This post is part of the series in response to Dunbar’s 2012 Australian seminars. See index.
New puppy homes need to have a long term confinement area set up ready for their puppy’s arrival. The idea is that, by using a pen setup in this way, the puppy will self-toilet-train and self-chew-toy-train. It also helps to teach the puppy to be alone. Long term confinement areas are designed so puppies learn where to pee and where to chew, and how to be alone. Basically, a pen like this allows a puppy to make correct choices, and so be successful in achieving appropriate behaviours.
Dunbar advocates for puppy pens to be set up with the bed far away from a toileting areas, as puppies are naturally inclined to toilet away from their sleeping area.
This pen has several features:
- The edges of the bed can (and should!) be taped down to prevent the puppy chewing the bed.
- Kongs should be used to distribute food in the middle. The Kong could be tied to the edge, to prevent it entering the toilet area, or you could raise the toilet area in a litter box so the Kong can’t roll in there.
- The toilet area should be turf and as far from the bedroom as possible, as puppies naturally want to eliminate away from their bed.
- The toilet area should have faeces removed as soon as possible, but the urine should be left so that the odour attracts puppies to return to eliminate in the same spot.
- The water is near the sleeping area.
- There should be plenty of Kongs! Puppies should only be fed from Kongs.
Regarding food toys, Dunbar advocates puppies being fed exclusively from a food toy. Chewing a food toy becomes a ‘good habit’, and good habits are as hard to break as bad habits. Furthermore, the puppy will begin to think, “Why would I chew the furniture? I can’t get food out of it!”
The long term confinement area is not just for puppy buyers, but also for breeders. Breeders should have this area set up to teach puppies good habits from the get go. Here is a video showing how I set up my puppy pen at home. (Dunbar would criticise my lack of Kongs!)
It’s important that the new puppy owner has it all planned. There can not be the opportunity for the puppy to make mistakes and begin to develop ‘bad’ habits that may result in them entering the shelter at a later date.
I’m a little curious as what that grass you are using is. Are they artificial or something else? If you don’t mind, can you share with me how you’ve placed the grass and the papers so as to find out the most efficient way to place them. I only paper trained Peanuts.
And what about the poop? If there are tiny bits left, do you wash the artificial grass immediately?
Had Kongs been cheap where I live, I’d get them in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, the smallest Kong costs 5 times a regular latex toy made for dogs.
Huggies and Cheese,
Haopee
By the way, GREAT ARTICLE. Have you heard of Leernberg?
The turf I use is artificial grass, but Dunbar advocates using real grass. Poos are normally easy to wipe off of the grass – it’s only sloppy poos that are a problem. I wash the turf after about a week or so, and I have about 5 pieces of turf cut and ready to go so the pups never go without grass.
The grass is placed ontop of newspaper with papertowel sandwiched between – but with my last litter, I just used turf with nothing underneath. I haven’t decided the best way to do it yet!
Kongs are expensive, but they’re supposed to be durable and last longer than a typical toy.
I have heard of Leerberg and have read a lot of his stuff, but I generally don’t agree with him. He seems into dominance and harsh punishments which I don’t advocate.
I’m a big believer in using an x-pen for puppies. it gives them a small, safe territory to explore while keeping them out of trouble.
Although it’s not possible for every household, it’s ideal to not put a potty area in the confinement area at all. Of course that means you’ll need to be available to take an 8 week puppy out every 2-3 hours. I was lucky my boss gave me permission to bring Honey to work during house training.
Hey Pamela. In the past, I have always encouraged owners to not allow their puppies to toilet inside at all, and to use a crate when they could not watch their puppy. However, Dunbar would argue that new owners are pretty bad at toilet training puppies and we want to set the puppy up for success. A puppy pen, set up like this, means that the puppy gets ‘toilet trained’ (develops a preference for peeing on turf) with minimal effort on the owner’s part. The resounding message from Dunbar would be that your average pet owner needs a lot of help!
But your typical new puppy owner doesn’t really understand what ‘supervise’ is, and doesn’t always use crates in the best way.
For my own puppies (i.e. ones I keep), I crate them inside from 8 weeks, and they are only supervised inside, and unsupervised time outside. I’m pretty good at this.
And, for a breeder, it’s close to impossible to manage the toileting habits of 3+ puppies to ensure they are peeing outside and not inside… When one goes, you celebrate, and wait for the next, and the next… Then it time for the first one to go again! I definitely think this is the best set up for breeders, but is probably not for highly dog-savvy owners. (But for new puppy people, yes!)
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On weekdays I wake up at seven and leave at eight and am back at 3:30 so how do I do my puppies food schedual (and can’t affored someone to come in an give them food) could I give them food when I wake up and leave them food befor I go?
Hi Nora. It depends on the age of your puppy in regard to how many meals they would need, but I would give them one as you leave (at 8am), one as soon as you get home (3:30pm) and 1-2 other meals during the day, depending on their age. Some people will get their mum or dad to babysit for days where the puppy may otherwise have to go without lunch – lots of people are pretty keen to babysit puppies!
Hi,
I brought home a westie-scottie mix puppy home and been trying to toilet train. Due to the restrictions in a rental home, I would like to paper train so that she can go to the toilet when there is no opportunities to go out.
I first brought her home at 8 weeks and now she is 13 weeks. I have enclosed her in a room and set up similar to what you have done. I faced with a couple of problems enclosing in her room. The room is pretty big and I am not sure if I am giving her too much space. Most of the times she pees and poo on place I want her to toilet but there are times she would pee somewhere else.
The other problem I have is that the room is far from the living area (where all the activities happen). When I am home, I let her out with me and do as much supervision as possible. I would also do what any new puppy owner would do. I ask my puppy to go to the toilet every 2-3 hours. But sometimes, I missed out on asking her to go and she would it on the carpet flooring. There are also times when she goes to her toilet area herself without any supervision. But there are the horrible days where she would just pee everywhere. I’m not sure if she gets it.
Should I enclosed her till she is toilet trained? And how long should I do that?
I’m not sure if I have done right or whether this is normal. I would really appreciate some advice on this.
Hi Yilin,
It sounds like you may be giving your puppy a bit too much freedom at the moment. I would be taking the puppy to toilet every 1 hour and anytime she changes activities (e.g. wakes up, finishes eating, has a drink, etc). If the puppy doesn’t toilet, I would either a) confine to their long term confinement area, or b) confine to a crate. Not until the puppy has gone to the toilet in the right spot would I then let the puppy out to be social again.
I hope this is helpful.