More and more people are starting to add a puppy to their family and although having a puppy can be a great experience, they do usually need to be trained to discourage unwanted behaviour early on.
This is why we constantly see a large number of questions relating to training a puppy with each month with passes as correctly training a puppy is not only important but it can also be surprisingly difficult too.
We have noticed more and more people reaching out and asking if they should spank their puppy to discipline it when required.
In our opinion as well as the opinions of most experienced dog trainers, there are much better options available to discipline a puppy when it misbehaves and spanking can often have a negative effect on the training experience with most young puppies making it harder to train them in the future.
There is an absolutely huge range of proven training methods that work well when training your puppy and are able to quickly and easily get you excellent results that don’t include spanking your puppy.
There are also various studies that show a direct correlation between it taking longer to train a puppy correctly when physical punishment is involved in their training with a direct correlation showing a shorter training time when positive reinforcement is used too.
Should You Ever Spank A Puppy?
Although some people do spank their puppies during training, you are often able to get better results by using positive reinforcement and verbal cues with this being the predominant training method used by professional dog training establishments all over the world now.
Spanking your puppy can also result in a number of negative, unwanted behaviours developing in your puppy too often dragging out the training time period.
Some people do believe that violence breeds violence and if you use a physical punishment when training your puppy, you can encourage your puppy to bite and claw more in an attempt to defend itself.
Physical punishment such as spanking can also result in your puppy becoming fatigued with its training sessions much quicker than it otherwise would and giving up or losing interest too.
If you are trying to train your new puppy then you will be fully aware that one of the main issues it just holding your puppies focus during the training sessions without it getting distracted.
This is where treat based positive reinforcement comes in as a tasty puppy treat is a quick and easy way to hold your puppies attention for long periods of time.
There are also various puppy training systems that layout the best training methods to use for quick and easy results without spanking your puppy that you are able to use to your advantage too.
Better Training Methods Than Spanking A Puppy!
Puppy training methods that are based around positive reinforcement for desired behaviours tend to be much quicker and easier to use than training methods based around physical punishment such as spanking for undesired behaviors.
This is why the majority of professional dog training institutes all around the world who train working dogs for law enforcement, the military, and various other organizations have all switched over to positive reinforcement techniques.
We are fully aware that there are some situations where a puppy will display unwanted behaviors consistently making it difficult to use positive reinforcement correctly.
One of the best counters to this is to put your dog in a room by itself for ten minutes each time it does this undesired behavior. This works by separating to puppy from its pack and teaching it that the behavior it did prior to being separated is not desirable.
Due to puppies being more inclined towards wanting to be accepted into the pack as early as possible, this can be an excellent training aid.
In some rare situations, tools such as a No products found. can be used but these are usually not needed and other training methods can produce quicker, more consistent results.
Can You Spank A Puppy?
Depending on your location, spanking your puppy may fall under various cruelty to animal laws and although rare, you may end up having your puppy removed from your care as well as receive a fine.
In some very rare cases, you can also end up facing jail time for spanking your puppy too so trying to use other training methods is usually the best route to take.
With animal protection laws often being vague to allow law enforcement to adapt them as required, even if your local laws don’t specifically state that spanking your puppy is illegal, there may be other clauses in there that cover it.
Considering the quicker and often more consistent results that training your puppy using positive reinforcement techniques delivers, it is much easier to use these methods for puppy training.
There have been various cases in recent years in both North America and Europe where a puppy owner who excessively spanks their puppy has not only had the puppy removed from their care and received a fine but has also received a court order preventing them from ever caring for animals again.
In our opinion, the risks simply outweigh the possible rewards for spanking your puppy, especially when there are so many other training methods available to you.
What Happens If You Physically Punish Your Puppy?
Using physical punishment such as spanking to train your puppy can cause a number of issues ranging from your puppy showing aggression during the training sessions to your puppy simply losing interest.
This then results in more unwanted behaviours in your puppy as well as it often taking much longer for you to be able to train your puppy to act the way that you want it to.
As we touched on earlier in the article, puppies tend to have a high desire to be accepted into the pack as soon as possible.
This is why putting your puppy in a separate room, away from the rest of the family has proven to be such an effective training aid when your pet puppy displays unwanted behavior.
Another very strong motivator for dogs of all ages are high-value treats that are excellent for use as a reward for showing a desired behavior in your puppy.
There are a wide range of different treats on the market that can work well with this and depending on the food that you make at home, some meat-based kitchen scraps can work very well too making puppy training a much quicker and easier experience.
How Do You Discipline A Puppy That Won’t Listen?
A very small number of puppies can be very difficult to train and may require professional help from an experienced puppy trainer.
Most cities and some large towns now have puppy training classes that you are able to take puppies to that will work on training particularly hard to train dogs and help you along the way.
Depending on your budget, this can work out to be expensive though but there are a number of home puppy training programs that work out to be much cheaper than puppy training classes that you are able to take advantage of.
Although home puppy training programs do have a stigma attached to them, some of them are actually very good and not far off what you will be doing in a puppy class yet coming in at a fraction of the cost.
There are also a large number of guides online that offer advice on how you are able to train difficult puppies but some of this can be hit and miss as many of the people offering this advice are not qualified and have questionable levels of experience too.
This is why we would always recommend that you seek help from a professional from a difficult to train puppy be is via a puppy training class or a home puppy training program.
Conclusion
That brings our article going over if you should ever spank a puppy to an end. We hope that we have been able to help you better understand the different training methods that you have available to you when looking to train a new puppy as well as why you should try to avoid spanking your puppy if possible. More often than not, spanking your puppy can actually end up encouraging negative behaviours then using positive reinforcement methods would so it tends to be best avoided.
