Dog play going too far

[SilverHairedCat]

So, my girl (27kg greyhound/collie/husky Cross) has 2 staples in her chest and a big bruise above the wound after playing with our friend's 7mth old collie pup all day on Sunday.

They are good pals, but the play is usually tumbling and chasing. They were in the garden with us all day whilst we were bbqing etc and noone noticed anything unusual, and certainly no yelps or growls from either of them.

The play is usually a chasing game, but can be wrestling and some mouthing - usually ears and jowls. Clearly it went too far at some point, as we all suspect the pup has bitten her.

How do we change the play? Re directing? The pup is ball obsessed, so I'm loathe to use a ball to distract her - I've also noticed she's getting protective over tennis balls, so it's possible the bite was down to that?

They're never unsupervised, but our dog is so stoic she rarely makes a noise - barely a squeak and a wriggle when she was stapled, poor love - so if it does go too far, they are not showing it.

You cant realistically stop the pup play biting ...it's what they do! However if your other dogs a bit fragile I'd just monitor it closely. If the pup goes too far and clearly lands a hard bite which is not play, you've got to intervene rapidly with hard words and a 10 min 'time out' so that behaviour and consequence are linked in pups mind. We are having same prob right now with our pup btw! 10 mins of ignoring in another room seems to hit home...we've got a penned area know as 'the sin bin'

Oh, and my dog is 2yo so still thinks she's a puppy too!

The pup doesn't nip anyone else, will monitor that.

Is the Collie pup socialised with other dogs? Other than your dog I mean. She needs to learn what is appropriate and what isn’t and only other dogs can do that effectively. It sounds like your poor girl isn’t ‘telling her off’ when she goes to far, possibly because she’s quite young herself.

No tbh, I don't think she is (my opinion). These two play together every day but mine is a submissive sap despite her size, and the pup is shaping up to be a much more pushy and dominant dog (I'm not talking about dominance theory!). The only other dog the pups been around recently is a 3rd friend's female dog who is an aggressive arse, and you've reminded me that she actually bit the pup when pinning her a few weeks ago. That dog has been known to attack before, but her owner is basically in denial....

Obligatory photo of sad dog (because she's on house rest, no running for a day or two!)

Hmm, she’s not going to learn how to ‘be a dog’ under those circumstances. And at seven months they’re rapidly running out of time to change that. Do you think her owner would be open to you suggesting socialising with ‘helpful ‘ dogs? Do you know anyone else with a dog that might be appropriate? I’ve had three friends and DSD ask to bring their puppies here to play with DDog because he’s good at letting them have their up to six(ish) months old ‘passport’ where they get away with murder and then he’s very good at letting them know what’s ok and what’s not ok, in the correct way. If you’re correct in your thinking that she isn’t socialised then you might soon unfortunately end up not being able to let her be around your dog anymore.

Yep, ok, she’s adorable. Bring her to me now, I want her.

She's a beauty! Part fox, part giraffe, part deer and judging by today's noises, part piglet.

Yes, I think they would - I'll see them later so may be time to have a chat about it. Most of her time spent with other dogs is with ours, but even walking her in busier doggy areas would help, no? Especially without a tennis ball....

I wouldn't want my young dog interacting with a dog that caused the need for staples and bad bruising. This is always a difficult situation it is similar to when your best friends children do not get on with your children.

It will teach your dog nothing except that to get the bullying to stop she will have to get more aggressive. Can you tactfully avoid them playing together or as soon as the play gets rough then break it up.

Dog play should be like an echo, one dog is seemingly being the top dog then the roles change within the game Healthy dog play looks like a rocking horse the dogs move in a up and downward fashion. They should break off at intervals to sniff and wee. If the roles do not change then it is not happy dog play. If you do not step in then your poor girly will have to up the anti to get it to stop.

What a beautiful dog

I would have described the play much like that until now, including the regular play.

Photo of them behaving nicely!

Regular breaks, even!