When a friend heard we were on our way home to Montana bearing 8 week old Maggie the wirehair he laughed and said, “What you gonna teach her first, ain’t much you can teach an 8 week old pup.
Well maybe…Like building a house first thing is to build a good footer and lay up a solid foundation…Mags has just been yanked away from 11 littermates, shoved in a crate by strangers and transported 4 long days and nights to a strange home (in this case the move from balmy Arizona to frigid Montana involves not only dealing strange folks, sights, smells and sounds…it’s damn cold here boss, I ain’t got much hair and…
So the usual simple operation of keeping a close eye grabbing her up, haulin ass to the yard to pee and poop is suddenly compounded big time…like upon hitting the grass she is almost instantly shivering, suddenly not all that interested in relieving herself and—no dummy she bounds up the steps to the deck and races pell-mell for the backdoor…Can you blame her? Hardly but she still needs to pee and poop outside NOT inside…So you repeat the process over and over until…
This in itself can quickly feel like a full-time training exercise but there can be no slacking off…every in house mistake is a step backwards. Eliminating mistakes entirely is the only way.
Crate training then goes hand in hand with house breaking. Why because I cannot watch her 24-7 so two things: 1) Since whenever she is loose in the house I must maintain vigilance the best way is to confine her to one room; 2) or… into the crate she goes.
Stay tuned, next up—Crate Training.
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