Age gap between established dog and puppy

[frizzynfrazzled]

Inspired by another thread, but I didn’t want to derail it with my own question…

What do people consider a ‘good’ age gap between an established dog and getting a new puppy?

Its not something I’d given a huge amount of thought to if I’m honest, aside from the obvious- not too small a gap because I wanted dog 1 to be reliable in their training and over ‘the Kevin’s’ and testing boundaries. And not when established dog was too elderly that a bouncy puppy would clearly be too much.

We’ve had dogs since 2008, and since then we’ve had two pairings. The first had an age gap of 3.5 years, the second was 4.5 years. In both cases all dogs got on really well from the off and we never had a moment’s trouble from the relationships, either as puppies or as they hit adolescence, or in the first dog’s old age (very very sadly dog one didn’t make old bones, he had a complication following surgery and was PTS).

For us, being young-ish adult dogs worked really well. They are a very sociable breed (all the same breed, dogs 2+3 closely related and from the same breeder), so perhaps that helped.

We recently lost our old girl. She was 14 which is a really good age. I think we are all a bit lost without her, especially dog 3. Despite still having bouncy D3, the house somehow feels very quiet without d2. Dog 3 has been very withdrawn over the past fortnight, but is starting to return to ‘normal’ with lots of long walk distractions and attention.

Some family members are keen to get another dog. Obviously this wouldn’t be quick (as in D3 will have probably come to terms with being an only by the time a puppy arrives, because it will be months. Our breeder is due a litter in the early summer). I’ll be honest, I flip flop as to whether it’s a good idea, remembering how bloody hard puppies are- at some point the previous 3 all had me in tears!.

But the other post has given me pause for thought. Altho in that case, the OP’s dig was used to being an only, so perhaps that has a big impact.

Dog 3 is 10, still very active and bouncy (in a good way). Usual walks tend to vary across the week. Usual pattern is 2-2.5 hours offlead 3 times per week, with shorter walks of 1-1.5 hours on the days in between. However, she’s now of an age that if something comes up, illness etc, she’s quite happy with a quick leg stretch. She’s the perfect amount of ‘waaaheeey! Let’s go!’ to happy to settle and snooze if nothing exciting is happening. Genuinely people are surprised by her age. She does not come across as an older lady. She’s a delight (if I do say so myself).

We sometimes stay with family who have an adolescent dog and she appears fine- will play until she’s had enough and if he persists will tell him and he stops, and they settle.

But, as I said, the other thread has made me think. So I am interested to hear others experiences.

Thanks

Obviously every dog is different, every family situation is different, but we've had mixed experiences with adding a dog to the family.

The first time, we had an age gap of 4 years, which worked out well. Older male accepted female puppy very easily. They slept in the kitchen together from the very first night. We later added her half sister. Introducing a male pup to her, as a much older bitch of 9.5 years, however, was disastrous for us. She was aggressive towards him and they had to live in separate rooms with a dog gate between them. As you can imagine, this complicated life greatly. They could be walked together, but in the house she hated him so they had to be fed and toileted separately. He was almost two years old before she totally accepted him being here.

It shocked us because she was a young, energetic 9 - still looked like a youngster, and was calm and quiet natured. We thought she'd love a puppy but she loathed him on sight. He was the same breed as the older dog she'd lived with but we'd had a 3 year gap in between losing him and getting the puppy.

I can't say if it was just down to the individual dogs because I'm sure others will say their older bitches have been fully accepting of a puppy. But for us, currently having just one adolescent female, if we don't add a second dog before she's 4 or 5 then we'll probably remain a single dog household, because in our experience, 9 was too old.

I think it very much depends on the dog, the puppy - and at the point at which you pick up the puppy, 99.9% will depend on the breeder - and your family circumstances.

