Training for 'Mikey' gsd-x

Hey guys , well those of you that know- i've just 'adopted' Mikey an 11 mth old german shephrd x .

He has settled in relatively well with the girls but does have an issue with Sasi. Shes a 10week old NI puppy. Being a pup she is very much the usual "come play with me i wanna play" duracell bunny type Sharp teeth sharp claws.

Mikey will play fine outside with her as obviously there are alot of other things that will easily distract her from him, in the house its not good. If sasi goes near him, he snarls & growls at her. I take her away & play with her for a while.To break it up.

My question is how do I deal with Mikey when this happens? I had this with my last dog & Ruby but as Inky knew the boundaries & my voice changes it was imo easier to deal with. I realise that Sasi does need to be warned & told off by Mikey but I dont want to show Mikey ANY negativity as only
been here a couple of days but at the same time need to draw a fine line before he maybe does any damage. He is a big lad ...his head is the same size as Sasi lol

Any advice greatly appreciated. Thankyouuuuu

Bev xx

some older dogs dislike pups in their personnal space.. teh visual and verbal shows are normal warnings .. does the pup take notice or not .. if not then you are doing the right thing by removing her .. from what you describe you don't need to do anything with the older dog ... he's just arrived - it's all new a strange to him - he has no substantial relationship with you or his new environment yet and will need space and time to adapt PLUS A PUP TOO!

question ( not criticism) : why did you take on a new adolescent dog when you have just got a pup?

Can you provide Mikey a space of his own, e.g. use a babygate to give him a room to retreat to without Sasi following? We adopted a pup with an older dog in the house and she got fed up of pup's continuous attempts to play (her favourite was grabbing the older dog's tail!) so we just gave them plenty of time-outs from each other.
Like you said, you don't want to punish Mikey from giving these totally natural warnings, so I'd take it into your own hands and give him an escape from her every so often.

It is OK for an older dog to tell a pup off---snarling and growling sound bad to us but are a dogs way of communicating. He is teaching her manners. I doubt very much that he will hurt her in any way at all---especially having watched them playing.

I expect he will need a time out place but don't use it when he does the snarling thing----just use it to give him a break generlly and do the same with her.

rune

Totaly agree with the others
He dosent need told off for telling a pup to get out of his face - he is being a good boy and giving nice warnings

Dont leave them alone together and make sure you always heed his warnings and get the pup away - then the pup will learn to move away when he growls and everyones happy

Once he settles down a bit more he might want to play with the pup but its fair enough that he isnt in the mood and just wants his space just now

Nothing to add here either, all sounds good from what others have said.

Puppies do have a certain "licence" but of course, some dogs just really don't like them, but I think you'd find Mikey's behaviour would extend to the outside environment too if that was the case. He's purely telling her to get out of his face at home where he wants to relax, but I'm sure he'll come round if she listens to him like she should. I actually think the males are much better with the puppies than some of the bitches from what I've seen here with my old boy and Zena when she first arrived. In fact, I can't quite believe just how much she's got away with, and there was only ever ONE time when he really meant business (he even frightened ME with his barking and snarling at her ), but she was trying to pinch his raw carrot off him at the time, but she never did it again

Shepherds will always warn first, so if she pushes it too far, he might make it louder next time if he thinks his message isn't getting across, but hopefully it will if he does this like mine did! A full blown shepherd "p*ss off" is enough to scare anybody let alone a little puppy!

Good luck, I hope this'll be the end and she'll take heed.

Thanks for the reply, no Sasi takes not a pick of notice.I let it go a bit further when i went in at lunchtime to see them, I let him growl 3 times to try warn her, but she came back for more everytime.
I had been thinking of taking Sasis mum on , as shes up for rehoming too, but then saw Kodas post about Mikey & felt it would be more beneficial to rehome him instead. I have alot of patience with dogs, its just gonna take time to get them trained & settled x
Yeh i have babygates, i got them when Ruby was a pup to keep her off the stairs & out of the front living room lol i'll put one on the kitchen door way tonught then at least whichever one goes in tgere can still see us without the tormenting play included. Thankyou

Thanks Rune, am thinking mikey is associating the garden & walks as playtime & the house as rest / sleep time. Which obviously means s*d all to Sasi lol

Thankyou So pleased am off work tomorrow & kidfree so I can spend some quality time sorting this out.

Bev x

Thanks Helena, I hope she does start taking notice with a bit of Aided unhooking her from the poor lads ears/face/tail help once hes growled. Mikey is anything but dog aggressive, on the beach last night a strange dog wandered over & picked mikeys ball up...he couldnt have given a stuff aslong as he could have a sniff of said dogs bum

Ooooh forgot to add on that I've got Mikey booked in for training classes at a place in colchester on june 15th. Theres only 5 dogs in class and it lasts an hour. It sounds much better than the one sasi is booked into, may change her class if this is better

you should see my n.i if a pup gets in her face lol

there seems to be an unwritten rule here(yup cos they cant lol) that pups get away with murder.. grumblings,growls, muzzle holding goes on (all lessons in k9 body language)but at no point does it get beyond that... BUT hit the 6 month mark and you expected to start listening to them ...and they do

size has nothing to do with it...Tupac was playing with a chi x jrt pup of 12 weeks the other day,twas teeny! smaller than his head,and i think Tupac came of worse

.... Mickey has my rules..outside is for proper playing indoors is for chillin lol