How to add another dog to your family?

[mommyoffive]

How do you add another dig to your family if you already  have one?

We have one dog and think about adding another one sometimes.   How do you do this?

She is a 9 year old dog.  She was a mom and had a mate. 

Should I get a certain breed of dog?

Should I get another female dog?

A puppy?

[ktgrok]

Generally two different sexes are easier, as less social turmoil over who is in charge. Puppies get a "puppy pass" from most adult dogs, and I'd think especially one that had her own litter, which helps a lot with getting along. 

[Pawz4me]

With dogs your safest bet is always opposite sexes. Then two males, and last of all two females. And yes, two females CAN get along. Many do. But when they don't the fights can be truly vicious.

With a nine year old dog I'd think long and hard before bringing in a puppy. Think about how active (or not) she is, how much she enjoys (or not) playing, etc. For some nine year old dogs a puppy would be perfect. For others it would be a nightmare. Our Shih Tzu is almost nine and we recently added another dog, one estimated to be about the same age. For him a puppy would have been a horrible choice. He would have hated it. I'm not even sure he liked puppies when he was a puppy. 😉 

I generally introduce new dogs (adult to adult) outside, with both on leash and a handler for each. I've never needed to do more than that, but if necessary you can separate with crates or baby gates.

[sangtarah]

Well, I should have asked this question! Our 9 year old ShihTzu/Bichon cross wasn’t too happy about a pup, but she hasn’t been too mean either. We didn’t do anything special, just let them be together. Our older gal has been fine, after teaching the pup a thing or two, LOL. She seems to even like him at times now. 🙃

[Selkie]

54 minutes ago, Pawz4me said:

With dogs your safest bet is always opposite sexes. Then two males, and last of all two females. And yes, two females CAN get along. Many do. But when they don't the fights can be truly vicious.

This has been my experience, too.

[mommyoffive]

Glad I asked because I have been looking at girls.  Guess I need to focus boys.

[mommyoffive]

1 hour ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Fwiw I’ve had multiple girls at the same time forever, and have never had an issue except with one extremely aggressive adult Great Pyrenees rescue who went back after 6 months because she attacked everything and everyone. Puppies usually fall into the pecking order initially and don’t rock the boat. It’s been with males where I have seen any power balance shift, once the younger one comes of age if he is larger, more dominant personality. I’m sure everyone has different experiences though, and ymmv.
 

Our oldest dog is 11.5 and we just brought in one puppy in the spring and will be bringing in a second in late fall most likely, because I want them to have the experience of her wisdom, and our other dog, before they’re too old for puppy shenanigans. Ours our all large dogs though, so maybe small dogs are different.  I’ve never owned a dog under 60 lbs, so small dogs are an unknown to me for sure. 

Thank you for the information. Humm, more food for thought.   When you are talking about the balance shift with a male.  Is that between 2 males or with a male and a female?

Our dog is a big girl around 75 lbs.

[Pawz4me]

1 hour ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Fwiw I’ve had multiple girls at the same time forever, and have never had an issue except with one extremely aggressive adult Great Pyrenees rescue who went back after 6 months because she attacked everything and everyone. Puppies usually fall into the pecking order initially and don’t rock the boat. It’s been with males where I have seen any power balance shift, once the younger one comes of age if he is larger, more dominant personality. I’m sure everyone has different experiences though, and ymmv.
 

Our oldest dog is 11.5 and we just brought in one puppy in the spring and will be bringing in a second in late fall most likely, because I want them to have the experience of her wisdom, and our other dog, before they’re too old for puppy shenanigans. Ours our all large dogs though, so maybe small dogs are different.  I’ve never owned a dog under 60 lbs, so small dogs are an unknown to me for sure. 

Dogs are dogs. Size isn't an issue. My advice is based on my years of experience both as a pet owner and in rescue work, which has involved dogs from 100+ pound to the little ones and everything in between.

Dogs of all sex combinations can indeed get along. But I'd bet a goodly sum of money that if you surveyed veterinary behaviorists and top trainers the overwhelming majority would recommend the same pair combinations that I did above. There's no guarantee for any combination, because individual dogs are of course individual personalities. But the combinations I recommended above are IMO and IME stacking a favorable deck. And again, I think you'd be very hard pressed to find a canine professional who didn't agree in general, even though there are of course plenty of anecdotal stories of multiple females peacefully co-habitating. Me . . . I believe in stacking the deck. 😉 

[mommyoffive]

24 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

I have had the younger male dog usurp the older male in pecking order- it balanced out and wasn’t an issue but it was an obvious shift in who was boss. I haven’t had the same experience with females. The Queen is the Queen until the end, is typically how it has worked around here. Our Queen Bees have been the type to put anyone in their place, be it male or female. The worst dog fights I have ever seen (not at my house) have been between two large males, but I have seen females get pretty nasty in other situations. I still maintain it’s about personality as much as anything. If I had a super assertive female dog, I would either get a male or try to find a middle of the pack personality puppy. I will never again do a rescue adoption of an older dog, because it is a lot more unknown and I think more of a balancing act. I still have young kids so there’s no way I would bring in a large dog I didn’t raise. 

You last sentence was exactly what we did.  We were against it for a long time and wanted a puppy for that reason but it was to much for us at the time.   We fostered a puppy one time and it nearly broke me.  A puppy who didn't sleep through the night, 5 young kids with a baby who didn't sleep, and a husband who traveled.   

We were lucky in that we got some background info on her because the family who gave her up provided the shelter.   We didn't take her mate because he was huge and seemed very dominant.    But anyway she has been perfect and great with my kids.  My youngest was one or so when we bought her home. 

[mommyoffive]

Dumb question ahead.

If you we brought a male into the house, would it try to mate with our female?

[Pawz4me]

29 minutes ago, mommyoffive said:

Dumb question ahead.

If you we brought a male into the house, would it try to mate with our female?

Not if they're both altered, and if unaltered not unless/until the female comes into heat.

But "humping" is often a play/dominance behavior between two dogs (even of the same sex).