❓Why are we even talking about poop?! 💩For an embarrassing length of time, I assumed that poop and puppies went together. That spending a ton of time cleaning up soiled newspaper, a grungy weaning pen, and bathing dirty puppies is just a part of raising puppies. I finally got really serious about litter box training my puppies after deciding to try using the Puppy Culture protocol with my next litter. I found that while lots of breeders had systems that worked for them, there was actually very little information available to help breeders develop a system that was adaptable to different sizes of puppies, didn’t compromise the space needs of puppies, didn’t encourage tracking through the toilet, and further, actually taught puppies to prefer to void “away from”their resting and play area. I experimented with a variety of solutions gleaned from Puppy Culture, other breeders, and my own efforts, and I hit upon a system that worked very well for my puppies, and was easily adaptable to the needs of puppies of all sizes. The difference for me and my puppies was nothing short of game changing - I now found myself with more time to do really impactful work with my puppies. I also found the puppy’s new owners were simply raving about how their puppy was the smartest puppy ever and was SO easy to house train. What a great start!The method I developed was so easy and so beneficial to me and my puppies I wanted to share it with other breeders. I started mentoring breeders because I discovered there was very little helpful information available for litter box training puppies. I quickly found that teaching potty training to individual breeders was fun and rewarding, but very time consuming. So Poop School was born!Poop school offers so many great benefits for us, the puppies caregivers. 👩🏻‍🦰👨🏻‍🦱Cleaner puppies. This means more positive interactions with us.

Less pathogen transmission from stepped in feces and feces/cysts on puppies (coccidia, giardia, internal parasites) means fewer breakouts of illness, and less diarrhea.
Poop is contained to one area and not spread all over your weaning pen. Litter clumps around feces, meaning less tracking and contamination. This means a smaller space to clean.
Less time cleaning means more quality time to spend with puppies, and more enjoyment for caregivers.
Cleaner puppies means no high pressure, rushed, emergency “poopy puppy” bathing. We have time to introduce puppies to bathing without gradually, meaning my puppies leave here with very positive feelings about being bathed.

And for our puppies! 🐶🦊🐺

Cleaner puppies have fewer outbreaks of illness, so they actually feel better and thrive.
Cleaner puppies get more quality time interacting with caregivers.
Clean puppies are easier to house train and have more positive interactions with their new owners.
Positive interactions build confidence, and confident puppies are more likely to grow into confident adult dogs.
House soiling is a common cause of owner relinquishment or return to breeder. Being clean and easy to house train helps ensure a puppy stays in it’s new home forever.

And for new owners! 🙋🏻‍♀️

Cleaner puppies are easier to house train, increasing client satisfaction.
New owners feel more enthusiastic about their puppy when house training goes smoothly, this helps build a strong human/puppy bond.
Clean puppies have fewer accidents. This decreases the chance that a new owner will become impatient with their puppy and cause house training or confidence problems.
Clean puppies make owners very proud! This builds the human puppy bond and decreases “the puppy blues” or “puppy buyer’s remorse”.

And for those owners with special needs! 🦸🏻‍♀️🦸🏽‍♂️

Poop school is great for show, service dog, and sport puppies who learn early to void on cue, and who are confident voiding in front of people. These owners can easily teach puppies to void on cement, shavings, grassy areas, and on a leash.
Urban owners and owners of small dogs, who desire to use a litter box long term will find their litter box trained puppy to have a tremendous head start in toileting skills needed in these specialized situations.

How are we going to do this? I think most caregivers agree, we want less mess, healthier puppies, and happier house training for the new owner.

This class is built on a management based approach that teaches caregivers to create “choice points” for their puppies that gradually funnel puppies towards the learning we want to occur and the habits we want to develop. All of this is accomplished without compromising puppy wellbeing or development. This makes our method easy to implement and time conservative (because breeders are busy!) We are going to be controlling our puppies options, to create this learning and habit funnel.

There are 4 main breeder skills you will be learning.

Management: Setting up, then evolving the weaning pen’s layout to encourage the toilet habits we want puppies to learn.
Positive Reinforcement: Using positive reinforcement to strengthen good habits.
Raising Criteria: Learning how to funnel puppies into the habits you want by knowing when and how to change the puppies environment based on physical maturity and skill acquisition.
Transition: After you built a great poop school foundation in your puppies, learn how to support your new owners through the house training process. We’ve made this easy, providing you with written instructions for puppy packs, and even a Facebook Group devoted just to supporting your new puppy owners through the house training process in a breeder positive environment that respects your work and builds upon it.

Is poop really that important?