Puppies really do like slippers. A minute after this incipient wrestling match, they were both chewing on one with their new little teeth.
Very first trip outdoors! You know why I start housetraining puppies so early? Because I don’t like cleaning up messes any more than the next person, that’s why. Yes, it makes later housetraining easier for us all. Sure, it’s also good for the new puppy owner. But it’s also just worth extra trips up and down the stairs to take the puppies out and let them do their business outside. Which they automatically do if given a chance, so that’s handy. Also, I’m really happy my knee is almost back to normal because I see a lot of stairs in my near-future.
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If going down those stairs too often turns out to be a problem, would it work to set out a litterbox with sandy or grainy catlitter or garden dirt, and put them on that to do their piddles? They can start to learn the association between that sandy/soillike texture and doing their business, and it should be easier to scoop out clumps from a litterbox than cleaning messes off the floor.
I’ve heard some small dogs can learn to use a litterbox, if their humans can’t take them outside often enough, but I don’t know if King Charles spaniels could learn that.
If the stairs become too problematic, I can and will cheat: If I go out the front door, it’s just two steps and around through the gate into the yard. If I go out the back door directly into the yard, it’s 14 steps. So going around is always a possibility, and that’s what I’ll do if necessary.
Litter training puppies doesn’t help get the notion of “outside good” in their heads, and that’s a valuable notion, worth working on.
Cavaliers could be taught to use a litter pan, but litter-trained puppies are seldom as reliable about avoiding accidents as properly housetrained puppies. Litter training makes sense largely for apartment-dwellers or people with a disability that limits their mobility. Fake grass works better than litter, and I do have one couple who taught their puppy to use a patch of fake grass because they do live in an apartment. That puppy is far, far less reliably housetrained in other people’s houses than a typical puppy, but it works for them in their apartment.
They really are truly adorable!
Do they have prospective homes yet, or are you waiting to see how they turn out & which ones you’ll keep?
If I keep Morgan’s Blen puppy, then they are all spoken for. If I place him as a pet, then one puppy is not yet spoken for.
In other words, I have four homes lined up with deposits, so all that matters now is that the personalities develop in ways suitable for those homes. For example, I think I know where oddly marked Girl 2 will go. I know it’s really early to guess about this, but my suspicion is that she is going to be a little spitfire, and I have a buyer who doesn’t care about sex or markings, but wants a puppy with zip.
That’s why I ask such specific questions when someone wants a puppy, because some people want a really mellow puppy with low drive and some want a puppy with pizzazz. Or some really care about markings and some don’t.