How To Get The Perfect Poodle Puppy: Basic Training Tips

Poodles are lovable, cute to look at, highly intelligent, and diverse when it comes to their breeds. We have to admit, who wouldn’t want to own a poodle?

If you’re like us, just looking at a poodle and its characteristics can make it tempting for you to get one to become your new family member.

However, just because they are lovely to look at and loveable is not a sufficient reason just to purchase a poodle . 

The truth is, you have to commit to a lot more time and effort than that to raise a poodle puppy.

You have to be willing to learn and have a large amount of PATIENCE.

Why Patience?

We say patience because, just like all dogs, you must devote your effort to training your poodle puppy and teaching it obedience lessons.

What is the training timeline for a poodle puppy?

To be honest, if you get a poodle puppy, you will have to teach it different training methods at a certain age. For this reason poodle puppies come in a range of breeds and sizes; therefore, they can reach different developmental milestones at certain ages. 

To give you a better idea, we’ve broken down the training timelines for toy and miniature poodles and standard poodles. 

4 weeks – At this age, this poodle puppy breed should start to have a supplement in addition to their mother’s food. They may find it difficult to eat puppy food straight away at this age, so it’s best to soak the puppy food in goat’s milk or water to make it easier for them to digest.

8 weeks – Toy and Miniature poodles should be fully weaned off milk and be switched over to kibble. The puppy is getting used to being touched on her ears, feet, and body. When the puppy bites, you should begin redirecting him to a toy.

12 weeks – This is an ideal time to bring this breed home, and ideally, you should start grooming from this age. You can brush their hair and trim their nails if needed to prevent your poodle puppy from scratching. Similarly, grooming them at 12 weeks will help them get used to the experience and prepare them for grooming later on. Your pup should start learning some of the basics like sit, down, and stay, in addition to introducing you pup to the crate.

16 -18 weeks – Once they’ve had all of their vaccinations, you should take your miniature or toy poodle puppy to a professional groomer. You must do this, as they will inform you of the right trims for your poodle puppy. Assuming your pet has gotten all their vaccines, it’s time to get your dog outside to work on some socialization and staying calm around distractions.

How do you become successful at puppy training?

If you are training your poodle puppy, make note they won’t be fully trained overnight. Training a poodle puppy takes time, effort, and training. But during this process, you can do a few things to help fast track your success.

To begin your training, you need a secure area where you can monitor and supervise your poodle puppy. It’s not recommended you put your puppy in a crate to train and monitor. 

Instead, you should give them a canine playpen; this will allow them to roam around in an ample amount of space and helps keep control of their mess. Similarly, it allows you to keep organized with food, water, and toys in one place.

One of the important things you should do is have tasty treats for your poodle puppy to hand. This allows you to quickly praise your poodle puppy when they’ve done good behavior. 

Similarly, it’s best to have two suitable phrases to address your poodle puppy with. The first phrase should be associated with good behavior, such as “Good boy/Good Girl.” Likewise, the second phrase should be linked to bad behavior, such as “oh no.” 

You must dedicate a good amount of time to your poodle puppy during the training stages. Not all poodle puppies are alike; they all have unique characteristics and needs; therefore, it may take longer than you expect. Therefore, have patience, bring a chair, read a book, check your email, or anything else.

Whenever you’re training your poodle puppy, be ready with supplies. For example, if you need to take it outside and it’s raining, have a waterproof jacket or an umbrella to hand. Similarly, if you’re outside and needs to go to the bathroom, have a back to hand to pick up its waste.

Finally, when you’re training your poodle puppy, you must stick to a schedule to train them. This not only helps you manage your life, but it also helps your poodle puppy to develop a good routine. Just like you stick to the same feeding times, develop a specific routine for obedience training, toilet training, and more.

What is the first training technique you should teach your puppy?

One of the very first things you should teach your puppy is its name. It’s essential your puppy is aware and knows its name before you can begin any further training. 

A good way to begin practicing this is calling your poodle puppy by saying its name, looking at it, and gesturing for it to come towards you. When you call your puppy, use a calm and warm voice. Once your puppy comes to you when you’ve called them, reward it with a treat.

When should you start with potty train?

We can all get dogs at different times in our lives, and we can also bring puppies into our home at different ages. First of all, if you plan to bring a new poodle puppy to your home, it should be no younger than 8 weeks. 

Any poodle puppy younger than this may lack the proper socialization skills they’ve learned from their mum, won’t be as healthy and be harder to train.

Now, once you have your poodle puppy home and it’s a healthy age, it’s time to think about potty training it. To be honest, it’s often recommended by experts that you start training your poodle puppy any time between the 12-16 week period. However, as a dog owner, you won’t have anything to lose if you start training it before there.

The reason experts recommend this time frame is by that age, they will have the capacity to take control of their bladder and bowel movement. Similarly, this is the right age for the poodle puppy to learn how to hold their bladder.

Do note, if you want to toilet train your puppy outside, it’s best you do so after it’s had its full course of vaccinations. 

What methods can you use?

Getting a poodle puppy is an exciting time for all family members. Yet it can be nerve-wracking as you want them to be trained and have good behavior from an early age. 

While training a poodle puppy certainly involves a lot of trial and error techniques, there are a range of them you can choose from to do so. To help make raising your poodle puppy easier, we’ve curated some options for you:

Positive Reinforcement

Just like humans, dogs respond and learn better to praise as opposed to punishment. One excellent way of training your puppy is providing them with a treat once they’ve done good behavior. Keep repeating this form of training, and over time, your poodle puppy will automatically do this good behavior as they’ll expect it with a positive thing, a treat.

Bell Training

This method of training is particularly helpful when your poodle puppy needs to go to the toilet. In this training method, a bell is installed next to the door, and you train your poodle puppy to tap the bell when it needs the toilet. Over time your puppy becomes conditioned with ringing the bell to let you know when they need the bathroom.

Pad training

This is another potty training method involving puppy pads placed over your home. The pads are designed for your poodle puppy to go to the bathroom on them. This allows your poodle puppy to become familiar with going to the bathroom in a certain spot, and it enables the transition to outdoor training to be easier. 

Crate training 

Simply by purchasing a suitable crate for your poodle puppy. What a crate does is that it allows your poodle puppy to familiarise itself with a specific location and feel like it has a safe space. A crate can teach them how to be on their own such as sleeping and teaches them basic techniques to use a bathroom. There is some training you can do with the crate right away like the “crate” command, stay in the crate with the door open, prolonged downs in the crate, and “wait” out the crate while the crate door opens.

Final Thoughts

Poodles are lovely to own, and poodle puppies are irresistibly cute. If you are to own a poodle puppy, though, you must have the time and patience to train it. Not all poodles are the same, and it isn’t an overnight process.

You can use a few techniques to train your poodle puppy by using positive reinforcement, crate training, pad training, and bell training. We recommend trying a few of these as a form of trial and error, which will help them grow, learn the right behaviors, and mature.

Make sure you’re prepared, stick to a routine, and give your poodle an ample amount of space. Overall, Poodle puppy training is hard, but it’s incredibly rewarding and worthwhile to have an obedient poodle in your home.