speaker 0:   0:00
This is The Puppy Training Podcast Episode #42: Helping Dogs Get Along. This podcast is designed to help you on your journey of becoming best friends through love and learning as you train your own dog from home, and I'm here to help you every step of the way. This is the puppy training podcast, and I'm your host, Amy Jensen.

speaker 0:   0:27
Hello, everyone. Thank you so much for listening. It means a lot to hear from so many of you on how this podcast is helping you and your puppy in training. In whatever work you do, it's always nice to know that the effort you put in is making a difference for someone, and I know many of you experienced that same feeling in the work that you do in the world. I love that we can help each other and learn from one another, and technology makes us able to connect from around the world, which is so cool.  

speaker 0:   0:54
Today's topic is all about helping multiple dogs in your household get along. If you have a dog who guards things from another dog, or maybe a puppy who just won't give your older dog a break, I will share a few tips on how this situation can change for the better. First, let's give a shout out to Deb for today's podcast topic, thank you for sending it in, and to Kristina, thanks for your topic suggestion of dogs guarding their humans. That's a great topic, one that we haven't talked about yet, and I've added it to the list, so listen for that one coming soon. Let's talk about how to introduce dogs to one another, some management strategies that we can use, as well as the training ideas that we can help our dogs learn new behaviours so that they get along better. Whenever we talk about dogs and behavior and wanting them to do something differently, you'll hear me say a lot, “management and then training”. It's really important to pair the management with the training because we don't want our dog to keep practicing things that we’re trying to train out of them. If they get to keep practicing it, it's harder to train them to change. Management is key. I'm gonna give you some ideas today on how to manage situations where dogs maybe don't always get along, and then I'm also going to give you some training ideas. Just remember, as you are working to train the new behavior, it's important to manage.  

speaker 0:   2:19
Let's talk about how to introduce dogs to one another. When I'm first introducing two dogs that have never met before, I prefer to use some sort of barrier. This might be a baby gate, it might be an exercise pen, and then I'll ask someone to help me so that there's a person for each dog. The dogs are on leash. They approach the barrier, the gate or the exercise pen from opposite sides. When they get to the barrier, they can sniff one another for 3 to 5 seconds, and then I'm in a turn and redirect my dog away, and I'll repeat that 2 to 3 times. When you're turning and redirecting your puppy away, food works well, a favorite toy works great, whatever your puppy loves, maybe a squeaky toy or just a food reward, show them what you have and get them excited to follow you in the opposite direction. Then again, you're gonna do that several times now. The point of this is that you're able, in this scenario, to watch both dogs, and you can observe their body language so you can watch for nice loose bodies, neutral gear positions or where your dog naturally holds their ears. That's what we're looking for. Same with the tail. Wherever your dog naturally holds their tail, you want to watch for that. We don't want any sort of change in their body language. Anything that stiff or tense, if there's any kind of snarling or any low growling, than I'd probably be more careful in letting those dogs be together for the time being. I would maybe practice a few more of these meet at the barrier and sniff to say hi and then walk away kind of interactions until the body language is a little more positive. That would be something that maybe I'd work with the trainer on or you could reach out to me and my program, and I could help you get through that process. As long as the dogs, as they're doing these little episodes of sniffing and walking away, are happy and their body language is nice and loose and relaxed, then it's probably safe to have a supervised play session where they can actually interact without the barrier. Once your dogs are together and they're able to play, I do suggest that you supervise the playtime, especially if you have a brand new puppy that's come into your home, which is what my program specializes in. When these new puppies come in, they have a lot of energy and razor sharp teeth. It's common that these puppies overwhelm the dogs that are already living in our homes, especially if our dog is older. A lot of times these puppies will just go back at the dog, and they're biting their ears and they’re biting their tail, and depending on your dog and their personality and how patient they are with a new puppy, either they'll instruct the puppy on what is or is not appropriate, or they will just sit and kind of take it. It's important to supervise and then step in as needed. If you notice that your puppy is overwhelming your dog, your dog showing signs of a little bit of snarling or trying to escape or tucking the tail, cowering, getting down lower. There's different signs for the body language that you'll recognize your dog is not enjoying what's going on, and I would step in and separate them. Put the puppy in an exercise pen with something to chew or a toy to play with. Then your dog can have some space and some breaks from the puppy. Then you'll notice that, at other times of the day, they might get along really well. Maybe you're older dog does want to play or engage with the puppy. It's just that their energy levels don't match. Puppies, they’re full of energy, and they just want to play and bite and mouth all day long if they can when they're not sleeping. The older dog might not appreciate that, and depending on their personality, they may or may not be able to tell the puppy, ‘yes, I like this or no, I don't‘. That's where your job comes in that you can supervise that and read their body language, see how they're doing and then offer breaks as needed.  