A breeder who puts in significant effort to teaching the puppy and has lots of resident dogs (family I mean, not just lots of breeding bitches - so they have dogs that are a range of ages) will have had dogs that install manners in the puppy from a young age. So you can be reasonably confident that - if your dog is happy with other dogs in it's space and is happy with a puppy - when you bring the puppy home it should slot in fairly well after a few days/weeks. Whereas if you go to a breeder who does not put time, effort or energy into raising a puppy well and has no other resident dogs (and thus puppies only socialises with mum), you will find it harder as the puppy will likely not really have had manners installed in it.Puppies learn quickly and the first 8 weeks of their life are so incredibly informative that, if you pick the right breeder and your resident dog is okay (and you know its okay, not just you're hoping it's okay), there's no reason things shouldn't work out okay.

But that is all caveated by the age of the resident dog. An older dog who has never lived with another dog, or who has only lived with older dogs, or who has health issues or is slowing down etc, will always struggle with a more energetic puppy. And sometimes, they just take a dislike to the puppy for no apparent reason.

I have five dogs at the moment (but I do breed so it is different as the older ones are use to the puppies from day 1). They are 13, 10, 6, 3 and 5 months. The hardest part is the walks. DDog 13 can still do 7 miles in a single walk and is incredibly energetic and will often walk with the other adult dogs for 90 minutes - 2 hours a day and we'll average anywhere from 7-9 miles. But not every day. Puppy, however, can only do 2 miles or so on a walk. Trying to meet their differing exercise needs is very very hard. I can only do it because I have two DDs who will walk puppy and DDog 13 (on her slower days) come rain or shine and DSis and DMum live within ten minutes of me. I wouldn't be able to give them what they need otherwise.

Ideally, I would say 4/5 years old. As @CoubousAndTourmaIet if you wait too long, they can really struggle and exercise becomes an issue, but if you do it when they're too young it's a nightmare for training the puppy and, realistically, by 4/5 a dog can cope missing a walk every now and then or doing a shorter walk with the puppy.

Every dog and family is different though. I've known it work incredibly well - I have someone who has been buying puppies from me/DMum for over 25 years now and she always has 3 dogs at a time. She's never had any issues. But I equally know people who have added puppies to homes with other dogs and, even though they think their dog will be happy and say it loves puppies, their adult dog has nearly killed the puppy.

In theory, I think a 3 year gap is good, so older dog is matured and trained before puppy arrives. But it very much depends on the dogs' personalities and there are no guarantees they'll get on whatever age.

My first two dogs were litter mates. They got on as puppies, had a few fall outs during adolescence and then tolerated each other for the rest of their lives. When the first dog died I considered getting a puppy, but didn't feel it would be fair as DDog was 14.5 years old and deserved a stress free, peaceful old age. Sadly, he died three months after his brother.

A few months later, I got DDog3. He absolutely loved every dog he met, so when he was 14 months old I got a puppy. He hated her and I had to keep them separated for the first three months. Sadly he had lots of health issues and their relationship was always dictated by how he felt. On good days, they played together. On bad days, he'd attack her. I lost him when he was 3 years old.

Ddog4 was an only dog for ten months. She likes to say hello to other dogs, but never plays with strangers. When she was 3.5 years old, I added puppy number 5. She was a bit wary to begin with, but I knew it would take her a while to warm up to puppy. After 3 weeks, they were friends and playing together.

When DDog 5 was 3 months old, I took in a 9.5 years old foster dog. FDog was understandably very stressed and was in quite a lot of pain from untreated health issues. Puppy was annoying as only puppies can be. Foster dog would grumble, growl and snap at her and I thought I'd have to move foster dog on. But on day 9 everything clicked into place. Puppy and foster dog play together and sleep curled up together.

Foster dog and middle dog have a 6 year gap. They get along, but don't really have much to do with each other. They've never played together. And middle dog doesn't do cuddling up, so it was nice for puppy to get a snuggle buddy.

We had an age gap of 7 years between our original dog and getting a puppy (puppy 1). We saw our boy starting to slow a bit and didn't want to be without a dog...
Then when puppy 1 was 3, and original dog was 10, along came Puppy 2 as we didn't want our 3 year old Puppy 1 to be an only dog*. This is how we ended up with 3 dogs for almost five years!
We are now, because Puppy 1 is now 12, thinking about whether we need to get another dog so that Puppy 2 who is now 9 doesn't become an only dog...

*Footnote... Our dogs are our grandchildren substitutes!!!