shoot this video than now? So, a couple of things that I wanted to mention as far as potty training goes with a puppy. So, Fox is eight weeks old and we actually have been struggling a little bit with potty training with her and that's due to a couple of reasons. First of all, when we came home with her from the breeder, she um, wasn't used to going outside in the cold because she was up from Wisconsin where it's really cold out and she came home to here where we were having a blizzard and it was really cold.
So, she was going out to potty but didn't want to go out for very long. So, that was one issue that we were running into as well as, um, like I mentioned before, we have a new baby. So, slightly distracted when she comes inside, she's running around, you get distracted by a baby or a phone call, you turn around and there she is pooping on the floor. So, believe me, it happens to everyone and they are puppies and it's not necessarily a good thing but it is to be expected. A couple accidents will happen. So, now we are going to try and set Fox up for success as well as ourselves up for success. Um, if she continues this conditioning process of I go outside I pee, I come inside, I poop, then we're going to have this problem, um, for much longer than just the few weeks while we get adjusted to our new, um, house her new house and our new routine.
So we're not going to let her condition this behavior any longer, which is going to make us have to come up with a more structured routine. A couple of things that we're going to do is, one, we're going to monitor when she eats and when she drinks. Um, usually what goes in fairly quickly has to come out with a puppy. So during breakfast she gets an opportunity to eat and drink. Then we need to go out and go potty right away and we monitor what that looks like. If she goes out and pees a giant lake, most likely she's going to have to go potty again fairly soon. Um, if she goes out pees, a huge lake, you come in, you play around for a little bit, goes out and peas just a little bit. She's probably about to the point where she's emptied her bladder.
So that's definitely something to keep in mind is monitoring when they eat and when they drink, that's going to coincide with when they need to go out and potty. Another thing that we're going to do to set Fox up for success is every time she comes out of her crate we go outside to go potty. That means whether she's napping, whether she's been in there for just a little bit after playtime, anytime she comes out of that crate, we go out to potty. Even if she's only been in her crate for a few minutes, and I'll explain why she may only be in her crate for a few minutes here in a minute. So,, that's another thing to keep in mind. Every time she comes out of her crate, she goes out and goes potty. Then the next thing I mentioned, hey, we've got a new baby and life happens and you get distracted.
So, it's really easy to lose track of time. And like I mentioned before, puppies have fairly small bladders, so they're not going to be able to hold it for very long. So in order to set her up for success, we're going to actually set a timer. I'm going to start with about 15 minutes. So, she goes out, goes to the bathroom, comes into play. I set the timer for 15 minutes, then it's another potty break and we're going to eventually be able to extend that amount of time longer and longer. But while we're trying to fix some of these naughty pottying in the house habits as well as her bladder is still developing, we're going to set it for a fairly short amount of time as well as that will allow us not to get distracted and forget that we haven't taken her out for a little bit of time.
So, those are some main things that we're going to do to help build on this potty training and build success with Fox. Next we're going to talk about playing with puppy toys and baby toys. And I will have a great opportunity to explain some of that here in a minute because I know as soon as we go out and go potty, she's going to come in and want to start playing with some of those baby toys that we've got out. So, I will explain that in a minute. So, first we're going to get her out of her crate to go potty. Um, it's important too that your puppy comes out and goes outside on their own, if at all possible. That way they can learn where they need to go to show you that they need to go potty. So, come on Fox. Good girl. Come on. Wake up this way. So, I'm going to get her attention. Good girl. And we're going to go to the door to go outside. Come on.
Come on baby
Good girl. So we're going to help her go down the stairs.
Fox! Come on, come on baby. Come on.
At a girl. She's doing the stairs by herself, which is great. We're going to ask her to go potty.
Good girl. I didn't want to distract her while she was going potty though. Good.
Come on in. Come on.
So, I didn't want to distract her when she was going potty by telling her good girl. I wanted her to fully empty her bladder before I said anything to her. But I did want to reward her for doing a good job and going potty outside because if you distract them, she may not fully empty her bladder. So, we're going to come in here and I'm sure that she's going to see some of the baby toys that we've got out. Come on girl, come on in. She usually, usually runs right for some of the baby toys. Hey Baby.
Good girl. But we're inside. I'm going to set my timer again. I almost forgot. I almost got distracted because I'm talking to you guys and I'm starting my 15 minute timer.
And now we've got the puppy toys or the baby toys. So, she immediately grabs a, baby toy, which is not to be um, unexpected. Like I mentioned, that's probably what she's going to do. At a girl come here, Fox. So, first things first, I'm not going to get mad at her. I want her to be a great little retriever when she gets older and I don't want her to think that she can't bring something to me or she's going to be in trouble or um, that she's doing something naughty. She doesn't know the difference between baby toys and puppy toys. So, I am going to pick up the baby toys
Come on.
