Dominance challenges old/young dogs

[susee]

At what age does it become less of an issue between housemates.
ie:

Currently have a 13 yr old fmale B Collie, the advise is get a Puppy, because she will cope a lot better with that, although she is going to be pretty unhappy about it initially because she is still very firey ++ and dominant around territory house/car, but excellent +++ everywhere else


I would have prefered not to go the Puppy route, but i was probably a bit too scared not too start with a baby becaus eof my concerns around her getting knocked around by a teen or adult dog from any circumstances, coming in


So, is the Puppy actually likely to become a problem and start pushing for the top spot with an aged Dog as .........he ages, making her unsafe, as she really is not up to it physically at all, shes old, but doesnt know it


Or, is she of an age where she is becoming a bit safer, although i am a rescource to be fought over i would have thought ??

[CarrieJ]

Or, is she of an age where she is becoming a bit safer, although i am a rescource to be fought over i would have thought ??

It's hard to say...if she's been the only dog for awhile and you will need to place yourself in a leadership role not a resource role. Resource guarding is IMO not something to just passively accept.

I'd stay away from the same gender as that creates lots more competition then same sex dogs. (I am a hypocryte; as I inherited an older little female and have a female GSD)

You will have the older dog "correct" the puppy, and the puppy will hit adolecence and become a "poo face" challenging, competing for everything etc. It happens but it's up to the owner to control the situation.

[susee]

Thanks Carriej, no i wouldnt accept rescource guarding passively, no-way Jose !

[Davey Benson]

13 yr old f bc? I would be surprised if she even acknowledges the puppy, and if she does it will probably be with disdain. There will probably be moments when she might play with the new arrival, but mostly she will just view the little one as an annoyance. However I don't think this reaction will be age specific. She will probably react this way with any new intruder in her space. There might be less resource guarding issues with bringing in a younger dog however.

[kiya]

You can't predict how they are going to act. When I got Kiya at 14 wks we had Chazzy, a 8 yr old female GSD that didn't have a mean bone in her body and Apache was about 1-1/2 yrs old. Kiya was respectful and more so when Chazzy corrected her for trying to take a bone, that never happened again.
Present day, I brought Lakota home at 8 wks old to Kiya who was about 5 and Apache was about 6-1/2. I thought for sure that my problem would be between Kiya and Lakota, the 2 females, but it turned out that my older male had -0- patience or tolerance for the pup. Kiya and the pup were best buddies from day one.
I think one of the most important things I had to learn was that when my pup was being obnoxious and the older dog corrected the pup, I did not interviene and correct the older dog for it. Of course I take precautions to prevent incidents with toys, bones and food. And both older dogs did show a "spark" of life with the pup around.

[JKlatsky]

It really depends. On the personality of the puppy and the tolerance level of the older dog.

Our older male-8yrs- was FANTASTIC with Tag as a puppy (who can be a real jerk) and very tolerant- but would definitely correct him if he got too rude. But then Tag grew up. And Tag started trying to assert himself...and if there is one thing that Ike will not politely ignore it's a dominance challenge. So...we keep them largely separate at this point. There's no fun in letting dogs play together if you have to be on constant alert for trouble.

Anka is our female and you would think this would be no problem...you would be wrong. She loves all our older dogs...but you can see that she takes a lot more roughhousing from Argos who was her older brother than she will from Tag. It's like she's knows that he's younger and below her in our pack. He tried to push her out the way once at the giant water bowl we have in the yard for when they get thirsty and she may have overreacted slightly when she let him know that wasn't OK. But all Argos has to do is give her a look and she backs right off. And Argos is not the most dominant dog in our pack.

So there can be a lot of juggling that occurs not just in the beginning. Personally I think much can be managed by just introducing the dogs SLOWLY over several weeks/months and teaching them to ignore each other and then just accepting the play that occurs spontaneously...and not just "Hey LOOK!! I Brought you a PUPPY!!!" and plopping the pup down on the floor in front of the old dog. (Which I know sounds riduclous...but so many people do JUST that)

[susee]

Thanks all. This Dog was bought into the house when we had a then 12 yr old Red Cloud Kelpie, the most laid back dog out. And he was no problem, she was, at 8 mths old very very possesive, and remained that way for the nnext few years, i initially got a behavourist in because she was very very aggro with him, it settled in the end.


There will be no playing, she will just say nick off, shes still veeery active but not into playing at all, the one issue i have to be very mindful of, and i will have to contact her specialist about it to get them to approve a Pup in case they think its not a good idea.

She actually has a Cardiac implant ( Pacemaker) which she got at 12 yr old, which is like a matchbox just under her skin about where her collar is near the shoulder blade area, so i have to just check this out, it can take a knock, and that s why they are implanted there, she has a very typical thick BC coat, so i have a few extra issues to consider.