I feel bad when I spank my puppy for peeing on the carpet-any less violent ways?

Answer 1

Do not hit your dog!

If you catch him in the act, yell NO and take him outside. Once he's outside, all is forgiven and you say nicely "go potty".

If you do not catch him in the act, smack yourself for letting him out of your sight.

Answer 2

Adding to Nancy M: I don't want to be redundant. If you DO catch the puppy going on the carpet, you have until they stop to do anything about it. Once they have finished peeing or pooping the chance for teaching them anything is gone. If you catch them going, pick them up (even if you get peed on) and take them outside to let them finish. Spanking, tapping, and yelling mean absolutely nothing to them at this age, rubbing their nose in it is cruel and doesn't get ANY message across at all, they just don't get it. If you take your puppy out often enough (about every 2 hours until 16wks and then slowly increasing time) and confine them when you can't you won't have this problem in the first place. Also, you shouldnt let the puppy wander around where you can't watch for signs for needing to potty, spinning, sniffing backing up... Hitting, yelling, tapping will all cause the puppy to be sneaky and find a place to go where you don't see it (which can end up being REALLY nasty when you find it) and/or start the submissive urination behavior which is REALLY hard to reverse. What your doing now is not helpful at all and will only make it harder to train for the correct behavior.

I had a litter of foster puppies I got at 4 weeks old, they are about 9 wks now and thanks to the good weather we've had, are all as well potty trained as any 9wk old baby can be. They RUN to the door after mealtime, after they get out of the box and will go to the door when roaming around the house. They cry when they have to go and will no longer go in their puppy box. you can teach puppies things you would never expect at an age far earlier than what you would think but it takes patience and diligence. If your not willing to commit the time and effort, find someone who will.

Asher gave you WONDERFUL advice, that is the best way to train your puppy, and it works.

Answer 3

Yes, there are many.

You can do a simple Internet search for housebreaking a puppy. You can also purchase books from the bookstore.

Spanking the pup will just make the pup afraid of you and accomplish nothing.

In addition, a puppy is much like a infant child. Depending on the age of the pup, it does not have the ability to control it's bladder. You can crate train the pup, restrict it from areas where you have carpet and read the books on housebreaking.

I'm not trying to be mean, but spanking your puppy is like spanking an infant. It doesn't understand why and doesn't have the ability to correct it's behavior yet. You have to teach it.

Answer 4

Puppies should never be allowed out of your sight until they are 100% housetrained. It takes 10 correct actions to override one bad action. If the puppy doesn't get a chance to piddle on the carpet, they never learn that they can. If you can't be watching your puppy all the time, it needs to be in it's private area that has a bed and a piddle pad. I always take my dogs outside at least once every hour. If they are a puppy, and they piddle, they get some free run time in the house. If they don't piddle, they get to go to their private area (which is a pen in the corner of the living room so they aren't left out). I take the puppy out of it's pen and take it back outside after 15 minutes. If it piddles, it gets house time, if it doesn't, it goes back into it's pen.
Pretty much, if the puppy ispeeing int he house, it's becasue you aren't watching it close enough. No offense, it's a hard thing to do. But, as a previous poster mentioned, you wouldn't spank a baby you are trying to toilet train for using it's diaper, so you shouldn't spank a learning puppy. Dogs truly WANT to be clean, they need guidance sometimes. Think of it as teaching them where TO go, not where NOT to go.
As an aside, I once sold a puppy where the owners used spanking as a way to housetrain the puppy.... all they did was teach it that peeing was bad. They brought me the puppy screaming one day. It was trying so hard to be good that it hadn't peed in 4 days and was in agony. I asked the people to leave and I took the puppy outside, massaged it's tummy until it couldn't hold back. It peed outside and cried the whole time, looking at me as if to say he was sorry he had to pee. I praised him to high heaven and he learned very quickly that peeing in the grass got him a cookie. No, he did not go back to his previous owners :-)

Answer 5

You definately, do not need to spank your puppies for peeing on the carpet. While people may tell you to be firm with them for this, in my opinion it is not necessary and actually better not to. Here is what I have done with all of my dogs and has worked great. Just take your puppy outside a ton! Take him out everytime he wakes up from a nap, before and after he plays, and after he eats and or drinks. Every time he potties outside, give him lots of praise and a treat. If he starts to go inside, don't yell or spank, just quickly grab him and bring him outside. When he goes, praise him. When he is not supervised, keep in in a crate or small enclosed area. They do not like to go where they sleep if possible. goodluck!