Which is what we recommend. Pick up the baby toys, get them out of the way when it's puppy play time.
Then we're going to go get the puppy toys.
Here ya go. Good girl.
So we got a whole pile of puppy toys out here for her to pick and choose from. These are all things that are okay for her to play with.
So, we're going to let her play with these. If she goes after another baby toy that I might've missed getting picked up, I'm going to trade her. Basically give her one of the puppy toys that it is okay to play with. But I just wanted to show you this as an example. So, this, this little guy right here, isn't he cute? This is a baby toy. It crinkles like a puppy toy. It's plush like a puppy toy. There's no way that this is a realistic expectation of Fox knowing that this is not an okay toy to play with. And this one that also crinkles and is plush is a puppy toy and is okay to play with. So, have realistic expectations. She's a puppy. She's not going to know the difference between a baby toy and a puppy toy that are almost exactly the same.
So, don't get mad at your puppy for playing with kids and baby toys. Pick up the baby toys if at all possible. And um, get the puppy toys out when it's puppy playtime. Now Aiden's really small, still. He's only three and a half months old, so it's definitely, um, something that he's not scattering his toys all over the place yet. He's also not moving around much, so he's not playing with the puppy and the puppy's not playing with him yet, just because I don't want her to accidentally hurt him. With her sharp little puppy teeth or nails because he is pretty little still at this point. So, I'm going to go put this little baby toy up.
But giving her the opportunity to play with the toys that we do let her play with is good. So she's got all these options. Oh, so exciting. And this is just pretty much free play time. We're not doing any training sessions. Um, puppies need playtime as well as training time. So, right now we're just playing and watching her because even though she has just gone out to Potty, there's an opportunity that she might need to go again or she might need to poop. Even though I know she's recently gone to the bathroom, um, outside pooped outside. So, we should be okay for the time being. Um, but again, I want to be paying attention and not saying, oh, you'll just play in here and I'll go fold the laundry in the bedroom or I will go work on the computer because I'll be distracted. And it's important that we're conditioning good behaviors in the house, whether that's not going potty, um, or not chewing on things that she's not supposed to. And if I'm not here to watch her, I'm not able to redirect her focus to something that she does need to be doing. Um, instead of chewing on the leg of the coffee table or something. So paying attention to her while she is out is important. I understand. Life happens. Our life happens. It's easy to get distracted and stop paying attention even for just a minute. And that's when sometimes those potty accidents or naughty behaviors happen.
Now she is just an eight week old puppy. So, we haven't worked a lot on any other training yet. Um, but people ask a lot of times, am I going to have to keep picking my baby toys up forever? Well, not necessarily. Um, it's always nice to eliminate some of those distractions for a puppy, but as she gets older and our expectations increase for her, you won't have to pick up all the baby toys all the time. She'll be able to go lay on her dog bed, place training. We'll teach her how to do that first with a clicker. Then we'll condition that using um, the caller to caller, condition her to stay on a dog bed so that when she comes out and is part of the family, she can just go hang out on a dog bed while Aiden would be out playing with his baby toys, crawling around, walking around, that sort of thing, which are all things that we're definitely going to have to work on.
Um, not only do we have to puppy proof some things, but when Aiden starts moving around, we're definitely gonna have to start baby proofing some things in this house, so things to look forward to. But she's just playing and I can play with her. Do you want to play with this one? Oh yeah, yeah. Oh, watch my hand girly. So, she grabbed my hand instead of the toy and she does have sharp puppy teeth. It was an accident though. She was gone for the toy so we can play a little tug. At a girl, a little bit of tug. Good puppy, good puppy, good. Give her some attention and love. You're the star of the show there Fox. What do you want to do?
What about this one? The duck. The duck is a favorite. As you can see. It's um, been through a few puppies. There's definitely some wear and tear on it, but it's still a good toy. Yeah, yeah, good job, oh yeah. Good job, good. So, we do play a little bit of tug with our puppies. A lot of people say, hey, I've heard that tug of war is a bad thing to teach your puppies, especially if you've got a bird dog, um, that they're gonna fight you for birds and things like that. This is not something that we've experienced really a puppy that doesn't want to give up birds, but we've noticed that playing tug can build a really strong natural hold with our puppies as well as puppies want to play that game with you. They want to play this tug game. She's having fun and this is definitely a game that she can't necessarily play by herself.
So if she wants to play this game with us, she has to bring the object back to us, which can help with retrieving. So ready? Go get it. At a girl, she was like, maybe I'll just pounce on it over here. Come on, bring it here. Good girl. Good girl. Yeah, good. So, we can start building on some of the behaviors that we are going to out of our puppy as they get older. Um, everything that we want our puppy to do as an adult, we can start developing. Some of those behaviors as a puppy, which includes not biting, not going to the bathroom in the house, not jumping up on us. And um, even some of these retrieving behaviors in a young puppy like this without it being necessarily a structured training session.
