Need Advice (How to get a Spoo puppy and older little dog to get along) - Poodle Forum - Standard Poodle, Toy Poodle, Miniature Poodle Forum ALL Poodle owners too!

Pepperdine Paul · 06-30-2011, 04:01 PM

Hi all, I'm a newly proud parent of an 11 week old Black Male Standard Poodle (15lbs) named Kobe and a 14 month old female spayed Yorkie (4 pounds) name Sophie! Sophie has been with us for 5 months now.

I'm now in the stages of trying to help Kobe (Spoo) become a buddy to our Sophie (Yorkie) but as a puppy parent I need to be patient and a pack leader!!
Kobe is a calm Spoo but when playtime with Sophie occurs (supervised always) he can get a little too heavy footed for her and he sometimes nips and barks at her. She is super calm but will stand up for herself when he becomes too rough. I just want them to get along well. Am I expecting too much at this early stage of his puppy life? I thought Spoos get along with there housemates? Or will time pass where they will get along eventually because he is only a puppy?

Any tips on how to get them to get along well is very much appreciated!!! Or if there is a current thread then please direct me to it.

Thanks All!

Rocketagility · 06-30-2011, 08:12 PM

I truely beleive your spoo pup will get along but right now the pup doesn't understand like you say he is to ruff so you will need to supervise and sometime stop play and give breaks. You also need to help support the older dog to know she can get away. Make sure you walk them together and train them get your spoo a job and a way to get exersice like agility, flyball, frisbee, herding, swimming, biking etc.

FunkyPuppy · 06-30-2011, 08:24 PM

Lol i have a 'teapot yorkie' or 'petshop silky' of 4-5 years that i introduced to my female spoo, and for the first two weeks he was downright SNARKY with her! All toys were his, all attention was his, all food was his, and he had ZERO interest in playing.

Now they are besties. They have near-identical energy levels and he (zorro) has been a key part of teaching bite inhibition. When she pesters or bites too hard, he wallops her. Pups need that sort of correction from older dogs.

They'll work it out.

FunkyPuppy · 06-30-2011, 08:47 PM

Double post. Admin?

Rocketagility · 06-30-2011, 09:10 PM

Sure they will work it out I only worry about the larger dog hurting the smaller dog by accident. Years ago I had a new pup that would run and jump onto my older dog and she hit him the wrong way and broke her leg. A total freak accident but it was very costly so I now try and prevent to much ruff play. And to be honest there is nothing wrong with some obedience.

FunkyPuppy · 06-30-2011, 09:18 PM

Shrug... i don't have a 'traditional' sized yorkie, i have a much more sturdy-sized rescue that some young girl bought from a puppy shop and gave up to a shelter at 5 1/2 months. I've never had to worry about his bones being bothered.

I am well aware of such things called obedience... as a professional in the dog world, i apply training religiously. however, i am more inclined to allow my adult dog to apply a sharp bite when Bonzai steps out of line, rather than chase them all over, tut-tutting when Bonzai nips too hard.

fjm · 06-30-2011, 11:45 PM

A 4 pound dog is at risk of injury from a spoo puppy - and I am always a bit uneasy about the "let them sort it out" advice. Too much risk of bullying, and of dogs learning snarky behaviour for my liking. Does your Yorkie have a safe place - a crate, perhaps - where she can be undisturbed? I would be supervising all play, and intervening when it gets to rough or exuberant. Make sure the pup meets plenty of well socialised dogs to teach him good canine manners, and in time I am sure they will become excellent friends - but perhaps not until he has grown out of some of his puppy bounciness!

JE-UK · 06-30-2011, 11:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pepperdine Paul

Kobe is a calm Spoo but when playtime with Sophie occurs (supervised always) he can get a little too heavy footed for her and he sometimes nips and barks at her. She is super calm but will stand up for herself when he becomes too rough.

As long as he is honouring her corrections, I would just monitor. If he's blowing past her objections, and forcing her to escalate all the time, I'd step in. Perhaps he could wear a short leash in the house, to allow speedy enforcements of time-outs if he gets too rough?

caboodles · 07-01-2011, 05:02 AM

I believe an important thing to ensure they are getting along is to make sure Kobe always stays in a calm state, and doesn't go over into crazymode.

I remember Winston used to get SOOO excited when little yorkies would come over, to the point where he would easily be able to hurt them without even being aware of his force. to him, little dogs represented excitement. Basically, I worked on him and getting him to ALWAYS be calm so he wouldn't scare the little ones aware. If he got excited and crazy, I would remove him from the situation area, and get him to sit or lie down until the point where he was able to relax himself. Afterwards, he would approach the yorkie with a totally different energy and now they all get along wonderfully.

I think it's very important in the long run because yorkies and little dogs are so fragile and can easily be fractured by a bigger dog trying to play with them!

Pepperdine Paul · 07-01-2011, 08:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fjm

A 4 pound dog is at risk of injury from a spoo puppy - and I am always a bit uneasy about the "let them sort it out" advice. Too much risk of bullying, and of dogs learning snarky behaviour for my liking. Does your Yorkie have a safe place - a crate, perhaps - where she can be undisturbed? I would be supervising all play, and intervening when it gets to rough or exuberant. Make sure the pup meets plenty of well socialised dogs to teach him good canine manners, and in time I am sure they will become excellent friends - but perhaps not until he has grown out of some of his puppy bounciness!

Sophie (Yorkie) does have a crate which she loves and when I'm gone for some time they are both crated next to each other and while they sleep during the night. Its weird, they are gentle in the house but once they are outside my Spoo gets a little too rough. I always separate them and tell the pup "No" or "Too Rough". As he is 12 weeks old now I've been taking him around to Home Depot, Lowes and other hardware place to meet people but only while he is in the cart. Don't want him to walk in their yet till he gets his rabies vaccine at 16 weeks but does have 3 rounds of Parvo and DMPP shots already. Thanks for the advice and will always be supervising there play together.