Backyard Potty Training

Most dog owners don't like it when their pets use the entire backyard as a potty area. Here’s how to teach your dog to potty in one specific area of the yard.

Backyard Potty Training
Although owners love their dogs, they don’t love the results of the dogs using the entire backyard as a potty area. Urine stains can kill grass and leave ugly yellow patches. And no one wants their kids playing among urine and feces. Here’s how to teach your dog to potty in one specific area:
Help your dog to discriminate. If your entire backyard is one substrate—for example, all grass—it’s harder for your dog to make the distinction between the desired potty area and the rest of the yard. Consider creating a special potty area with a different substrate, such as pea gravel, wood chips or, if necessary, plain dirt. If your backyard is dirt or concrete, consider putting in a square of sod.The puppy pen trick. If it’s not possible to create an area with a different substrate, help your dog to understand where you’d like him to potty by setting up a folding metal puppy pen in the target zone. Periodically put your dog on leash and walk him (or carry him) to the pen. Close the gate. As soon as he’s finished, praise him and let him out. Be sure to guide your dog to the pen each and every time you take him out to potty. Eventually, once the habit of urinating and defecating in that particular area has been established, you will be able to remove the pen.Don’t leave your dog unsupervised in the yard. If you do, he’ll have the opportunity to potty anywhere he’d like, which will undo all your hard work. If you must leave him during the day, your dog can be crated up to 3-4 hours (unless he’s a very young puppy), or confined to an area such as a bathroom or kitchen with a baby gate across the doorway, with “wee wee pads” to urinate on....
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Author: Nicole Wilde



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