We have 3 labs - 12 years, 10 years and 18 weeks. The pup is winding the older dogs up: My oldest lab just dislikes her so much she barks and snarls at her the whole time. The pup continues to jump up, so is clearly not taking the warnings. I’ve tried shutting the old dog outside, telling her off for being aggressive (she’s only made aggressive noise so far, and bared her teeth), tried shutting the puppy out, telling the PUPPY off, but nothing is working. We obviously reward good behaviour, but this is really never possible now. The old dog gets upset as soon as she enters the room. The other old dog is a walkover. The puppy jumps all over her and bites her ears.... and she just squeals and tries to cower away from her Anyone have any advice? I’m at my wits end... 6 months pregnant and fed up of the constant tension in the house. I feel so guilty at introducing this puppy into my older dogs lives in their twilight years, and feel sure things will start to improve, but I think some intervention is needed. Just keeping them separated isn’t working because they aren’t getting to “practice” being good. Thanks in advance.
I think I would keep the pup in a pen, when you can't supervise her. I expect the 12 yr old will eventually explain proper behavior to your pup, hopefully without any damage. I would not shut the older dog out, or punish her for standing up to the pup. It was her house and now this intruder has come and tried to take over. If your pup is like most she will calm down and eventually learn from the older dogs.
I would really think hard about whether you really want to keep the puppy, to be honest. People always think I'm a bit hard-core when I say things like this, but at 18 weeks the pup is not even 5 months old yet - and in 3 months time, you are going to have a baby. Given how things already are, will you be able to devote the time and energy to raise the pup to be a decent member of human society and your family - or is it not better to return the puppy to the breeder whilst they are still relatively young and whilst the breeder may be able to place the pup relatively quickly? Puppies DO harass older dogs. It is stressful and unpleasant for the older dog to be bothered by a puppy all the time - and frankly, unfair. You need to keep the puppy separated from the older dogs to ensure that they have space to relax - so - you need to separate the house up using stair-gates. Any time puppy and older dogs are together in the same room, the puppy should be on a house line/tag line so you can stop her from reaching and harassing the older dogs and supervise things - not by telling ANY of the dogs off, but purely by prevention using the house line and redirection onto other toys and objects. It is relentless and tiring - and that's what's involved. If you don't think you can cope with constant separation and supervision until the puppy is much older, then please rehome the puppy now. When we add a puppy to our family, the pup lives in the kitchen - stair-gated off from the rest of the house, where the other dogs are. The pup trails a tag line at all times. The crate is in the kitchen and the pup is trained in the kitchen. Any time the pup is out of the crate, I also am in the kitchen to supervise the pup. When the pup falls asleep, the pup goes in the crate and the older dogs in the rest of the house get my attention. In the evenings, we all sit together in the lounge and the pup has a tagline on which I use to prevent her from harassing the older dogs. Over time, I need to prevent the pup less until eventually things are ok. Then the pup gets a larger crate in the dog room with the older dogs. Raising a puppy well is as time-consuming as raising a baby or child. Someone is going to lose out, when a baby arrives and IME, it's never the human child.... As breeders, we do not place puppies in homes where people have any plans to have children in the next 2 years.
