Making The Jump From One Dog To Two

[wire]

First 6 - 8 months kept shaking my head......how I thought I could manage 2 male Wheatens....just a crazy household

Now, 2 years down the track, I could never, ever, imagine life with out the both of them together. They love each other.

[kja]

[english.ivy here]

I'm a multi dog household and it's the best thing ever. I would never be a one dog household again. With multi dogs they all spend 90% of their time outside quite happily.

Training, walking, outings are all heaps of fun with two dogs.

They spend most of their time playing together and get the best enjoyment out of it.

[Katdogs]

Everyone else has covered the main points but I still can't believe how double dogs = triple poo pickup? Is it just more running around together?

[koalathebear]

Have been considering getting a second dog for quite some time but hadn't really done anything about it. Now the opportunity has come up where a dog of my breed needs a home.

I've been thinking about the pros and cons of all of it, but I'd really appreciate it if people who have multiple dogs could think of anything I need to be asking myself (or the breeder) before I take the plunge of going from one dog to two.

We have two dogs. A lot of people say you should have dogs of different genders but it doesn't seem to make much difference with Kelpies. My two get along great and are very well behaved together - I love having two dogs and don't regret having two dogs for a second :)

Some things to consider:

- although my two are very well behaved together, I can't walk them together so normally OH walks one dog, I walk the other and then we meet in the middle somewhere so the dogs can run around together

- when I first got Hoover, Elbie seemed a bit upset/put out and I had intense guilt about deposing him from his prime position as Only Dog :laugh: He looked so reproachful. I also worried about pack hierarchy because Hoover seemed more pushy in some ways. In the end it all sorted itself out and they seem happy with their pack dynamic

- training can be a bit tricky. For instance, OH was fine about taking one dog for obedience but although OH is happy to come to agility class, set up and put away equipment and babysit one dog - I have to run both dogs for agility because OH doesn't want to actually do agility - it makes things a bit challenging sometimes.

As I said, overall, it's great having two dogs and they keep each other company and cuddle together. It was also much easier to train Hoover because he copied Elbie in relation to housetraining and tricks as well. Good luck with it all :)

[Esky the husky]

I got so excited reading the title and seeing who started this thread.

I hope it works out for you Minxy

I'm in such a perfect position to ad to my pack at the moment to, but I'm sure your story will have a happier ending :laugh:

[dandybrush]

I enjoy having 2 but it is more time consuming as you need to spend time with each individually. My Mason is my special dog and I dd not know how he would react to having another dog live with us. He was very jello us of Gibbs at first but soon warmed up to him. They love each other so much and they both love thir humans too :) I would say Gibbs has bonded more with my hubby I think, but he does enjoy spending time with me too :)

thats funny, mason, my younger girl willow has bonded closer to my OH also. my first boy razzle is a mummies boy and my dog :)

minxy are you prepared to put kyojin away to work/train/walk/play with the new dog separately. this was the hardest thing for me i hate feeling that my razzle is missing out as it used to be he would do everything with me. but now i was putting him away to spend time with someone else.

that said my dogs get on famously and they love to play together. yet they still both look forward to going out for walks and to new places with me (separately and together)

the rest really doesnt matter imo. the feeding and the vet bills etc. i guess when u have 2 dogs u just pay for 2 i've never thought about the extra expenses

[CaseyKay]

We have four, still not sure how that happened! It was hard going from 2 to 3 as it was two seniors and adding a puppy but 3 is a good number for me. Now have the 2 BC seniors who love their daily walks and lazing around (12 year old with arthritis now does puppy walks with OH in the daytime and the Brittany pup... and 10 year old girl walks with me am and pm so we now have "pairs")and my agility/tracking BC 2.5 years old that I spend a lot of one on one time training. The Brittany pup is OH's to work and I just get to enjoy her. The 2 youngsters can create havoc when together, noisy wrestling mainly. Could NOT have 4 young dogs that would do my head in They are all girls too!

I think when the seniors go we will wait until Scout and Gael are much older before adding any more young dogs, Madd was 10 and KC 8 when we got Gael. Generally the only difficult time was the 18 months we only had Madd after the 2 previous senior dogs died 6 months apart. I'm definatley not a one dog person!

[Sheridan]

The first day Mini was here Grumpy was 'Oooh, a girl!' Next day it was 'Oh, she's still here. Where's my breakfast?'

Edited April 12, 2012 by Sheridan

[voloclydes]

we have 6... a chi, a pair of jrt, a foxie cross and 2x dals.

all the boys are fixed... sophie the dal is not... all dogs were added as adults apart from the foxie who was puppie... he was added when the OH's or jrt became a bit old and stiff at 13... it pepped him up and made him a bit more active, it was a bloke thing... he had to keep up...insert rolly eyes man.

they all get along fine apart from the odd despute... they soon forget that it happened too.

last night at bed time the jrt started a blue with sophie... who really like to finish arguements... so he was locked in the crate over night...

the hair thing tho when we went from one dal to 2 was 100x worse. not sure where such a short haired dog keeps all that fur!

the dals do tend to act like a pair.... hence the term in this house "the spots" one is hardly without the other.

it will be fine, dogs cope its humans that stress about little things.

