A puppy arrives in a house where everything is foreign: the smells, the sounds, the people. The first days decide whether it will consider this place safe. The task is simple — make the world predictable.
What to prepare before it arrives
A water bowl and a food bowl, a bed, a carrier, a collar with a tag, pads, and the food the breeder was using. Do not change the food on moving day: the move is stress enough, and adding a diet change to it is a reliable way to get an upset stomach.
The first hour
Do not carry the puppy around the flat and do not show it everything at once. Put the carrier on the floor, open the door and let it come out on its own. Then water, and the spot where the bed is. One room on the first day; the rest of the flat can wait.
The first night
It will be hard, and that is normal: the puppy is sleeping without its mother and littermates for the first time. Put the bed next to yours. If it whines, do not take it into your bed, but do not leave it in another room behind a closed door either — lower your hand so it knows someone is there. This passes after three or four nights.
Toileting
A puppy needs to go after sleeping, after eating and after playing. At those three moments carry it to the pad or outside, without waiting for a puddle. Nobody is told off for a puddle — telling off teaches hiding, not holding. You praise what was done in the right place, and you praise immediately, not a minute later.
Food
A puppy is fed more often than an adult dog: four times a day until four months, then three, and two by a year old. Exactly how many grams depends on weight, age and the calorie content of the particular food — the calculator in the pet profile works that out.
What not to do in the first week
Invite guests to meet it. Take it visiting. Leave it alone for a whole working day. Bathe it without cause. All of this is fine later — once the puppy has decided the house is safe.
When to call the vet
Refusing food for more than a day, lethargy, bloody diarrhoea, repeated vomiting — do not wait for morning and do not look for the answer online. That is the case that needs an examination.