Puppy's first night? Please help.

Hello All,

After sadly losing my old dobe some months back I have now got a new puppy that I'm picking up tomorrow, again a dobe but this time brown and tan. I could never replace my old boy and another black and tan seemed disloyal

Anyhow I need your opinions on what to do for the puppys first night home.

The books I have read and an article on this site have said to take him up to my bedroom and keep him in a box by the bed so I can reassure him through the night. Then move him to the kitchen after a week.

However the breeder who is very experienced with dobes says that it is better to leave him in the kitchen from the outset or it will only confuse the puppy in a weeks time when he won't understand what he has done wrong to be left in the kitchen.

Opinions please, ASAP as we pick the little darling up tomorrow

Just to let you know he has a cage and bed set up in the kitchen ready so he will be safe left on his own.

Hello mustard You don't say how old the puppy is? Yes you can leave the puppy in the kitchen, but I prefer to have them with me it makes housetraining/bonding easier, the article on housetraining in the article section explaines this in detail . If you leave the puppy in the kitchen and wish to housetrain it you will need to go and take it out in the night anyway or it will get used to soiling in the house..if it is in a crate it will not want to soil it's bed.
If you decide to leave it in the kitchen it will cry because it is alone for the first time..putting a safe cuddly toy in with it will help,and a hot water bottle wrapped in a towel and a ticking clock. Also a blanket or towel that you took with you and rubbed on the puppys mum to get her scent. One reason for having the puppy in with you to begin with is so you hear it when it wakes, this helps to housetrain quickly and easily..good luck..hope to see some pictures...

Awwww I really hate it when people bring a new puppy home and then leave it all on its lonesome in the kitchen. My dogs share my house as pups and adults and that includes my bedroom I'm afraid.

If you want him/her to spend the night in the kitchen throughout it's life, then I suppose you're going to have to start off the way you mean to carry on. No doubt you will be kept awake for the first few nights with the crying (oh, I couldn't stand it!) and I would also leave a dim light on. A tiny baby taken away from it's mum and brothers and sisters only to be left alone in a dark room with nobody to cuddle up to. I have also had to have my puppies in my bedroom due to running food businesses from home and the health inspector would have a field day if he saw a dog's bed in my kitchen!

I do hope he/she settles down comfortably and goes to sleep and doesn't care that he/she/s all alone as some pups are ok. Good luck with whichever way you go around it, but I would also agree that if you chose the bedroom and then went on to the kitchen at a later stage the puppy would get confused and wonder why he had been isolated in the kitchen. I hope he's got a nice comfy little bed to sleep in or a crate with some comfy blankets, and some nice toys too? Enjoy your new arrival and good luck.

I'd say take it to your bedroom till it knows that this is its new home and you are its new Mum. My baby, who I collected almost exactly a year ago, slept upstairs for 4 nights. Woke on the first two, cried very briefly on the first but shushed when I spoke to her, stirred but settled without crying on the second, slept through 3 and 4 and slept through downstairs from 5.
It's only a tiny baby, what a horrible ordeal to lose Mum and litter mates and be left in the dark in a strange place with strange smells.

Good luck - we'll look forward to hearing all about him................................and a warm welcome to Dogweb!

My dogs have always slept in the kitchen from day 1. Teagan cried for an hour on the first night, but after that was quiet!
Now she is older, and toilet trained, she sleeps next to our bed

..I have never had a puppy get confused . as the article explains you don't just suddenly put the puppy in the kitchen after a week... you do it gradually ..I believe puppies like children need to develop in stages ..if you take the puppy away from it's mother and litter and introduce it to a new enviroment that is one stage, if you then leave it with no 'living contact' on the first few nights I think this is very hard for the puppy...as it bonds/gets used to the new enviroment you introduce new situations like being left alone ..but i think this is best done ..gently you have less problems then.
Leave a puppy alone in a strange house away from the litter for the first time it cries/frequently get shouted at/ then it gets confused

"The books I have read and an article on this site have said to take him up to my bedroom and keep him in a box by the bed so I can reassure him through the night. Then move him to the kitchen after a week."

Mini, where did I say do it within a week then??? I actually said "at a later stage" like you are suggesting?? Or do you mean you are agreeing with my post then to quote it? Don't understand Mini (nothing new there then! )

Helena I am agreeing with all your post the highlighted bit about the puppy getting confused
I don't think having a puppy with you to start it off confuses it, and I explained why I think that and what I do think confuses it

It was Mustards Mum who said about the 'week' in the article which does not mention a week and actually says I thought it did cos I know the woman who wrote it

Sure you'll work out what suits you best MM (from DM)

DM This is a thing that does concern me greatly though, the number I times I have heard of a puppy being returned to the breeder (and recently too) because the puppy 'cried at night' and it never fails to amaze me that people are surprised when a puppy cries when parted from its mother and siblings...Just a little thought at the start when one first gets a puppy can make so much difference...