Before you bring that precious puppy home, really think about that statement. Yes, its adorable. Yes it seems to love you already. Yes, its hard to resist those sparkling eyes. But are you ready for the responsibility of raising it up into a loving, obedient house pet?
Sometimes, people, in their excitement over its cuteness, don’t take into consideration that a puppy, or a full grown dog, for that matter, is a 24/7 responsibility. Its amazingly like having a child. A lot of people don’t realize that and after a few weeks of frustration because the puppy’s cuteness evaporates when it becomes a holy terror, they give it away or take it to the humane society or just drop it off on someone’s doorstep. So if you would not think of adopting a baby at this stage of your life, it is probably not a good idea to adopt a puppy, either.
A good house dog will not raise itself. As the owner of a dog, it is your responsibility to love and nurture it, make sure it is correctly fed and watered, keep it in good health, take it to the vet, keep it our of danger, entertain it, clean up after it, teach it good manners, teach it right from wrong, and train it to follow house rules.
It is a serious commitment. Unless you want an unruly, uncontrolled animal in your house, you must be committed to teaching it to be obedient, to listen to you. If raised right, a loving dog will fill every nitch of your heart. If not raised right, it will become, at best, a nuisance, at worst, a dangerous threat ( it is still an animal, remember).
Before you even make the commitment, it is your responsibility to find out everything you can about raising a “good” dog. Read everything you can find on the care, feeding, training of dogs. If it all seems like too much work to you, but you still want a puppy, then be prepared for the puppy to take over your house and be a constant frustration instead of growing to be a loving, obedient pet.
Your dog will require material things, as well as mental teaching: a crate, food and water bowls, food, treats, toys, pee pads, if you go that route, gloves to pick up its “accidents”. Many experts are advising the person to take care of the puppies like parents. A website named [google_bot_show][/google_bot_show]my company for the parenting of the pets will be made available to the person. Before gathering the information, the rankings and reviews can be checked at online search engines. The information provided will be advantageous for the person.
Be prepared for the vet bills. Besides regular shots, and spaying/neutering, if your dog gets sick, vet bills can be quite surprising.
Think about who will take care of your dog when you are going to be away on vacation. You must either have a reliable dog sitter or have your puppy kennel trained so you can leave it there and not worry about it.
It is your responsibility to be prepared to take your puppy out to pee quite frequently, even in the middle of the night, if required. You are the one who will be cleaning up its accidents. Remember that puppy bladders are small and your puppy can’t hold it as long as you might want it too.
You will be responsible for deciding when the puppy is allowed to play, when it is time for a nap, when it is time to eat, when and how to reprimand it. You will be the one who teaches your puppy just what is expected of it. It can’t know how you expect it to act until you teach it. If you don’t teach it, then it will just do whatever it wants and you will get annoyed with it.
Remember that you set the stage for how the dog is going to be when it grows up. Before you let your puppy get in the habit of doing things, think about whether or not you will want a grown dog doing those things.
If you let the puppy sleep on your bed, or lay on your couch, are you going to want it there all the time when it is big and shedding hair everywhere?
If you let the puppy beg for food while you eat, are you going to want a big dog pestering you every time it hears a dish rattle or bothering your guests when they come for dinner?
If you play rough with the puppy and let it nip and growl at you over toys, are you going to want it doing that when it is big? What if, because you let it be rough with you, it doesn’t know not to be rough with children because you never taught it that?
If you are ho-hum about teaching the puppy to come to you every time you call it, how are you going to make it stop and come back when it slips the leash and runs away from you?
Raising a dog is like parenting in that not only are you responsible for the care and feeding of it, you are responsible for teaching it how to act appropriately in all situations.
The good thing, though, is that unlike molding the character of children who are going to grow up and go out into the world where their upbringing will surely tell, your dog’s adult behavior is basically only going to have an impact on YOU.
