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Dog Training & Care Guides

Practical, force-free guides from the team behind PupPlan — written to actually solve the problem, whether or not you use the app. From your puppy's first week to recall, reactivity, feeding and enrichment. See the puppy schedule app, the puppy training planner, the force-free dog training app and the dog training app without ads for how PupPlan helps, or compare it with Dogo, Puppr and Woofz. New guides are added regularly.

🐶 Puppy Basics

Just brought home a puppy? Start here — the essentials for the first few months.

Puppy's First Weeks

The first-weeks guides in one place: the age-by-age schedule, feeding, vaccination, crate training, potty training, socialising and biting.

2 min read · Puppy Basics

Puppy Schedule by Age

Week by week from 8 weeks, then month by month to 12 months: meals, sleep, toilet trips, vaccines and a sample day.

9 min read · Puppy Basics

New Puppy Checklist: Your First Week

What to buy, how to puppy-proof, surviving the first day and night, and the early routine that sets everything up right.

9 min read · Puppy Basics

How to Potty Train a Puppy

A step-by-step house-training plan: routine, confinement, reading the signs, handling accidents, and a realistic timeline by age.

9 min read · Puppy Basics

Crate Training a Puppy

Build a puppy who loves their crate — the right size, the introduction steps, night-times, and what to do about whining, without flooding.

8 min read · Puppy Basics

Puppy First Night: Crying in the Crate

A force-free first night: crate beside the bed, toilet trips, what crying means, and when distress means you went too fast.

7 min read · Puppy Basics

How to Stop Puppy Biting and Mouthing

Why puppies bite, teaching bite inhibition, what to do the moment teeth touch skin, and managing the evening "witching hour".

8 min read · Puppy Basics

Puppy Socialisation: A Complete Checklist

What socialisation really means, the critical window, and a checklist of sounds, surfaces and people — done safely before vaccinations are complete.

8 min read · Puppy Basics

🎯 Training & Manners

The everyday skills that make life with a dog calmer and easier.

Clicker Training for Beginners

How to charge the clicker, mark behaviours with perfect timing, avoid the classic beginner mistakes, and fade the clicker out.

7 min read · Training Basics

How to Teach Sit, Down & Stay

Teach the foundation cues with luring and marker training — plus the three Ds and a reliable release cue that makes "stay" stick.

8 min read · Training & Manners

How to Train a Reliable Recall

Build a rock-solid "come when called": choosing a cue, charging it, long-line work, proofing against distractions, and recall games.

9 min read · Training & Manners

How to Stop Leash Pulling

Why dogs pull, the right equipment, the "be a tree" and "reward the slack" techniques, and turning sniffing into a reward.

8 min read · Training & Manners

How to Stop Jumping Up

Why dogs jump, removing the attention reward, teaching a polite "four-on-the-floor" greeting, and managing the front door.

7 min read · Training & Manners

Teach "Leave It" & "Drop It"

Two life-saving cues taught with trades and rewards — so your dog gives up dangerous things instead of guarding them.

8 min read · Training & Manners

10 Easy Dog Tricks to Teach

Step-by-step, force-free instructions for shake, spin, roll over, high five, bow and more — fun that builds focus.

9 min read · Training & Manners

🧩 Behaviour & Fears

Force-free help for the trickier stuff — reactivity, anxiety, barking and the teenage phase.

How to Help a Leash-Reactive Dog

Why dogs bark and lunge on lead, finding the threshold distance, desensitisation and counter-conditioning, and the "look at that" game.

9 min read · Behaviour & Fears

How to Help a Dog with Separation Anxiety

Spotting true separation anxiety, building independence, the absence-training ladder, and when to involve a vet or behaviourist.

9 min read · Behaviour & Fears

How to Stop Excessive Barking

Identify the type of bark — alert, demand, boredom, fear — and the right fix for each, plus why anti-bark collars backfire.

8 min read · Behaviour & Fears

How to Desensitize Your Dog to Fireworks

A sound desensitization and counter-conditioning protocol for fireworks fear — plus how to survive fireworks night itself.

7 min read · Behaviour & Fears

Surviving the Teenage Dog Phase

Why your once-perfect puppy seems to forget everything in adolescence — and a calm, force-free survival plan to get through it.

8 min read · Behaviour & Fears

How to Read Your Dog's Body Language

Tail, ears, eyes and posture — the calming and stress signals that warn of a bite, and why a wag isn't always friendly.

8 min read · Behaviour & Fears

How to Calm a Hyper Dog

Why more exercise often makes it worse — and how sleep, settle training and calming enrichment actually help.

8 min read · Behaviour & Fears

Cooperative Care: Vet & Grooming

Teach your dog to willingly take part in nail trims, grooming and vet exams using consent and rewards, not restraint.

9 min read · Behaviour & Fears

❤️ Health & Nutrition

Keep your dog healthy, fed right, and on schedule.

Puppy Vaccination Schedule

A clear, vet-guided timeline: core vs non-core vaccines, when puppies can safely go outside, boosters, and worming and flea timing.

8 min read · Health & Nutrition

How Much to Feed a Dog by Weight

A feeding chart by weight, with daily grams and kcal, puppy, adult and senior portions, and a calculator you can check against the bag.

10 min read · Health & Nutrition

What Dogs Can and Can't Eat

Toxic foods, a table of foods that are safe in moderation, and what to do if your dog eats something harmful.

10 min read · Health & Nutrition

Dog Age Calculator

The epigenetic formula beside AVMA size bands, and why multiplying a dog's age by 7 gets the age wrong.

6 min read · Health & Nutrition

Caring for a Senior Dog

When dogs become senior, the health changes to watch for, joint and weight management, and keeping body and mind active.

9 min read · Health & Nutrition

Keeping Your Dog Safe in Hot Weather

Spotting heatstroke, emergency first aid, the pavement test, and how to keep your dog cool and safe in summer.

8 min read · Health & Nutrition

My Dog Won't Eat: What to Do

Fussiness vs illness, the red flags that mean see a vet now, and what you can safely try at home.

8 min read · Health & Nutrition

🧠 Play & Enrichment

Tire the brain, not just the legs — enrichment is how you get a calmer dog.

15 Dog Enrichment Ideas to Beat Boredom

Easy nose work, food puzzles, foraging and training games — most using things you already own — to tire your dog's brain.

8 min read · Play & Enrichment

Why Do Dogs Love Squeaky Toys?

The science behind the squeak, how to use it as a training tool for focus and recall, and helping a dog who loves squeaks too much.

6 min read · Play & Enrichment

How Much Exercise Does My Dog Need?

How much exercise by age and breed, why mental exercise counts just as much, and the puppy over-exercise trap.

8 min read · Play & Enrichment

Put the Guides into Practice

PupPlan turns these techniques into guided courses with step-by-step lessons, homework, and progress tracking — plus a built-in clicker, squeak toy, dog whistle, and desensitization sound library. Free 1-week trial.

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