If you have raised littermates together, any advice for me?

I decided to keep 2 littermates together and they are now 15 weeks old. Have heard from trainers and others that it is going to be very tough bc the dogs will bond so strongly with each other and not one-on-one with a human. So far they have been great together and I get a break from entertaining them as they play with each other. Housebreaking is going bit slow since I have to corral both pups out the door when ever either one seems ready. But they are smart and sensitive and have paper trained fairly well. Both respond well to me and the 3 of us have bonded.

Others have told me to separate them often so that they will get over some of the separation anxiety. They have been separated for only as much as 20 mins at a time but now sleep in separate crates (which has really helped the female bc the male is more active and wakes her up). She prefers her own crate. He goes back and forth between her crate and his but is okay with sleeping over night in his own crate. They are side by side.

This is uncharted water for me. Books all talk about how to train your "one puppy" with not a word on multiples but there must be breeders and others who have had litter mates together into their adult years. Any thoughts?



I love the whiskers above the eyes.

As long as they're pooping outside,
you're winning!

now if we could get more consistent with the peeing...

They DO have me trained -- they sometimes 'sit' without being asked and then stare at me until I give them a kib or treat.

I think you just have to play to the individual characteristics of each pup. One will be the alpha, one not so much. I have always had multiple dogs, not from the same litter though. They act like it though once they bond. They are grown, but still lie on their backs and play snarly like when they were puppies. The younger one of ours is more alpha, is a year younger than the Senior dog. Senior dog is bigger and stronger, but the younger one is just very bossy. :)

that aren't littermates together. Their bond will be no stronger than it would be if they met as strangers to each other even after they're grown. Dogs either totally accept another dog into their pack immediately after meeting or not. But because they are the same age, they may have more squables in determining which one is more dominant over the other. Had they been different ages, the older dog may be more prone to demand dominance over the younger, but that's not always the case anyway.

What you have is two pups who happen to come from the same litter. Anything that will be any different is having two pups to raise and train rather than one. The fact that they're littermates is immaterial.

I would suggest crate training for potty training. Because they're young, they will just need to be taken outside a lot more often than an older dog, but they learn to not go to the bathroom in the house MUCH faster if they're potty trained with the crate ONLY. Took my pup about two weeks to be potty trained with just the crate. It was about a week of having to get up at least once during the night to take him out to go, and taking him out very often to go throughout the day, but he had it figured out that there was no going to the bathroom in the house in about two weeks and learned how to let me know he needed to go outside to go to the bathroom pretty much immediately.

This isn't to say he had to stay in the crate all the time - he didn't. I just timed his bathroom breaks so that the times he was out of the crate in the house he didn't need to go. Every single time I took him out of the crate, I took him straight outside to do his business. Once he was done doing all he needed to do, he could come back inside and be around the house with me watching him like a hawk until I thought he should go out again for a pee. Any time he drank any water or ate a meal I knew that a few minutes later he was going to need to relieve himself again, so outside we went.

Teach them immediately to enjoy the bathtub and riding in the car so that this won't ever become a problem in the future. Tubby toys go a long way in helping them learn that bath time and getting wet is fun. Taking random rides in the car teaches them that car rides don't always mean a scary trip to the vet and riding around in the car looking at neat things out the window and sniffing at the wind is fun.

lots of good tips there.

my next door neighbor has a war with his cocker everyy time she gets in the car....I had mine in the car from day one and they look at the car as a treat.

no?

I love labs - and learned in the most heartbreaking way that raising a lab puppy was not a good fit for me (hyperactive daughter and a toddler were enough thanks much), but I searched and interviewed and found him a home with three young boys who would wear *him* out - a happy ending.

I got myself a senior rescue and he's a puppy for about 15 minutes a few times a day... and that is perfect (for me)

Your babies are GORGEOUS!! : )

enjoy... : )

they crank it up twice a day but sleep a lot and are manageable even when energetic. I have them sit and be calm before anything; eating, greeting, new toy, etc. I has worked well. They now do it on their own; if something gets them too excited they sit.

Any time you have two puppies of the same age (or two kids nearly the same age) they will interfere with each other, related or not. We raised two litter mates (who happened to be the entire litter). I just lost one of them a few months ago, after about fourteen years. They were great beasties, and were great together, and it took some of the strain off us since they had each other for company. They one who survives was so heartbroken she wouldn't go to the area where her sister died for weeks. We had to move the food bowl to accommodate. She still whimpers sometimes for no apparent reason. People who don't think animals love and live as passionately as us are blind.

Nice looking puppies there. :) Love them fiercely.

May I present Bonnie and Clyde


Inseparable litter mates.

We got them after our last Shitzu died because we felt that unlike our last dog who hated it when the humans had to leave, we figured that with two of them they could keep each other occupied. They do. As far as their bonding with each other, I wish someone had told us about giving them separation time early on because if I try to take one for a walk without the other, they both go nuts. The one left inside barks incessantly and the one being walked keeps looking for the other one.

As to them ignoring us due to their relationship with each other, forget about it. They are such velcro dogs that it is almost too much. It has actually been an interesting anthropological study as we became a family, or perhaps "Pack" would be a better description. I'm the Alpha male and they kind of know what they can get away with and what they can't. They also know when they can climb all over me and when I'm not in the mood. My wife, on the other hand, is their mommy. Wherever she is, they are. Bed, chair, kitchen, bathroom, they follow her EVERYWHERE! If she goes out to shop or something, they don't leave the chair you see them in until she returns and if she is gone for more than a few minutes, when she comes home, you would think she had been gone for years by the welcome home she gets.

