28 replies to this topic

[bcnewe2]

(It's entirely possible I'll be down by a couple before the end of the year. )
J.

Yes I am looking at the same thing. My oldest is 16 and next in line is around 13+. Can't imagine life without either of my old ladies.

What, no meet an greet in the bathroom? No one would go out till we do our little bathroom dance! Cept Mick who could give a rats patoot about bathroom time. He's ready to go out and make sure no neighbor dogs have peeded on his ladies spots!

When I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed about having so many dogs in a tiny house I will think of you! Some ask why I keep all of them in the house, I can't imagine not being able to share their lives with me all the time!

[juliepoudrier]

I hear you on the oldsters. Jill, at 15 1/2 is having much more difficulty getting up on her own and I find myself having to regularly rescue her from various situations, but she's still hanging in, tough old girl that she is. Willow appears to have a recurrence of her mast cell cancer and has intermittent bouts of anemia, which could be related to the MCC or perhaps, per the vet, internal bleeds due to something like hemangiosarcoma. Farleigh is 13, but I think he's mean enough to live forever!

When I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed about having so many dogs in a tiny house I will think of you! Some ask why I keep all of them in the house, I can't imagine not being able to share their lives with me all the time!

Mine stay in the house for that reason too. They're working dogs, sure, but they're also companions. Fortunately I have a decent amount of room in here, but if it were a smaller space, we'd just make do somehow!

J.

[Sue R]

We have a couple that don't get along well in certain situations. Well, one of the two doesn't get along well in certain situations, and it causes issues if they and the situations are not managed.

My dogs are fine left loose in the house for reasonable amounts of time - I can be outside for several hours and leave them loose, like if I am mowing the yard. Since the situations are crate-related (and sometimes, personal space by people related), they are not issues at most times.

I have found that management, being aware of potential triggers, and being a consistent leader (not always a strong point for me) work well. And, when we are gone to work or need to be out of the house for a while, we often crate *just to avoid* potential issues that we would not be present to prevent.

Normally, in our house, it's either everyone in the crate or everyone out but, should our current problems become bigger problems, we would probably do some rotational crating. That is what we do when we have visiting dogs oftentimes - with our three and our daughter's three, or our son's family's two, we either use different parts of the house for each group (we have pass-through baby gates, thank you, Lisa!) or rotationally crate each group since we often don't have sufficient crates in the house for all.

PS - Our dogs, like Julie's and Kristen's, are companions as well as farm-working dogs. They live in the house, sleep on their beds in our bedroom, and live their lives with us as part of the family. Thankfully, in spite of mud and cow poop, we can hose them off and bring them in no matter what kind of messes they've faced outside.

[juliepoudrier]

Ah, yes. We've had lots of rain lately. I could probably plant a garden in the amount of dried mud/dirt I've swept off the floor in the past few weeks.

For those considering crating and rotating, keep in mind that crating one of the troublemakers and leaving the other loose can still cause problems. When I moved to my last place I automatically crated Willow whenever I left the house (because of her chewing habit). I'd come home to find her water bucket dumped, her crate in obvious disarray, etc. Totally out-of-character crate behavior for Willow. It took me a while to figure it out, but Jill was left loose in the house and apparently she was going over to Willow's crate and picking a fight with her through the crate door, hence Willow making a mess out of her crate. After that, Willow was still crated whenever I left home, and Jill was still left loose, but Jill was baby gated OUT of the area where Willow's crate was so that she couldn't taunt Willow through the crate door....

J.

[Sue R]

Very good points, Julie, and we take that into consideration - using the baby gates or separate rooms or making sure that compatible animals are in one area. Sometimes, as in your case, it takes some figuring out to realize what is going to work and what is not.

