Wooden floors + dog = ???

[Fillybuster]

All a bit hypothetical at the moment, so please be kind.

I've been wanting to get a dog since a very long time before I met DH. Actually, I wanted several dogs, one or two cats, hamsters, rabbits and possibly a horse, too. But somehow have ended up with 3 dcs and no pets to date.

We are about to do a massive renovation project on our home. It will take about a year and dh has finally been worn down agreed we will get a (smallish....cocker or similar) dog when we have finished.

At the moment, we are planning to have dark wood floors through most of our open plan downstairs. Tile in kitchen and utility, but kitchen is open flow onto the wood areas.

Penny has just dropped for both of us that this might not be a very good combo (although good for clearing up accidents in those early days....!)

Can anyone please let me know their experiences? Can we go ahead and get a wooden floor or will it get totally trashed? Or is there some sort of compromise?

Thanks :)

We had wooden floors when we got our first cocker years ago.

She did a bit of slipping and sliding for the first few days. Especially when she tried to run. It didn't take long for her to get the hang of it.

She didn't damage the floors either that I can remember. But I can't saying definitely not.

We have just got another cocker and have carpets throughout, apart from the kitchen. She slides across the kitchen floor all the time.

We have just had her nails clipped and hair between her pad trimmed and that's helped her. She was sliding about on the hair between her toes.

But she does seem to enjoy running round the kitchen and sliding about

We have wooden floors throughout the downstairs and and tiles in the kitchen, our dog doesn't slip or slide and it makes hoovering the hair and cleaning up the mud really easy. My dm has laminate flooring and our dog slips and slides all over it and really doesn't lime walking on it. I think it just depends on what kind of wood you have.

Keep the pups nails trimmed and they shouldn't scratch the floor. I also file my cocker's nails, just to round them off otherwise they do have sharp edges (learnt that one from her jumping on the sofa and gouging a nice big hole in it). If you do it from young, they do get used to it and it doesn't become a battle! I've got wooden floors in the lounge and hall and they still look fine, you should be ok with a smaller dog. Although the puppy chewing is another thing entirely! My skirting boards look awful from when she was teething

My first thought was puppy chewing! I'd be inclined to get the puppy before you start the renovations so by the time they are done the puppy will hopefully have grown out of chewing.

We have laminate and our lab walks on it fine!

We have great quality laminate and it's not damaged at all. Why would it be? Do you mean from their nails? That's never been a problem with us

My parents have a wooden floor with a golden retriever and Labrador. They don't slip about but it's noisy and there's scratches all over it

We have varnished original wood floors and its chipped and scratched from nails. I think laminate is hardier than real wood?

Still it's easy to keep clean and I think carpets would stink judging by how bad my rug smells after a wet dog has snuck in and slept on it!

We have laminate floors and are about to re-do them. Much better to have wooden or laminate. For one thing you don't get the smell of dog all over the house! Even when we've had a small rug down for a change, within a week it starts to smell very doggy. At least it can be thrown away or put in the washing machine to freshen up. Carpets, unless cleaned regularly, absorb the stink very quickly. I know people with the dog and carpet combo, and the smell hits you as you walk in their front door. Not dirty people or dogs at all, just the carpet and dog mix.

Laminate and Golden Retriever here - no problems at all apart from it being a bit slippery if he comes straight in from his paddling pool. His fluffy butt seems to act as some sort of sponge that soaks up water and releases it once he gets inside!!

And it's lovely and cool for our dog to lay out on in the summer months.

We have hardwood and the dog does this comedy running on the spot thing a lot, and skids around everywhere! We are about to move and are going with wood effect Karndean in the new place as its a bit more textured and grippy.

Thanks all. Dh is more worried about the state of the floor than the dog, but somewhat (....ish) reassured by your comments.

Sadly we can't get the dog during renovations as we are moving out and renting in a no pets house.

But will have to think about how we keep our large rugs from smelling...!!

Our Labrador is terrified of hardwood/laminate floors and wont go in our bedrooms or in the kitchen. He will put his front legs in as long as his back legs stay on the carpet. We had to put a runner down in the hall so he could get in and out of the house.

He was okay as a pup, but at around 7 months old a firework went off very close outside, he got a fright and lost his footing while scarpering out of the kitchen. He's 3 now and even his absolute favourite high value treat, a raw beef, wont lure him back onto any hard flooring (I've also tried short nails using a dremel, and pad wax)

I have pale tiles in a rural area with the moultiest dog in the world. Shows every mud print and takes ages to dry. I'd go for wood or laminate next time.

We are looking to get a dog. House checked and told we need rugs over laminate.

I've got an oak floor downstairs and two jack russells. It's fine, it gets marked worse by dining chairs being pushed in and out than it does by the dogs. I've had it for three years and wouldn't change it.

We've got dark-ish wooden floors throughout the whole of the downstairs of our house, and they've been fine
No scratches, easy to clean up accidents, and the dog doesn't slide around
The only 'downside' is that she is a yellow lab who moults like mad, and it shows up quite a lot
But I've bought one of those rubber brooms and a cordless dyson, so 5 mins twice a day keeps the floors clean

We have a smallish dog (Jack Russell X shi-tzu) she manages our laminate really well, after her evening walk she goes a bit loony and it's hilarious watching her run about 😂

We moved from a house with carpet to one with laminate a couple of years back. From the first two days the sound of the dogs claws on the laminate drove me insane. I didn't think I'd be able to cope with it. I never even notice it now!

We have a springer and decent laminate. Have had no problems at all, no scratches and he doesn't slip or slide. As a bonus, the colour (walnut) seems to match the colour of the mud outside, because we can never see any dirt on it