Answer 6

Don't hit or spank a puppy, it isn't effective and makes them afraid of your hands. Pretend you're a mom-dog. When the pup does something really really bad, more than a stern "no" and scolding type bad, you can grab it by the loose skin on the sides of it's neck and shake it firmly with a loud, firm "NO". DO NOT do this in anger. Your goal is to startle the pup, not scare the crap out of it, and this type of shaking is what a mom dog would do to discipline a pup. You can also roll it onto it's back, again by grabbing the skin of the neck, and growl/scold into it's face. Again, don't do this in anger or rage, your goal is to firmly let the puppy know that what it has done is totally not ok and this consequence of firm scolding can be expected if it does the "bad" thing again. My pup was removed from her mom/litter too early, pups should be with their litters for at least 8 weeks to learn social skills like bite inhibition, she was dropped off at a shelter with a broken leg at 5 weeks, then ended up in an awsome refuge, which I adopted her from at 4 months. She got socialization there, but not quite what she would have gotten in her litter and has always played/bitten too hard. A few weeks ago I started biting her back, just hard enough to make her squeak a bit. That has actually been really really effective although my trainer raised her eyebrows at it when I told her about it - then she said, hey, if it's working...The biting back has to be IMMEDIATE so they associate it with the playing too hard. The funny thing is that it seems to be location specific to her. At first I did it in my car, she was really chewing on my hand hard and I was driving, I pulled her toward me and bit her shoulder. I did this three times in a 15 minute period, she hasn't bitten me hard in the car since. Then I did it a couple weeks later when she was really biting me hard on the bed - I grabbed her foot and bit her toes. Again, it took three times and she doesn't bite so hard on the bed. Recently, in the living room she was biting too hard so I bit her back on the ear three or four times...I've noticed for the last couple weeks she is being much more concious of how hard she bites - it seems to have really worked well. I've also been grabbing her scruff and shaking (firmly but not with a lot of force) when she is playing rough on the bed when I'm trying to read or be quiet. This is also seeming to be very effective. I grab, shake a couple times firmly but not roughly and say "No!". Then I let go and it's over. For the past few months I've been trying to do all positive training and avoding corrections of any kind. My pup is super active, very silly and funny and loving and playful and lots of her "naughty" antics are funny so I've put up with them but she just turned a year old, is a bit of a spoiled monster and I need her to be less rough sometimes so I am playing "mom-dog" and giving dog type corrections. It's working. Good luck, and don't feel bad about the spanking, your pup will get over it. Oh, you might want to start training classes if your pup is old enough, and pick up a book or two that are less than 5 years old on dog training/behavior. The library is a great resource for this and even has books on tape/cd. Less than 5 years old because there's been alot of progress on understanding dog behavior and psychology in the last 10+ years so anything older than that is outdated.

Answer 7

You people are all so wrong, wrong, wrong, about potty training that I want to scream - what most of you are advocating is ANIMAL ABUSE and will only confuse the puppy and make him sneaky.

When you yell or hit because he piddled he has no clue what you want - he only learns to hide from you.

Potty training takes patience, you have a puppy - a child - you weren't born toilet trained either folks - how can you advocate hitting or screaming at an infant????

Wrong - wrong - wrong.

Take the pup outside as soon as he wakes up, after every meal, before bedtime and, depending on age, every 2 hours. If he gets it right, praise him loud and long and give a treat. If he makes a mistake (and babies do need diapers because they can't control it, puppies can't either for some time), clean up and NEUTRALIZE the odor - don't just clean it, get a neutralizer. If the smell is still anywhere in the house, he will use that spot again - that's how his puppy brain works.

You really should crate train, if you can't watch him, crate him. If he's out, watch him and take him out to the same spot again and again. Praise him for doing what you want - ignore his mistakes.
That is the only way to potty train a dog for life - the screaming, hitting, and pushing nose in it makes for a confused, fearful or even angry dog.

Please get a book on puppies please, "Puppies for Dummies", great book, dumb title, but great book - lots of information on puppies and their training and it's fun to read.

Now, will all you unkind, cruel people who want to smack, push, poke, or scream at an infant dog - which is what a puppy is - get some information so you know what you are talking about instead of advocating ANIMAL ABUSE.

Please quit "spanking" that puppy, that is sheer ABUSE - and it WON'T WORK.

Learn from someone who has potty trained many, many dogs (I do rescue) or, if you don't believe me, at least get a good book on potty training and READ IT.

Answer 8

Let's just clear things up.

You NEVER hit your dog, hit your dog with a newspaper, swat your dog, punish them by dumping them outside/in their crate, rub their nose in it, scream at them, or treat them in any way you wouldn't treat a potty training child.

Dogs have accidents. That's part of having a dog. If you have a small or toy breed, the chances are pretty much 50/50 that you will ever get them 99% potty trained. Breed research and responsible breeders make this clear.

For everything else, I personally prefer the "leash" method. Leash the dog to you and watch it. Anytime he starts to do a potty dance, say "no" and take him outside. Take him out every 30 minutes. Use a command like "go potty" or "pee-pee" and when he goes, lots of love and treats. As the dog gets better, you can lighten up.

Crates will not magically potty train a dog. Potty training is done by people and can take tons and tons of time.

GL 2 U

Answer 9

Donot spank him.
If caught in the act, make a load noise and say no then take him outside to use the bathroom.

He will catch on real fast that this is in appropiate behavior.

Donot get onto him for peeing if not caught in the act, this will only cause him to regress,

Answer 10

You don't spank your dog for doing something it doesn't know how to do -- if you want to house train your dog, house train it but don't hit it for your lack of knowledge in dog training. Puppies will need to go out after eating, sleeping and playing - so take it out, when it does its business let it know it has done right and it will soon learn that this is what you want. You haven't shown it what you want so hitting it for doing what it HAS to do is inappropriate. Did your mother beat your when you went in your diapers? Of course not - there was no way you could be held responsible for doing something that you couldn't control or didn't know what was desired of you. Train the dog instead of just getting frustrated and hitting it. If you don't know how, find a good trainer in your area and go learn how to train a dog. House training is simple if you realize that it isn't about punishing the dog for not knowing what to do but praising/rewarding it for doing what you want it to do.

Answer 11

Spanking is not the way to go - crate training is the answer, and get a deodoriser for the spot on the carpet! Remember puppies have to go outside OFTEN - they are babies in a fur suit!!!!! And you have to watch them every minute just like a toddler.

Please, please dont listen to some of these answers!!! You do NOT rub a puppy's face in it! Would you do that with a child when potty training? Read some books on bringing up a puppy - there are many good ones out there. Slapping, smacking only makes the poor thing fearful. They need to be watched, taken out after every meal and every time they wake up or when they walk around looking unsettled - they need to GO. When they perform outside, praise, praise, praise. When you can't watch them, put them in the crate with a bone or chewie.