Question:
Hi all!
I'm sure my dh is just being a worry wort about this. We have an 8mo old cockapoo neutered male. He is as gentle as you can immagine. My parents own a 2 yr old spirited border collie female. Whenever we visit she puts our pup in his place by jumping on him or rolling him, she has even given him little nips if he goes near her toys or gets too much petting from us. I feel this is normal but not too nice for our pup but my dh keeps worring about it. We are going on an overnight ski trip this week and lucky will stay with my parents. In march we are going south for a week and Lucky will stay with them again. DH is afraid that Lucky wiil get hurt or become agressive to protect himself. Last year we had to put down a rescue dog due to agression that got way out of control. Please advise us. Thanks

Answer:
In my book this is totally normal. Your dog (could be either sex and neutered) is on your parent's dog's home territory, and she is just making sure that he knows his place in the pecking order. I have two dogs in MY house - both mine, and if the top dog feels the other is getting out of line she *postures* like crazy - just to let the younger dog know who is boss. When I have taken any dog to another house with a dog in it the *house dog* lets mine know whose house they are in, and whose toys they are etc. Tell your husband not to worry - the dogs will sort themselves out without bloodshed

Answer:
I agree with anniebananie. Little nips can be part of them"sorting it out". I know that when we introduced my dog to my BF's dog way back when we had even more than a few nips!! We found that every weekend that we spent togther, the dogs had to re-learn to get along. We finally had more success when we simply kept them together for long than a two day span and "iron it all out" if you will.

We now joke about it saying they(the dogs) lived together before WE did!! LOL

Maybe if this other dog is a part of your lives, you could have a little more time together, maybe even before you go on holiday and speed up the adjustment phase.

Answer:
An adult dog disciplining a puppy is completely normal and puppies should be submissive to adults. What's important is that it does not go beyond that and cause any actual injury.

How does your puppy react to this? Is he terrified, does he run and hide? If he just backs off for a moment, briefly flinches or tucks his tail, then resumes interacting with the adult dog I wouldn't worry. The female dog should stop disciplining your puppy as soon as he complies.

Just make sure it doesn't get out of hand. Your puppy is nearing maturity and dog aggression is certainly not unknown in border collies.

Answer:
Border collies also nip, they use this for out of control sheep, so maybe she is using this on your pup.

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