Should I use Puppy Training Pads
Are puppy training pads good or bad? Are they worth the money? Are there alternatives to house training your puppy. These are the questions discussed here.
The good things about puppy training pads:
- They keep your floor clean (so long as your puppy uses them).
- They attract puppies to toilet there rather than in other places.
- Health benefits before vaccination completion.
The bad things about puppy training pads:
- They encourage your puppy to toilet inside the house - with walls and a ceiling around them.
- This makes it more difficult to get them to toilet outside
- Puppies get used to having things under their paws when the pee or poo. It's called substrate preference. So, this encourages them to prefer to have padded paper under their paws when they toilet.
- Cost?
- Environment?
- Some puppies think they're great fun to chew up and destroy,
So where does that take us?
Well, the undoubted best way to house train your puppy is to get ready for them and set up a routine that means that they never actually get to toilet in the house. Using puppy training pads or newspaper introduces a further step in your house training. So first you train to use the pads and then you need to train off the pads. Why have an extra step when it's not necessary?
Are there times when puppy training pads are a good thing?
Yes, undoubtedly. If you live in a flat for instance, then it may be more difficult to get your puppy outside quickly enough. Certainly when puppies are very young they do not have control over their bladders, and they do need to go to the toilet much more often. So yes, it's certainly better to use puppy pads rather than have them toileting on the carpet.
Plus
- if your puppy or dog is ill and can't get out, or
- if there are health issues with taking your puppy to your garden
- or for instance, if you have a shared garden, or no garden and your puppy has not completed their vaccination program, then it may be unsafe to let them into areas that you don't know are safe.
For more detailed help and how to use puppy pads and other methods of house training, please see our puppy house training tips
Read more help here for when you've just got your puppy