# 11 month old showing aggression towards new puppy



## Racheal1977 (Jun 27, 2020)

Everyone meet Dex.
We are in love, he is the sweetest lil guy.
Archie our 11 month old golden not so much 😭. He will be 1 on April 14th.
Within 2 hours of Dex being home,Archie viscously went after him, 😭. Had him yelping. Because he went near a ball of his. Archie has never been aggressive, towards anyone or any other dogs ever. Now he has growled and snapped at him twice in the last 30 min for being near me. Please tell me this stops. How do i stop this and correct Archie when it does happen?
We are showing Archie more attention, have now put up all toys, which I hated doing. Feeding in separate places, and have the puppy in a larger kennel running type thing, plus have a smaller kennel for night time.


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## CAROLINA MOM (May 12, 2009)

Dex sure is cute. 

Archie may be correcting him, keep an eye on them when they are together at all times. 
It may take some time for Archie to warm up to him or accept him.


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## Racheal1977 (Jun 27, 2020)

CAROLINA MOM said:


> Dex sure is cute.
> 
> Archie may be correcting him, keep an eye on them when they are together at all times.
> It may take some time for Archie to warm up to him or accept him.


The growling I understand, but he did bite him when he went after him. Scared us all to death.


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## cwag (Apr 25, 2017)

Did the bite bleed? Correction can sound and look awful without any actual damage. My little Bichon would really go after Rukie when he was too rough. It was actually a little scary to both Rukie and me but never any bleeding. He learned to play with her in an acceptable way which was good because of the eventual size difference. They became best buds.


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## Racheal1977 (Jun 27, 2020)

cwag said:


> Did the bite bleed? Correction can sound and look awful without any actual damage. My little Bichon would really go after Rukie when he was too rough. It was actually a little scary to both Rukie and me but never any bleeding. He learned to play with her in an acceptable way which was good because of the eventual size difference. They became best buds.


He did a very little bit on his paw. He wasn't doing this to correct him unfortunately. I have never seen him act this way. It broke my heart for the puppy and Archie.


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## cwag (Apr 25, 2017)

That sounds bad then. If it was me, I would probably try to keep them separated and bring in a behaviorist or a very skilled trainer to help sort it out.


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## Alaska7133 (May 26, 2011)

So first separate. Then you need to let your older pup know that this behavior is unexceptable. You wouldn’t want him doing this on a walk to some unknown puppy that he were to meet. Now this is in your home. You need to take control and not let the older puppy rule the roost. Keep older pup on a leash at all times, so you can control him whenever you need to. Go back to the beginning of training with older pup. Make sure to focus on sit, come, here, heal, down, etc. Do not train older pup in your home or when your younger pup is around. You’re just trying to make sure that your pup understands commands and understands that they need to respect your decision that older pup cannot growl or bite baby puppy. In the meantime, baby puppy stays in x-pen when older pup is around. You want no direct contact until your older pup has solid obedience. 
Once you are sure older pup has solid obedience, you can bring out younger pup, but both puppies have to be on leash, and you have to be able to stop and correct older pup from growling or biting. I quick tug on the leash and a ”no”, may be all it takes to get your point across. But it won’t work, if your dog doesn’t respect you and doesn’t understand basic obedience. Do not allow younger pup to crawl on older pup or bite older pup. Keep them separate and safe from each other. Younger pup is going to be a pain in the neck to older pup for a while. 
Good luck and really you have this, you just need to set some ground rules. This is your house and you get to set them.


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## ceegee (Mar 26, 2015)

It's not unusual for resident dogs to dislike incoming puppies, but it is unusual for a resident adult dog to cause injury to the puppy. In your case the resident dog isn't really an adult yet, and the behaviour you describe seems like resource guarding (with the resources being the toy and the humans), so you're going to have to be a bit careful with this. 

I went through something similar when we introduced our current Golden, Duster. Our resident dog was a 5-year-old 10 lb. toy poodle who had always been nice to puppies in the past but literally hated "our" puppy. The poodle literally wouldn't tolerate the pup being in the same room as him and it took many months to achieve any kind of peaceful co-existence, to the extent that I actually thought at one point that the pairing wasn't going to work out. I will also say that we had it somewhat easier than you because the aggressor was so small. It was easy to scoop him up and remove him from situations, and because of his size he was unlikely to seriously injure the puppy. Also, the poodle was extremely well-trained (he is the reigning Canadian national agility champion in his class) and has never been in the slightest doubt that we rule the roost, not him.

