How can I potty train my dog fast?

When we welcome a dog into our home with joy, every move of the dog can touch our heartstrings. However, the dog's toilet problem often gives new owners a headache. In fact, as long as you master the right method, it is not difficult to potty train the dog quickly and effectively. ​

Dogs are born with certain instinctive habits, and understanding these habits is the basis for successful training. Dogs have a habit of tending to defecate in places that are familiar to them and have a specific smell. This is just like we humans are used to solving physiological problems in our familiar bathrooms. Their keen sense of smell plays a key role in this process. When we start training, we must make good use of this. From the moment the dog enters the house, we must create a specific toilet environment for it. You can choose a corner of the house and lay a special urine pad or newspaper. The urine pad and newspaper themselves have a special smell that can attract the dog and guide it to associate this place with defecation. ​

In the early stages of training, it is crucial to pay close attention to the dog's behavioral signals. Before a dog wants to defecate, it usually has some obvious behaviors. For example, it may suddenly circle around the room, sniff around with its nose close to the ground, or frequently walk back and forth in a certain area. These are all signals from the dog that "I want to go to the toilet". Once we catch these signals, we should immediately and gently guide the dog to the toilet area we have prepared for it. Never yell at the dog or show impatience at this time, because the dog may feel nervous and confused because of our negative emotions, which will interfere with the training process. We should use a positive and patient attitude and a gentle tone to encourage the dog to go to the designated place.

Grasping the time pattern is also an important part of training. Dogs, like humans, have a certain regularity in their daily defecation time. Generally speaking, within 15 to 30 minutes after eating, the dog is likely to need to defecate. In addition, just after waking up and after intense play, it is also a time when the dog is prone to defecation. We can take the initiative to take the dog to the toilet area at the corresponding time node based on these rules, so that it can adapt to defecation there. At first, the dog may not understand our intentions and will sniff around in the designated area and hesitate to act. At this time, we must be patient enough to wait and give it enough time to adapt. Maybe in the first training, the dog stays there for a few minutes without any response. We should not rush to take it away. Just hold on for a while. Maybe it will defecate smoothly in the next second. Once the dog has finished defecating in the designated area, we should immediately give it a warm reward. It can be a delicious snack, or a gentle touch and words of praise, such as "Baby, you are great!" Dogs can keenly feel our joy and affirmation. This positive feedback will let it know that defecating in this place is the right behavior and will be rewarded. ​

Consistency plays a decisive role in the success of toilet training. Every member of the family must understand the training plan and maintain a unified standard. If owner A guides the dog to defecate in the designated area according to the training rules today, and owner B allows the dog to solve it at will in other places tomorrow due to a momentary negligence, then the dog will feel extremely confused and don't know where the correct place to defecate is. In this way, the progress of training will be greatly reduced, and it may even lead to training failure. Therefore, communication and collaboration between family members are essential. Make sure everyone strictly follows the training plan to create a stable and consistent training environment for the dog. ​

In addition, during the training process, choosing the right cleaning products should not be ignored. When a dog accidentally defecates in the wrong place, we cannot simply clean up the excrement. Because dogs can remember the place where they have defecated before through smell, if the smell of excrement is not completely removed, it is likely to return to this place to defecate again. Therefore, we need to use cleaners specifically for pet odors, which can effectively decompose odor molecules and completely eliminate odor residues. When cleaning the dog's excrement, we must carefully wipe every corner to ensure that there is no odor residue and not leave the dog with the wrong "guidance". ​

Throughout the training process, the emotional connection between us and the dog is also deepening. The dog can feel our love and patience for it, and it will also try hard to understand our intentions and cooperate with the training. When we see the dog from the initial ignorance to gradually learning to defecate in the designated area, every bit of progress in this process makes us feel extremely gratified. Every time a dog completes its excretion correctly, it looks at us expecting a reward with eyes full of trust and dependence. This trust and dependence is the most precious emotional bond between us and the dog. Through successful toilet training, we not only solve an important problem in the dog's life, but also make the relationship between us and the dog closer.