What You Need To Know About Raising A Puppy

Opening your home to a puppy is one of the best decisions you’ll ever make. The early years of a dog’s life are crucial since they would form the basis for their future years, meaning there’s no better time to install the discipline, values, and tricks you want them to grow up with than when they are still little.

The first eight weeks of a puppy’s life will see them relying on their mother for everything. It is also the period where their senses of hearing and smell develop and their baby teeth appear. Usually, all you’d do during this period is watch their mother care for them. However, if you adopted an orphan puppy, you would need to play the role of their mother by keeping them warm and feeding them.

After eight weeks, they should be ready for their first pet visit for a check-up and vaccination. You should also have them micro-chipped, so it would be easy to recover them if you lose them.

Their house training should begin around this time. You first need to teach your puppy to poop and pee outside. To do that, you must establish a routine that ensures bathroom visits occur outside your home.

Other training, such as socialization, learning basic commands, and grooming, should also come up at this stage. Training a puppy requires lots of patience, repetition, and rewards.