My dogs do a lot of wrestling. Sometimes it gets ugly.
The pup is male and the adult is female. The adult dominates right now. But the pup is always challenging. I do hope this conflict will always be the case. Blue Star's Mom |
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| Is this rough playing that gets annoying or actual fighting, like baring teeth and growling that looks like it could or already has ended in injury? |
| My dogs wrestle all the time, but no one gets hurt.
Is the pup trying to hurt the adult dog or vice versa? If they aren't trying to hurt each other...they are just playing...get used to it... |
Yup. Bosley and Dixie are pretty well non-stop, unless there is something else happening....like food or visitors....
I don't like it inside the house, though, so if they get too rambuctious I send them outside to play. Then they tire themselves out and come inside to nap. And if they are tired from a walk or the dog park they are quiet, too... Do they get enough excercise?
If I can't send them outside due to weather etc. I separate them with a baby gate....(This is tricky because Dixie can fly over it, if she wants to). Don't make a big deal about it, as you don't know how they may interpet your interactions, if any. Don't take sides, and don't punish or correct. Are the dogs trained at all? Sometimes I just put them into a down stay for a few minutes to wind down. |
Quote: Do they get enough excercise?
That may be the key. Our dogs are working dogs and need daily big time exercise and mental stimulation. If not they take it out on whatever is handy. The pup is still developing and going to his "heritage" of hard work builds better muscles and keen brains. If you exercise the "tail off your dogs" they will be pooped, relaxed and happy puppies. |
| When they fight, they mostly are playing hard, as no one has been seriously injured. It's more annoying than anything else. Sometimes it can include growling and looks more like I must break it up. But, I usually do walk them once a day and take them out to romp at least 3 or 4 times. But this is when it happens. The pup will attack the other and bother her until she gets angry. I feel she is tired of it. She is used to going outside to do her business and he doesn't let her do that.
Am I just dealing with an immature dog? They are nice a quiet when I have them around me one at a time. So, I don't think it's not enough exercise. I don't have a fenced in yard and my female tends to wander off if she's off lead, so I have to take her out on a leash, except when we run in the field behind the yard. They will both run nicely together, and mind pretty well. My adult, Blue Star in pretty well trained, with the exception of her minding me to come home if she is enticed by what's out of the yard. The baby is great on leash, walks by my side and comes when called, and doesn't go out of the yard unless Blue Star does. Then he follows her bad behavoir. I think I'm feeling the pinch of being the owner of two sheepies now instead of one. Juggling both is not easy! I will take you advice and not show any favoratism. I try to do that anyways. I understand the implications. Thanks for all you input. I will take in consideration all that is suggested Blue Star's Mom |
| London will non stop wrestle with either of the two big dogs but normally it is Sam. I have found if I leave them alone when Sam is tired of the constant barking in his face or the wrestling he will quickly growl and let out a huge bark and maybe even a swipe of his paw at London which translates into "leave me alone". She gets the message and submits or goes off to bug someone else. I have notice that since I have not been exercising her as much she has much more (translate that into hyperactive little monster) energy. My fault and something I am working to correct.
Good luck with your two. |
| My pups are the same sort of combo...8 mo. old boy pup and adult female. There behavior sounds identical! What we think is going on in our house, is that Abby's reign as top dog is coming to an END. As my father expressed it when watching them one day "The shoe is on the other dog". Our strategy has been to let the dogs work it out for themselves, UNLESS, it involves Bert tormenting Abby while WE are paying attention to her. Its important that he realizes that ultimately mom&dad are the alphas!
as an aside, as bad as I feel for our older dog's troubles, I think its incredibly good for her in terms of exersize and, um, character building... |
| If they aren't fighting, I'd let them work it out on their own-- it sounds pretty normal. Blue Star will let him know when it's been enough if she's the one normally in charge. Aren't they only a little over a year apart? My boys are 13 months apart in age and it wouldn't be a normal night without an Andy Capp cloud of wrestling rolling by at least 10 times. We haven't known "quiet" for quite some time except on the nights when they've been at doggie day care during the day! |
| our sheepie and his sister fight all the time.
sometimes we have to step in when they cross the line but they have never hurt eachother. we only step in mostly when we cant stand to hear them anymore. They are both young 1 and 2 so i am thinking it is just a puppy thing. They can fight over a bone for a half an hour and the next thing they are licking eachothers faces and falling asleep cuddling. I hope they grow out of the fighting though.  |
| I think it's important to point out that there's a HUGE difference between loud roughhousing, and even the growling and snarling that goes along with it and real, honest to goodness, fighting. Usually before a real fight, the dogs will go completely tense, almost frozen in position and quiet before they erupt. If you didn't stop it before that happened, the fight is pretty much inevitable. Then it will be snarling, biting and using teeth for real-- not mouthing or nipping. Real fights are scary and not just an annoying behavior that you hope will quiet down and go away. The month or so that Bear and Clyde were fighting was one of the most stressful things I've ever gone through. There were times that I was worried one of them was going to end up losing an ear an eye or, worse yet, killing each other. I'm so glad that things have calmed down now! |
| I have 2 dogs. Unfortuanely they are not sheep dogs but cross breed lap dogs. They usually wrestle like mild growling, tags wagging You can see what they'll do next But then sometimes they'll fight They yelp, bite, snap, growl very scary What we do is separate them 4 a while Meggy (the puppy) usually takes away Charlie (the dogs) Bone causing a great injustice   Hope I helped  |
| Our guys are 23 and 11 months. The older one, Dexter, is neutered (we had him neutered about 3 months after we got Winston) Winston is not. They roughhouse quite a bit but only outside. Win is challenging Dex for dominance which Dex allows to a point but usually ends up putting Win in his place which is getting harder and harder to do. Sometimes Winston refuses to be put any place by Dex and thats when it gets wound up. Dex has only about 5 pounds on Win. When it escalates we put a stop to it which saves face for both dogs. We have a friend whose 2 males got so violent in the house that they knocked holes in the drywall. Another friend had a 4-year old GCH when she got her next puppy, both males. They were great buddies until the GCH was neutered at about 7. The now 3-year old decided he was the alpha which the older dog would not give up. Now the only time they get along is when one is on the grooming table. She highly recommended we not get a male as a second dog. So far, so good but we think Dex's days as the dominant dog are numbered. |
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