speaker 0:   6:00
Another important thing to consider would be mealtimes and when you're giving your dog's chews. If the food bowls come out and your dogs feel like they need to guard that bowl or that food from the other dog, this can cause some issues, and we don't want any fighting to break out. The same thing goes with any kind of favorite chew or toys. If your dog has a favorite item that they love to chew and then suddenly this puppy appears and they feel like they need to guard that item and the growling starts, we don't want to escalate into some fighting. With those kinds of situations, the easiest thing to start with us that management. Separate your dogs when they're eating their meals. This might look like putting your puppy in an exercise pen to eat his food while your other dog is out and finishing his food. Then, when mealtime is over, I pick up both food dishes and we put them away for the day so that there's not any kind of need to guard those bowls. Also, with the chews same thing:you can send one dog to choose something in one room, you could shut the door and let the puppy to something in that room. You can use that exercise pen again. You can use a tether where you attach your puppy to a leash and that leash is tethered to maybe something heavy that can't fall over, like a sofa or a dining room table leg, so the dogs aren't able to get to one another and possibly try to steal that item. When the stealing starts, then the dogs feel like, ‘Oh, I do need to stand up for myself, I do need to growl and let this other dog know that I don't want them to take it’. And all of that is natural dog behavior. Some of it's probably OK, especially if you have an older dog that's very good at teaching your puppy, is very patient with that puppy on educating them about dog body language and the signals that mean this or means ’no, I don't like that’. Again, it's gonna vary from home to home and situation to situation, and I understand that, but just some basic guidelines with the management would be to create separate spaces for your dogs to do the things that they love to do, and then you're not going to have any fights break out.  

speaker 0:   8:08
Let's say that your dogs are already exhibiting some of this guarding behavior. Maybe that's already happening, that's already occurring. We can absolutely do training in this scenario so that these situations resolve and we don't have any of these guarding issues. Let me give you a couple of ideas for that. First, classical conditioning, Good old Pavlov and his classical conditioning. You can help your dog associate the new puppy with the prevalence of food. We want this new puppy to be a positive association for your dog. Your dog will come to love the presence of the puppy and a natural way that that happens is the food that comes out with training. We use food and training because it is such a high motivator for a dog, and the dogs need to be motivated in an order to learn, and food works great. The beauty of this is the older dog sees that the puppy is bringing out all of these food rewards that maybe didn't previously exist as much or as often or as frequently. Now that this puppy is here, there are treats a lot. When I say treats that we're using, I use the puppy’s kibble or a dog food roll, I use freeze dried liver, I use Cheerios, apples, carrots, string cheese. I use a variety of things, but we do use their food a lot, just their mealtimes. Pick up the food, put it in a bag, put it in a training pouch and then incorporate both dogs into the training so that your current dog learns that this puppy is great because whenever we're training or doing new behaviours or finding things that we like that this puppy's doing, we're marking yes, and we're dropping treats. When I'm doing it with my puppy, I'm also giving my older dog treats, and he's learning, ‘this is fabulous’. Again, that classical conditioning of creating that good a positive association between the puppy and your current dog.  

