Puppy Wants To Sleep With The Adults

[BowWow]

I've kept a puppy from the litter I recently bred who's is now 11 weeks old and doing well. Up until now I have been trying hard to incorporate her into the lives of mum and our other male staffy. All is going well and at sleep time, I have put puppy in the kitchen on her own hammock, whilst the older dogs sleep on their hammocks in the lounge as they always did before. Puppy is now looking to share mum's hammock and climbs in with her, sometimes being a little too playful considering it's bedtime and the older dogs are snuggling up for the night! Mum is very tolerant but this causes the older ones to start shifting around and climbing on each other's beds. So I've put the pup back on her own in the kitchen. I'm really not sure how to go with sleep arrangements and the pup can be quite a bossy little so-and-so! I don't want to start arguments between the dogs as I've never had any incidents before, so I'd like to approach this carefully from the start. Any ideas on how to deal with this?

[sandgrubber]

I let mine work such issues out on their own. Give them options, but let them make the decision. If you want to train the pup, rather than going natural, I'd suggest crate training.

[Sandra777]

If you want the pup to sleep in the kitchen then you're going to have to confine it there - it's perfectly natural for it to prefer to sleep with others, especially mum, as "in the wild" an 11 week old puppy would be no where near ready to be living independently

[Bluefairy]

What about placing the pup in the lounge inside a baby's playpen with their bed inside it. This way she can see the older dogs, but not interfere with them.

Though I would go with the PP and just let them decide the pack order. The puppy is lonely and may get a nip if it goes to far, but this is all only natural.

Good Luck

Edited January 21, 2010 by Bluefairy

[BowWow]

All's good and puppy has managed to slip her way in with the big dogs without fuss. There are three hammocks and sometimes when it's colder I find her snuggled up with mum or my male staffy and nobody seems to mind. Yesterday after a cold morning, I found the three of them on top of each other in one hammock - the other two hammocks were vacant! Made me laugh so hard! It's working fine so far and everybody seems happy enough.