1. Caring for your new Yorkie
- Your new little bundle of joy is just an infant. It has the same needs that an infant has. A warm, quiet place to sleep, nutritious food, regular grooming, and lots and lots of love and patience.
- Your puppy is not a toy that can be played with when you want to play and then put aside when you get tired of playing.
- Your puppy needs constant supervision when not in a confined area. Your puppy will respond to love and patience. It will cower and hide from loud noises and anything painful.
- Just like an infant, it does not understand right from wrong, it does not understand human words and it does not pee on the floor to punish you for leaving it alone.
- Dogs don’t hold grudges, and you shouldn’t either. Dogs live in the moment. If you catch them in the act of doing something wrong, a scolding will be effective, if you don’t catch them, it does no good to scold them, they won’t know what they are being scolded for.
- A dog makes very quick connections between cause and affect, sometimes not the connection that was intended.
Example of dog logic: Your puppy is peeing on the pee pad, and at that same instant you drop a pan on the floor, or a child lets out a scream. The dog will make the connection between his peeing on the pad, and the frightening noise, and might be hesitant to pee on the pee pad again. A solution would be to try moving the pee pad to another spot and see if that makes a difference.
- Remember that your puppy is trying to learn your language while at the same time, teaching you their language. He/she will watch your every move until they know your habits better than you know them yourself. You need to try to get to know your dog as well as he/she knows you.
- Always handle your puppy with kind, gentle hands. NEVER hit your puppy, he/she will only grow to fear your hands and will cower or run away when you reach for it.
