It’s so important to puppy proof your house and garden when bringing a new puppy home, not just so your things don’t get damaged or for the sake of your sanity – but to keep the pup safe too!
When you get a new puppy, everything is exciting and happy and nothing could make you get angry at that cute little ball of fluff… until they chew your best cushion or eat half a Sky remote. (Or 4 Sky remotes…)
Keep reading for some simple, easy ways to puppy proof your house and garden!
5 Ways To Puppy Proof Your Home
1. Hide Any Wires
Puppies love to chew (get used to reading this because I repeat it a lot on the blog) and electrical cables and wires are no exception. Your pup doesn’t realise they might electrocute themselves, they just know that wiggly thing looks tasty.
Hide all wires, or put them in trunking to keep them covered. Make sure that any wires positioned under or behind furniture can’t be reached or dragged out by curious paws.
2. Check & Move Your Plants
Some plants are dangerous to dogs, they can make them feel sick or much worse. Have a quick look to see if the plants you have indoors are dog-friendly, if they aren’t see if you can put them up higher than your pup will reach or think about getting rid of them completely.
There are plenty of really good, life-like fake plants around now, they still aren’t good for our pup to eat but at least it wouldn’t be quite as bad as some of the real plants!
It’s a good idea to put any plants up high anyway, pups have a knack for eating them or knocking them over!
3. Move Ornaments & Breakables
Move any breakables including glass, pottery and ornaments. They could get smashed and get stuck in your pup’s paws – or even eaten!
4. Put Up Stairgates
Decide where your pup is and isn’t allowed to go. Use stairgates on doorways as well as stairs to stop them from entering rooms without you and getting up to mischief!
Stairgates are also useful when you want to move to another room without the pup, but want to still be able to see them or let them see you.
5. Hide Liquids
Move and hide anything liquid. Liquid = drink to our furry friends, especially when they are young! We had a Staffordshire Bull Terrier once who would try and drink bleach!! Most liquids will make your dog sick, hazardous liquids could kill them – put them out of reach completely.
Now you’ve found some tips on how to puppy proof your house, try some of these to puppy proof your garden too!
8 Steps To Puppy Proof The Garden
1. Put Up Fences
To puppy proof your garden you need to get some kind of fencing up. We let our dogs ‘free roam’ our gardens for years – and for years they would dig up plants, squash plants, chew plants/fence posts/gates/plant pots/greenhouses etc!!! Driving me completely.insane.
Ideally, you want a puppy section in your garden, you can build one yourself using old pallets and make a picket fence, or buy metal sheets to build a DIY dog run, we’ve tried short, wooden fence panels before now with certain dogs, but our best method has been buying actual dog run metal panels from eBay (this is where we had our current ones from.)
You could even use chicken wire or the green, plastic coated wire used in gardening. Whichever method you choose, it will save your pup from getting hurt and you getting mad!
Just check regularly for holes or breaks in the fence.
2. Keep Gates Shut
Barricade those garden gates! Make sure your gate has a good lock on it, whether you choose a bolt or a padlock or both. If it just has a handle, try and get a padlock on it or add another bolt.
Making sure your dog can’t get out is important but so is making sure no-one can get in either.
Be careful on bin days, sometimes one of the kids has put the bins out and then not quite closed the bolt properly, meaning the dogs have nudged the gate open and gone on an adventure!
Our dogs have escaped on different occasions and mostly we have been lucky to get them back – one time my Yorkshire Terrier, Bella escaped and I never saw her again, I was heartbroken for a long time.
3. Cover Your Pond
We have a raised Koi pond, we built the pond before we built the dog run – naively thinking the dogs would stay away from it and not destroy the garden this time… pffftt!
Sure enough, not long after we had filled the pond, Peanut our Pug started to sit on the side of it so she could stare into the house to let us know she wanted back in! This meant Evie our Dogue wanted to do the same, but being the big ginger clumsy thing she is, she repeatedly knocked Peanut into the pond when trying to get up!!! Poor Peanut!!
Luckily the poor Pug had someone outside with her at the times and was rescued by the kids – but it could’ve been much worse! We have a deep end of the pond and also a shallow end, but that doesn’t mean Pea could swim that far to get to the shallow end – she would just sink!
So cover your pond if your pup is out there unsupervised, even if it’s just some spare pieces of wood from the shed (just make sure they can hold the weight of the pup!)
4. Try Not To Leave Soil Exposed
Dogs will dig. They will happily dig all your prized hydrangeas up and then drag them across the garden. Making a lovely mess as they go. Soil is even better when wet – our Evie loves making mud pies and puddles!! Argh!
We have even had a dog that used to eat soil… sigh. Idiot.
5. Be Careful With Gravel
Our Aunt’s Collie used to be obsessed with eating stones and pebbles, and I’ve heard a lot of other dogs can develop a fetish for eating stones too!
Just keep an eye on any gravel or slate that is out there if the pup is alone, they might dig it up making a mess or even eat it – and that’s an expensive and worrying time if they do!
If your pup or dog loves to eat gravel, you will be best to take it all up and try something else.
6. Check Your Plants
Like with house plants, some outdoor growing plants and flowers are poisonous to dogs but also thorny ones can hurt! Try not to have thorny plants where your pup can get to them.
7. Try Raised Flower Beds
All of our flower beds are now raised, it makes it a lot easier to keep the puppies off my plants (I am a very keen gardener) but just remember that when they get bigger they will climb and trample on raised beds!
8. Make A Dog Run/Toilet To Really Puppy Proof The Garden!
Like I said earlier, having a special section of your garden just for your dogs is ideal, it doesn’t have to be massive either. If it’s just for outside toilet time and short breaks in between walks it will be fine.
Having a space sectioned off in some way for a dog toilet is important for the hygiene and cleanliness of your garden – especially when you have kids or multiple dogs. It’s also great to keep pups in while toilet training before they can manage a big walk. As garden lovers, parents and now dog breeders, we find that a dog run is one of our can’t live without things.
Think ‘Baby’
The best way to puppy proof your house and garden is to imagine your puppy as a baby – which they are to most of us anyway!
Think what would happen if a baby or toddler was let loose in the house – what would they be messing with or destroying? (Everything!!) Puppies will do the same.
Did These Tips Help?
Have you tried any of these easy methods to puppy proof your home and garden?
If not, hopefully, these simple ways to puppy proof your home and garden will help you keep your pup or dog out of trouble and help you keep your sanity!
If any of these tips helped you out, please share this post on your social media to help others! Sharing is caring! 🙂