The other thing I find fascinating is how different their personalities are. Clyde is sharp as a tack and misses absolutely nothing. He can tell time as accurately as an atomic clock. When it is time for their walk, he will sit and stare at me until I take them out. 8:00, 12:00, 4:00, 8:00. He knows to the minute. We put them in a cage once when we had company and he paced that cage, examining every detail until he figured out how to defeat the latch mechanism and let himself out. Bonnie is more like "Ohh, Ohh, Ohh, I see a butterfly!

They are a real handful but I wouldn't trade em for anything.

We didn't separate them. We kennel them together. They love to fight with each other & chase each other around the yard. When they tire of that, they're ready to hang out with us either together or separately. They are the most affectionate puppies I've ever seen :-)

what?

not littermates.

Taht said, raised cat littermates, but doubt that would be at all comparable.

They definitely bonded with each other (the surviving one was lost for a couple of years after his brother died), but they bonded with me just as much. If one was sitting on my lap, the other needed to be there too.

Your dogs are adorable!

I would put up with almost anything from such adorable little (well, not so little) angels. Labs are such fun dogs - I hope you have a great time with them! I always see people in Central Park walking their dogs and I just long for one, but unfortunately, I work too long and my roommate has a cat so it just wouldn't be a good situation for a dog right now.

Someday I will have my own little dog family :)

a good time for my to deal with puppies.

It was no problem at all raising them together. They were really good dogs. They were housetrained in one week and I think it was because one just followed the other. They really didn't like to play ball or frisbee with us humans. So maybe it was because they had each other :shrug: But they were great hiking buddies for us. Misty lived to be 13.5 and Ranger was almost 16 when he passed.

Have fun with your cuties. I would get littermates again - no problem :-).

They have a new surprise or two for me everyday. They are a dream to train and be with. I had Boxers before and they were very sweet but not as easy as these 2.

Yours lived so long -- what did you feed them?

dog food for on top. I think it was mostly Alpo or Pedigree canned. Nothing fancy. Neither dog had a problem with those foods, their coats always looked good and neither had allergies. I rarely gave them any of those snacks (Snausages, etc). They would get a crunchy, big biscuit twice a day after their walks. they both loved ice cubes, too.

We have an ACD and a Catahoula Leopard now. They both had itchy skin, dull coats on the Pedigree so I have had them on Authority brand (from Petsmart) or Diamond dry food. They also split a can of Authority or Purina One, too.

I miss having Labs. Neither one of our current dogs likes to swim and we live about a mile from a nice river. Have fun. Can't wait for updates :hi:.

don't treat them any different than any other pups.They will sort it out themselves.Interference will just make it worse

I'm going going to admire your gorgeous dogs. :)

They are beautiful! I hope they have long, happy, healthy wonderful lives as part of your family. :hug:

Our downstairs neighbor found a yellow lab, a year old, roaming on the highway. We haven't been able to find where he escaped from. But he's healthy and wonderful with our cats and dogs. We've been helping for several weeks now to find his owners, or barring that, find him a new home.

Labs are wonderful dogs, but they are so high energy!

Have they scanned the lost lab for a chip? Mine are chipped but you would never know it if you didn't scan them.

So far mine are only high energy about twice a day and it is directed at each other. They are smart and enjoy a challenge; the trouble starts when they are really bored.

No chip. :(

I'm not sure how useful chipping is. One of our dogs is chipped from the original owner who rescued her. We had to have the chip checked to change the information on it. It took the vet half an hour to find the chip, and he kept asking us "are you sure this dog dog has a chip?" She is a very small dog.

If they take half an hour to find the chip in a 6 lb dog when we already know the chip is there, how hard would it be to find that tiny chip in a large dog, especially if you don't know if the chip is there?

I trapped and brought in two orphaned feral kittens whose mother was hit by a car; that was in 2000. When I brought them in, a solid gray female (Smokey) and a tux male (Bandit), they were scared, both of me and my mom and my calico, Tweety. Only the Maine Coon came to their rescue and raised them as if he were their father. Only when Smokey was 3 months old and Bandit was 4 months did they begin to warm up to us (Smokey took to me; Bandit took to my mom). Given that they were semiferal, they were one-person cats who would run from anyone else and hide under the bed or dresser when company came over (that's how come the management at the apartments never caught us with the extra cats :D)

At 5 months, we took them to the vet for their shots and spay/neuter. This is a must for all people raising littermates of the opposite sex, unless you want a bunch of unwanted offspring from incestuous matings. They were 2 when my mom passed away on 2/4/03, so I had to give them up because I was evicted from my apartment due to her death (I was an occupant, not a co-tenant).

I now have 2 cats, mother and son. I had Ruby spayed shortly after her kittens were weaned (I kept Max and rehomed the 2 females) and Max neutered when he was 6 months old. Ruby's now 4 and Max is 2½. Needless to say, this little kitten has grown to be one big cat--16 lbs!

The most important thing to do if you're raising littermates, especially if one is male and the other is female--have them spayed and neutered!

Sometimes they get competitive with each other as they get older, but all of them bond with me just fine.

Once you have raised several together, the idea of having *one* new puppy will never feel like a big job again! :)