Potty Training for Puppies Under 16 Weeks Old

Though puppies cannot be fully housebroken when they are younger than sixteen weeks of age, you can still get things started and begin preparing your puppy for this training when he or she has achieved the degree of bladder control that is necessary. Remember that puppies younger than sixteen weeks do not have full sphincter control and cannot hold their bladders for very long.

This means that they will eliminate frequently and will not always be able to control when or where it happens. Furthermore, the time between the initial urge to urinate or defecate and the time when they actually go is not a long one. Therefore, unless you are extremely aware of your dog's "body language" and can instantly recognize when he or she is preparing to eliminate so that you can take him or her outside right away, the odds are that elimination will occur right then and there.

This being said, puppies learn a great deal at this age and can pick up some good habits even before he or she is actually ready to use them on a regular basis. For example, you can always encourage your puppy's natural instincts for living and sleeping in a den. Wild dogs, wolves, foxes, and coyotes all have an inborn instinct to keep a den where they can sleep. This is usually a small, sheltered area that is big enough for them to stand, lie down, and turn around. A part of this natural instinct to sleep in a den is the inclination to keep that sleeping area clean and unsoiled.

Therefore, if you crate train your puppy with an appropriately sized kennel, you will be encouraging that instinct to den, and will therefore help yourself to housebreak your puppy. Because your puppy will not want to eliminate where he or she sleeps - as long as you don't make him or her wait too long before going for a walk - then you will be able to control the eliminations at night and other times when he or she must remain unsupervised. Make sure that the crate is not too big or your puppy will simply use one part for sleeping and another for eliminating.

At this age, you will likely be confining the puppy to a certain room of the house that can be entirely covered in newspapers to make it easier to dispose of the soiled areas. If you will be paper-training your dog, then you can feel welcome to praise your dog when he or she eliminates on the paper This will help you later on when you start to remove some of the newspaper until only a small patch remains where he or she will continue to eliminate.

If you will, on the other hand, be housebreaking your dog so that he or she will be eliminating outside, don't praise your dog for eliminating on the paper. You don't want to send the message that it is good to eliminate indoors. Instead, remain neutral. Don't do or say anything to your dog when he or she eliminates, and simply clean up the soiled papers and dispose of them before going about your business as you usually would. This way, you won't have started building any habits before you're ready to begin moving your dog outside when it's time to go.