Potty training is perhaps the most difficult thing to master with a new puppy.
If you don’t do it right, you’ll end up with a confused little fuzz bucket that doesn’t know what it’s doing and that makes messes all over your house.
That’s why I’ve added potty training to my pitbull puppy training tips series.
It’s difficult, but it doesn’t have to be painful.
4 Pitbull Puppy Training Tips to Make Potty Training Easier
Although it can be difficult, the difficulty lies with the owner, not the puppy. Usually the problem stems from a lack of proper attention to the issue, which is quite common considering the hectic lifestyles that most of us lead. If you follow the 4 tips I’ve laid out here, you should have no trouble potty training your pitbull puppy.
Consistency
Any type of training requires consistency. It’s how your puppy learns. That’s why it’s number one on my list of pitbull puppy training tips for housebreaking. You must be consistent when potty training.
Always take your puppy out first thing in the morning. If you have to set an alarm, do so. The most important thing is establishing a routine. After your initial potty break, take your puppy out every hour thereafter. In addition, take your puppy out after every feeding. Exercising consistency keeps your puppy clued in on what you want, and it limits the amount of accidents that can occur.
Reliability
Reliability is another key part of potty training, and I mean reliability on your part. Your puppy needs to be able to rely on the schedule you initially set. This goes hand in hand with consistency, and it’s another extremely important weapon in my pitbull puppy training tips for potty training arsenal.
A key part of your puppy’s ability to learn is for it to be able to anticipate what’s coming. It needs to correlate waking up, eating, and its own internal clock with taking a potty break. By getting into the routine, it can rely on you to make sure the lessons you are teaching actually happen. You CANNOT make a puppy wait to go potty until you’re finished with whatever you’re doing. It simply doesn’t work.
Reward
Another key component in my pitbull puppy training tips is rewarding your puppy’s desired behavior. When your puppy successfully goes potty outside, don’t just tell it “good dog” and pat its head. Instead, be so over the top that your neighbors think you’re crazy. Be extremely excited and animated – but don’t scare your puppy. Pet it, scratch it, ooh and aah over what it just did, and most importantly, give it lots of its favorite treat. Make going potty the best thing that’s ever happened to your puppy.
Puppy Pads are a Bad Idea
Last but not least is the issue of puppy pads. Many people mistakenly think that beginning with puppy pads will help the potty training process. Not so. That’s why it made my list of pitbull puppy training tips in this area. When you stop and think about, puppy pads are the complete antithesis of what you’re trying to accomplish.
Puppy pads encourage your little guy or girl to go potty INSIDE the house. So while you may consider them a stop-gap until your puppy learns to do its business outside, your puppy’s little mind is learning that it goes potty inside on that pad. Essentially, you’re trying to teach it to go potty inside at the SAME TIME that you’re trying to teach it to go potty outside. That’s no bueno.
Potty Training – It’s Difficult, but it’s Not
That sounds ridiculous, but follow me. Potty training is only difficult if you aren’t consistent. However, if you stay on top of it, potty training can be simple enough. It’s just a matter of watching your pup and keeping it on a tight schedule. If you follow these 4 pitbull puppy training tips on potty training, you should have a relatively painless potty training experience.
Looking for more tips? Head back to pitbull puppy 101 and start there!
Does this help answer your pitbull puppy potty training concerns? Let us know if you have any other questions in the comments!
