The simplest part of house training puppies is crate training.
Do not just put your puppy in the crate and try to train it in an offhand manner, It is necessary that you are systematic and regular in doing everything when crate training your puppy.
Crate training an adult dog is not at all easy. But with a puppy, you can quickly get it to adopt the crate as its home. All you need to do is to, put it in the crate the very first day you bring it home, and keep it there.
The use of rewards is a well-tested and successful method in training dogs. This method is not only effective in house training puppies but it also works well for crate training them as well,
You have to proceed step by step when you are crate training your puppy. Here is a list of those easy-to-follow steps:
1. Buy a crate that will be comfortable and snug for the puppy. You must have the crate at home, ready to receive the puppy when you bring it home. When you eventually bring the puppy to your house, put it near the crate and not in it. Give the puppy time to explore all around the crate and the crate itself.
2. If the puppy shows no inclination to enter the crate through the gate, do not feel concerned about it. What you must do now is to place some food near the gate and give the puppy a tiny little push to get it closer to the gate of the crate. Do this every day and get the puppy closer and closer to the gate.
The puppy will soon get used to eating right next to the gate. After a few days of this practice, place the food inside the crate. The puppy will have no hesitation to go in and eat its food. Once it has done this and curls up comfortably inside the crate, close the gate.
3. Make sure that the crate you have for the puppy is not too small and cramped for it. The puppy should be able to move around in it comfortably. The crate should be cozy without being restraining.
4. It will help if you take the puppy and put in the crate whenever you find that it is feeling sleepy.
Soon the puppy will realize that the crate is where he goes to sleep. When he has got this into him, he will make a beeline to the crate when he wants to sleep or just curl up and relax.
5) Once your puppy has identified the crate as his home, you can teach him the command of ‘go to crate’ or ‘go sleep’ to make sure he gets into his crate easily when you have to stay away from home for some time
Remember, your puppy is still too small and will not feel inclined to stay inside the crate the crate for long.
Now that you know this, you can get your puppy to stay in the crate without difficulty, if you keep it the crate for just short periods of time, say 20 minutes at a time. Then gradually increase this period of keeping it in the crate.
Learn more about crate training dogs. Visit www.puppycratetrainingtips.com where you can find out all about puppy crate training and how you can do it.