Dogs on the Sofa

[Snackz]

Do you allow your dogs on the sofa? If you do, do you have any rules?

Dogs are allowed on sofa, but blanket is out on the bit that they sit on, and we are good at washing paws after every walk etc.

Not here. We have a 34 kg lab x GSD who would take up far too much space (despite being convinced he is a lapdog...)

You come and stop him

I had all these lovely plans with my first dog when he was a puppy about never on the sofa. But the desire to be with me and cuddling was more important to them than anything else I could do, and I got over that one fairly quickly. But then I admit, I love the cuddles and now wouldn't consider not having them up here.

@Francescaisstressed Do they have a set space?

@MaidofKent78 Our pup is going to be a big one but the sofa is the only place he settles. After months of saying no to him on the sofa, we have decided to trial him on it. Our rules are though, he's only allowed up on his own (nobody sits with him) and if somebody wants to sit on the sofa, he comes off.

It's so hard knowing what to do for best!

Yes, but he goes on his blanket and has to ask permission first (by standing beside his corner of the couch, resting his chin on it, and looking at us...).

Ds just took this...
Believe it or not we have plenty of chairs. And ddog beds...

@MichelleofzeResistancech See, our rule is nobody sits with him. This started off because we didn't want him up there but he really settles on there so I caved in

Nope. Dog is not allowed on sofa.

He has a cushion that he lays on usually (chihuahua cross) however, if you've got a blanket on, you're getting snuggles as he's a huge fan of burrowing in laps.
We had big plans that he wouldn't be able to use a particular blanket because it was a fluffy dry clean only job... 6 months later that's his bed blanket 🤣

@Collidascope Good idea regarding the permission! Can I ask how you got him to do that?

Dc sent me this at Xmas..

@Santaiscovidfree is that you squashed at the end? 🤣

No, 2 greyhounds and they would take up too much room. They have beds in both rooms.

@silverwings That was the initial plan but that's failed

Yes, but only by invitation and she sits on a throw.
(The invitation not is easy to enforce at the moment because she's too little to jump up by herself)

Ddogs do have their own sofa in another room..

The invitation IS easy to enforce.

My ddog is small-5.5k and she is allowed on the sofa mostly because I love snuggling with her
but like PP we always wash her feet after a mucky walk and she is non shedding so less issue.
Dcat is bigger and sheds loads but rules the roost and sits where she likes!!

[quote Snackz]@Collidascope Good idea regarding the permission! Can I ask how you got him to do that? [/quote]
I don't think we deliberately taught him to ask. Perhaps we said "no" as he was climbing up on a couple of occasions when he was too dirty, and he just decided for himself that he needed to ask permission from then on.

we deli. We probably told him "no" a few times, and he pci

Our first dog never showed much interest in being on the sofa (he was very fluffy so always hot and had been mistreated so he preferred to lie in the corner of the room so no one could come up behind him. Then we got our second who had clearly always been on the sofa, so that was that - both dogs on the sofa!

As they are both dogs at risk of stomach twist and one of DH's dogs as a child died of that, they were not allowed on the sofas for at least an hour after eating. We also intermittently ask them to get down so that we know they will pay attention if we have guests, for example.

No idea where that last sentence came from!?

No, he used to get on as a pup but by around 6 months he got arsey if told to get off so he was banned. On the very rare occasions he tries it now he gets straight down when told but I would still rather he didn’t
Only thing is we always get on the floor for a cuddle so if anyone is on the floor he assumes it’s cuddle time and you get 35 kg of Retriever sat on you.

Yes. No. Lol

Yep - no wonder I have a bad back!! Husky got up and moved....

Yes.Ours is tiny so doesn't do any damage and we have a leather sofa that wipes clean