Basically we did what Alaska (see above post) suggests: keeping them separate, keeping the pup safe, and making sure the poodle understood that his behaviour was in no way acceptable. For example, whenever he attacked, he was scooped up and put in his crate. At the same time, we supported his position in the household by feeding him first, giving treats to him first, and so on. We did this not because he was the older resident dog but because he clearly had the stronger, more assertive personality. Duster, my golden, has always been a very mellow dog who is accepting of authority in general, unlike the poodle, who has often challenged us. 

As I said, it took quite a while to achieve anything resembling peaceful cohabitation. These days, five years later, the two dogs are friends. They can share a crate or cushion, and they share a water bowl. We still keep their food bowls separate and still feed the poodle first, and we're careful if both dogs are around human food at the same time. The poodle occasionally still tries to assert his ownership of the humans (e.g. if he's on someone's lap, he will sometimes growl or send out negative energy to keep Duster away), but we don't tolerate it; we put him on the ground or in his crate when it happens. I would probably be more worried if the aggressor was a bigger dog, but Duster is so laid-back that I think his attitude has played a big role in defusing the situation.

I hope you're able to resolve this. It's important to understand that it won't go away on its own, and that you're going to have to work at it, possibly for some time, to get the results you want. But it can be done. It's a question of consistency. Best of luck! Let us know how it goes.


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## Alaska7133 (May 26, 2011)

ceegee said:


> Basically we did what Alaska (see above post) suggests: keeping them separate, keeping the pup safe, and making sure the poodle understood that his behaviour was in no way acceptable. For example, whenever he attacked, he was scooped up and put in his crate. At the same time, we supported his position in the household by feeding him first, giving treats to him first, and so on. We did this not because he was the older resident dog but because he clearly had the stronger, more assertive personality. Duster, my golden, has always been a very mellow dog who is accepting of authority in general, unlike the poodle, who has often challenged us.


I agree, treat the original dog first. Feed the original dog first. Let the original dog on the couch first. Good points. I do the same thing. 

Sometimes a dog loves the new puppy, and we’ve had that. And sometimes the dog hates the new puppy, and we’ve had that. Keep everyone safe and establish boundaries. Make sure everyone understands the rules and the rules are set by you.


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## Racheal1977 (Jun 27, 2020)

Alaska7133 said:


> So first separate. Then you need to let your older pup know that this behavior is unexceptable. You wouldn’t want him doing this on a walk to some unknown puppy that he were to meet. Now this is in your home. You need to take control and not let the older puppy rule the roost. Keep older pup on a leash at all times, so you can control him whenever you need to. Go back to the beginning of training with older pup. Make sure to focus on sit, come, here, heal, down, etc. Do not train older pup in your home or when your younger pup is around. You’re just trying to make sure that your pup understands commands and understands that they need to respect your decision that older pup cannot growl or bite baby puppy. In the meantime, baby puppy stays in x-pen when older pup is around. You want no direct contact until your older pup has solid obedience.
> Once you are sure older pup has solid obedience, you can bring out younger pup, but both puppies have to be on leash, and you have to be able to stop and correct older pup from growling or biting. I quick tug on the leash and a ”no”, may be all it takes to get your point across. But it won’t work, if your dog doesn’t respect you and doesn’t understand basic obedience. Do not allow younger pup to crawl on older pup or bite older pup. Keep them separate and safe from each other. Younger pup is going to be a pain in the neck to older pup for a while.
> Good luck and really you have this, you just need to set some ground rules. This is your house and you get to set them.


So today wasn't nearly as bad as yesterday. We had Dex in a crate type thing that has plenty of room to run and play for his size, and kept him kenneled last night. Today Archie has been more curious about him, and laying by the crate a few times. I had Dex in my lap and let Archie approach us. He was gentle but when the puppy got to close to him he growled a little bit. I told him a stern NO and he sat down. 
I'm no where near as stressed as I was yesterday, but still stressed. I just feel so bad for both of them. Archie has had a ton of ball time today and cuddles and praises & treats.


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## Racheal1977 (Jun 27, 2020)

Here they are today. I think Archie wants to play, but I am so scared to actually let them next to each other. Archie did growl at Dex this morning while he was in his kennel, not sure why though. 
While he was doing this, he got told good boy about 100 times & got treats.


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## gdgli (Aug 24, 2011)

When I brought Buffy home as a pup I kept her crated. When I finally let her out with Aster I started with 5 minutes at a time and I managed the time. Buffy badgered Aster, he didn't want to play with her. When I had a behaviorist take a look she described Buffy as an alpha bitch---said she wasn't playing. The behaviorist recommended I show some leadership, not to allow this to happen. She said that the dogs expected this from me. I followed her directions and the dogs got along.

For the record I really take my time with something like this.


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## gdgli (Aug 24, 2011)

You might want to look at the Leerburg website to see what they have to say about this.


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