How to Train a Dog to Use the Litter Box

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Ty Brown with dogbehavioronline.com. I'm here today in Riverton, Utah teaching you how to train a dog. The topic of today's discussion is teaching you how to litter box train a dog. Now teaching a dog how to use a litter box to go to the bathroom is only advisable for very small dogs, dogs that have a hard time going outside due to inclement weather, or dogs that really struggle because going outside down a lot of steps is very hard because they're so small. And so in teaching your dog how to use a litter box, there's a couple key points that are very critical in order to have success. Number one, you have to supervise your dog. You have to make sure that in the beginning stages that at all times your eyes are on the dog. If your eyes aren't on the dog, you should be using a crate while you can't supervise the dog. And so make sure that that dog is supervised so that every time he goes to the bathroom, you can make sure it's only in the litter box. The second thing you need to do is encourage the proper behavior. At random intervals, usually about every hour, every two hours, after the dog eats, first thing in the morning, last thing at night, at times like that, you're going to want to take the dog to the litter box and give him the command to go to the bathroom. When he does go to the bathroom, immediately reward him either by some praise or a treat, and then allow him out of the litter box. And then the last thing you want to do is get your dog on a schedule. Get him on a food schedule, a bathroom schedule, an eating schedule so that you can predict when the dog needs to go to the bathroom, and that you can take him to the box on time. Now after doing this for a little while, your dog will start to get the idea and your dog will start to go to the litter box on his own. And that's how you train a dog to use a litter box."