[Pollywaffle]

getting a second dog only made us realise how much our first dog was missing out..in company..and you're giving a home to another animal...can't see any negatives.

[melinda10786]

I think it depends on whether you really want to.. We thought Monte would be a bit put out having a second dog and whilst he does still get his nose out of joint if we're paying a little more attention to Ivy, but he loves having company. Mine are opposites in a lot of ways, and I think that helps too. Ivy is very independantly minded and is happy to go off and do her own thing, and will come for a cuddle when suits her, whereas Monte can be a bit more velcro, but also is happy to do his own thing (generally when Ivy is asleep so he can steal all the toys she's been playing with :laugh: )

As they are a smaller breed, I can walk the two together on my own during the week and then my OH walks with us on the weekend. Monte gets to go to agility during the week and obedience on the weekend, but I've started swapping that so Ivy can come instead. As long as you can dedicate the time to swapping them around and doing the training separately and giving them time to themselves I can't see why not. We love having the two, my OH and I watch them from our back stairs chasing each other round the yard in tag team fashion and don't regret the decision. Yes, the vet, food and training bills go up, but if you're happy to have the two and dedicate the time, then they are definately worth it.

[minxy]

I enjoy having 2 but it is more time consuming as you need to spend time with each individually. My Mason is my special dog and I dd not know how he would react to having another dog live with us. He was very jello us of Gibbs at first but soon warmed up to him. They love each other so much and they both love thir humans too :) I would say Gibbs has bonded more with my hubby I think, but he does enjoy spending time with me too :)

thats funny, mason, my younger girl willow has bonded closer to my OH also. my first boy razzle is a mummies boy and my dog :)

minxy are you prepared to put kyojin away to work/train/walk/play with the new dog separately. this was the hardest thing for me i hate feeling that my razzle is missing out as it used to be he would do everything with me. but now i was putting him away to spend time with someone else.

that said my dogs get on famously and they love to play together. yet they still both look forward to going out for walks and to new places with me (separately and together)

the rest really doesnt matter imo. the feeding and the vet bills etc. i guess when u have 2 dogs u just pay for 2 i've never thought about the extra expenses

Yup, I think I can manage doing that. 5-10 minutes of play is enough to exhaust Kyojin for the rest of the day, so finding time won't be an issue. :laugh:

The first day Mini was here Grumpy was 'Oooh, a girl!' Next day it was 'Oh, she's still here. Where's my breakfast?'

:laugh: :laugh:

getting a second dog only made us realise how much our first dog was missing out..in company..and you're giving a home to another animal...can't see any negatives.

That's a good point. I'm home a lot now, but as soon as I get a job that will change, so I'd like Kyojin to have more company when I'm out. He's inside whenever one of us is home which he loves.

Thanks everyone, it's nice to know it should be a fairly smooth transition for Kyojin. He pretty much sleeps all day (and night) so I don't think he'd notice her too much. :laugh:

[raineth]

there are lots of wonderful things about having two dogs :) especially to do with them playing and having each other's company when you're out. We love watching them interact; and I have l;earnt so much from watching them together.

Having two dogs is quite a different dynamic from having one dog.

One of the downsides is that it's harder to take them both with you to places. Whether that be on an outing, or a few days at a freind's. While a lot of people might not mind having you come and stay and bring one dog, it does seem to be a lot more of an ask to stay with both. Maybe it doesn't matter if your dogs are little dogs, but I have found it does matter when both your dogs are the size of adult humans.

Other than that they are very able at working each other up.

So say when it's time for a walk, and we would grab the leads they would work each other up into a frenzy! (we have since worked this out). But that's just an example. If its something they both a get a bit excited about, then together they will get alot more excited about it :laugh:

[Snout Girl]

Or you could just bite the bullet and have 3 :)

Which reminds me, I need to update my signature to include Bruce :)

[WeimMe]

I think that it depends on the dogs in some ways. I thought that my girl would like the company of another dog as she loves having other dog visitors....just not permanent houseguests as it turns out! I need to feed them separately and at times during the day they need to be apart as young pup bothers the old girl mercilessly. The household also seems much noisier with two! I am hoping that once the new addition matures a little that things will settle down somewhat as there are times when the place feels like a madhouse.

I also find it harder logistically to go places with the dogs when you have two - we have a child as well, so it's a bit crowded in the back seat and as as been mentioned, people are reluctant to have 2 canine visitors where they were previously fine with just with one.