At a girl. Good, good girl. So I'm just opening her mouth because I can do that pretty easily as a puppy to get the toy out. Good. So that we can throw it again. Throw it again.
Good. Good puppy. Good Fox. Good, yeah, yeah.
Tug a little bit more. Ah, rolly polly. Good girl. Good girl.
So I'm going to let her play a little bit more with her toys. She's so excited about playing with her toys that she hasn't even noticed that Aiden is napping in his baby swing. But she's being a good girl just hanging out, playing with her toys. While she's playing, I'm going to go ahead and grab some water, but I'm still gonna keep an eye on her.
She thinks she's going to follow me. Fox!
So if she tries to get distracted or go someplace that, um, I can't keep an eye on her. I will go ahead and call her back to me.
Yeah.
Distracted by the camera man. You're a silly little puppy, aren't ya?
Good girl, good.
We also have some little treats for her if she wants to lay down and chew on one of those. She can. These are just some small puppy size pork champ treats.
Fox! Hey pup, pup, pup.
She's like, oh and I'm distracted by my puppy toys again. She's not ready to settle down. I thought she might be, but she can play with her toys, but I've got treats in case she decides that she does want to lay down and chew on a treat.
Oh, you're crazy.
You found a squeaker in that one, Huh?
How about we play with this one? It doesn't have a squeaker. Good, good girl. Good girl.
So, we try and play with puppy toys that don't necessarily have squeakers in them. Which is really hard to find puppy toys that don't have squeakers. This one I found, actually at Walmart, I can't find it anywhere else. But it has a rope toy that runs through it and a bunch of crinkle material and it's got a plush head, but absolutely no squeaker. When I find them, they don't always have them at Walmart, but when I find them I ended up buying as many as they have on the shelf because we go through them pretty quick with all these puppies. And it's nice to have them on hand because most other toys do have squeakers and we try and avoid letting puppies squeak on the toys because we are trying to develop hunting dogs. That... Birds squeak, just like some of these toys squeak. And if they get in the habit of squeaking their toys and realize that bird squeak, they can become a little bit hard mouth when it comes to retrieving. So, if she starts finding that squeaker every time she gets that toy and is squeaking it, squeaking it, squeaking it, she's conditioning that behavior. So, at that point we would actually take away that toy. There's our timer, so that means it's time to go out.
Come on Fox. Let's go. You're going to bring your toy with you. Come on, let's go. Come on. Bring it with then.
I'm actually going to take her toy while we go outside so that she's not distracted and then we're going to go out.
Come on. Go potty.
It's super windy out today.
Go potty.
Good girl Fox. Good girl. So again, I didn't distract her while she was going potty. Come on. Good girl. Didn't distract her while she was going potty so that she could take care of all her business outside. And we're off to inside play again. Lots of toys to play with.
Again, set your timer for another 15 minutes so that you don't get distracted. Fox... pup, pup, pup, pup, pup.
Fox. Hey, hey,
The camera person is super distracting. That would be Ethan because he looks like what he's got is a lot of fun to play with to. Rolly polly on her pile toys.
So if she starts chewing on the couch cause she was right there chewing on her toys. I'm going to try and redirect that, focus back to her toys and not let her chew on couches because couches are not puppy toys and they should not even be able to be confused as puppy toys. Where as baby toys sometimes can.
Good girl. Play a little tug. Good girl, good girl. Good.
Not the most graceful, but she is a puppy for sure.
So, while she's playing I just wanted to take a second and thank you guys for watching our videos. Thank you for asking us questions. We love providing information that can help you work with your own puppy or your own dog at home. So, thanks for following along with Fox's new puppy training series. We're going to be giving away a lot of great giveaways. Um, our last video we gave away some nail clippers, uh, and some appropriate puppy chews and treats this video. I think it would be appropriate to give away maybe a toy because she seems to be having so much fun playing with her toys inside. So, we'll definitely be giving away a toy with this video. So, make sure to like, share, comment, and subscribe to our youtube channel for more opportunities for these giveaways. Um, good girl good. Get some attention. Ah, ah. No biting.
Good.
And as always, our videos are available for our Patreon members first, and then they will become available on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube after that. So, go ahead and check out our Patreon community.
It has a lot of great opportunities to become more involved with some of the training through video exchanges as well as you can ask us questions. You can follow along with other people's videos and see what they're doing and how you could be doing some of your training sessions with your puppy. Somebody might even ask a question that you didn't even know you had. So, it's a great way to not only learn from us, but to learn from others as well. So, remember to like, share, comment, and subscribe to our videos for more great content and for your chance to win a lot of great prizes.