[appyridr]

I supervise my five as there are some dislikes. 2 are intact BC males, 10 and 4. Two neutered males; 8 yr.old BC and 3 yr. old Chihuahua. And one 5 yr. old spayed female BC. Three BCs are in wire crates in the house and crated in my bedroom at nite. I do not leave them all loose outside unless I am out there with them. 8 yr. old does not like 10 yr. old because he was a 5mos. old pup when then 2 yr. old male came into the household. They had a brief scrap back then and only one about 5 yrs. ago. But I don't trust so I bring the 10 yr. old or the 8 yr. old into the house while the others are loose in yard on their own. The 8 yr. old likes the 4 yr. old and they play tug together but no wrestling. Nobody else particularly likes the 4 yr. old, including the Chi.(who yaps & chases him when they all first go out) 8 yr. old gives the 4 yr. old a growl now & again to keep him in his place. I think the 4 yr. old has a bit of passive aggressive in him. lol The female usually plays with a toy but loves it when she can entice the others into chasing her. Plus the 10 yr. old and female often have a wrestle once a day. When this happens the other BCs usually grab a tug toy and bounce around the wrestlers in circles. They all have their favorite hard rubber toys and often 'steal' them from each other just because they know the other dog wants it. Except no one ever steals a toy from the female. She gnashes teeth at them if they come within a foot of her toy.
When they are out in a field with a group of other Border Collies, they work each other. 'Shussssh' them and they have a chase/heading game that is particular to the breed I think.
cheers Lani

[Cynthia P]

I've had a dog (mini schnauzer) that we had to keep seperate from the one of the Giant Schnauzers. The mini was just stupid and would go after the male Giant. It was easier to keep them seperate, rotate etc. Like Julie I have more border collies than the average (11 plus 2 puppies) plus 2 minis, a 14 year old Giant and an 13 year old ACD. (oh and 5 LGDs)

We have had a couple of fights that have been bad. One ended up with a $3500 bill for my open dog, and the other with a few stitches. We have males/females/intact and spayed.

For the most part they all get along, the bad fight was 5 years ago and one of the pack has been rehomed. It does take some time to get the new dogs, pups etc used to the LGDs and I have one bitch that would prefer we not bring anyone home. Everyone understands from a minor lift of the lip that the 14 y.o. Giant is still in charge.

I have 4 or 5 dogs loose in the house most of the time and there is never snarking; But walks we have the whole gang out unless someone is in heat, and they are crated and we never have more than 8 or 9 in the house at once...

Cynthia

[MrSnappy]

I have 6 dogs - 2 females, 4 males. The one female, Piper, is The Boss Of Everything. Nobody messes with Piper ever. Spring, the other female, is everybody's bestest buddy. She's the resident eye and ear cleaner and she will cuddle with whoever will have her. It's actually one of the reasons I kept her.

They all get along well except for Dexter and TWooie, who are constantly making ugly face and stiff walking around one another. Occasionally TWooie goes off on Dexter, but they don't actually *fight*, mostly because Dexter knows he's not allowed to fight. Also, I suspect everyone in the house knows that TWooie is not all present in the bean.

The WooTWoo get along very well and always have. I don't worry about leaving the dogs loose together everyday when I go to work, as the animosity between Dex and TWoo is pretty mild, plus Piper puts an end to anything that looks like it may escalate. I am gone 11 hours a day so I would never crate any dog for that long. I do crate two of them at night, one for age related reasons (Tweed) and one (Dex) so that he and TWooie don't grumble me awake.

Spring plays with Wootie a lot and can sometimes entice TWooie to try it out too. TWooie plays with Woo, but Woo doesn't love it very much since TWooie's play style involves biting Woo in the pants. Spring and Dexter play biteyface on the bed every morning and that's it. Tweed and Dexter play a weird game of chase and bite outside, but never inside. And nobody wants to play with Piper, as they all fear her. When she tries to play, they turn their heads and pretend it's not happening ;-)

RDM

[Rave]

If you are curious if your dogs are getting along or antagonizing each other during the day, a webcam is a great investment. Also helpful for watching to see if a dog is seizing, figuring out how your puppy is escaping, entertaining bored friends who miss your dogs, house security, and much much more. I set up one that I could monitor online. The first day I had it set up and logged in from work, I saw that one of my dogs was completely terrorizing the old dog. I immediately went the hour home to separate them and restore peace to the household.