speaker 0:   10:02
Another behavior that I love to teach puppies, older dogs, any dog really is the ‘go-to-bed’. This is mat work, some people call it that, some people call it place. In my program, we say ‘go to bed’, and the lesson is to 2.11 if you remember, so head over to unit two, you'll find that lesson in there. I'm gonna show you how you can use this lesson to help a dog who currently guards a resource from another dog in your home. This will help those dogs to get along better. First, we can use the ‘go-to-bed’ lesson to train your current dog to take his resource that he loves and go to his mat and chew it there. Now I would put the mat or the bed, whatever you want to call it, in a separate room. We're going to train the dog that whenever the puppy enters the room, that he picks up what he has, and he goes to the other room and lies on his bed. Now, in order for this to work, we need to prevent the puppy from following the dog into the other room. Otherwise, it's pointless, and the other dogs gonna still have to feel that need to guard that resource. However, if you can intercept the puppy or then put up a gate or shut a door so the dog exits, goes to his bed, chews the bone there, and you're closing the door or you're putting up the gate or shutting the gate whatever that looks like in your house to prevent the puppy access than your older dog can chew in peace, he can keep his prized possession and work on it while you are then able to play with the puppy in a separate area. The cue for this behavior becomes when the new dog or the new puppy enters the room. That's the cue for the older dog or current dog to pick up their resource and move to a different room. The action would be then that the dog takes the resource to the bed and chews it in a different area. The reward for the other dog is that they get to chew in peace. The cue, again, is the puppy enters the room. The action is that the current dog takes the resource to his bed in another room, and the reward is that the older dog gets to chew in peace, and I guess you could also say that the reward for the puppy would then be you're going to redirect them onto another activity, fetch, tug, maybe they get their own chew in this now separate area just so that they are supervised and they're separated so that no fighting occurs. Again, that lesson 2.11, ‘go to bed’, is the basis of this concept, and that will need to be trained. While you're training, remember, you're going to manage this situation. You're not going to let them get into any kind of argument or squabble over a resource that they love. You're going to separate them while they're chewing priced possession.

speaker 0:   12:41
The other way that you can use this lesson would be to train the new dog to do the alternative behavior, such as going to their bed when the older dog has a chew. It's reversed. Basically, the cue would be that your new puppy sees the older dog with something that they're chewing, either a toy or a bone or something that they love, and then the action would be that the puppy goes to their bed. The puppy sees the older dog with something that they're working on, the puppy goes to their bed, and then the reward would be that the puppy gets rewards for going to and staying on there mat or their bed. In this scenario again, the older dog gets the reward of ‘I get to chew in peace, I'm not gonna be bothered by another dog’. The puppy is learning, ‘Oh, if they have something good in there chewing on it, I'm gonna move away from them. I'm gonna go put myself over here on this mat and then I'll get something good, too’.  

speaker 0:   13:31
A few last ideas to help dogs get along with each other in the home would be to make sure they're getting enough exercise. Dogs who have plenty of exercise rarely get into fights. They're more likely to relax in the home and be chill. Make sure your dogs are getting outside and getting enough running around. Going on walks together is another great way to get them to get along. Taking them both on leash together, out and about, getting that exercise will really help keep their activity levels inside the home to a minimum and on a happy level. There are many other creative solutions. That's the fun part of dog training, that you can come up with really anything that will number one, change your dog's motivation, and then you reward that, and the behavior that gets rewarded most likely gets repeated. Any time you have a behavior situation, today we happen to be talking about dogs who maybe don't get along, or dogs who have trouble sharing something that they feel like it's theirs, you can fix that by looking at what's motivating my dog to do this behavior, how can I change my dog's motivation and then reward a new behavior. As part of this, I would love to hear the solutions that you come up with. What works at your house? What have you tried before? Do you have multiple dogs? And if there's things that you do that work well for you, please share. We like to learn from one another, we like to help each other, and that's a great part of this program. 

speaker 0:   15:00
That's it for today, guys. If you know someone getting a dog soon, please share our podcast with them. We really appreciate your help of spreading the word. Our goal is to help is many puppy families as possible start their training journey off on the right paw, and you could help us get there. Also check out the online puppy school at BaxterandBella.com, where you can get access to our members-only area and get all of the resource is you need to train your own puppy like a professional at your fingertips. I show you exactly what I do with the puppies I trained professionally and I walk you through the process Step-by-step. I would love to help you with your new puppy. Have an amazing week and happy training. If you have a question about anything you heard on this podcast or any other puppy training question, visit my site BaxterandBella.com to contact me.