Introducing a New Dog into Your Pack

#AlphaDogTraining #dogtrainingsaltlakecity Introducing a New Dog into Your Pack Published by Alpha Dog Training https://www.alpha-dog-training-slc.com Bringing a new dog into a home is always an exciting time. It's like adding a new family member or guest to the household. While much has been written on bringing puppies into the home - very little has been written about bringing new adult dogs into the home. The human pack leader makes it crystal clear that aggressive behavior is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. The human pack leader shows his dog or dogs that he will protect them FROM OTHER DOGS. This is a very important issue that the average dog owner doesn't realize, but I guarantee you your dog does. When it's done correctly the first few weeks of your relationship with the new dog set the stage for the rest of your dog’s life. The minute a dog meets you he starts to evaluate you as a leader. If you know this it's easy to set yourself up as a pack leader. Your job as THE PACK LEADER IS TO SHOW YOUR DOGS THAT YOU WILL NOT TOLERATE AGGRESSION TOWARD THIS NEW PACK MEMBER. Pack leaders decide when there will be a fight and by your stopping aggression you are reminding them who the leader is. If the new dog growls at us or the other dog during this process we either put him back in the crate (and the crate training begins again)or

we have the tools in place to give an appropriate correction. If you have a rank problem between you and your dog then you are going to have to deal with that before you introduce this new dog. There is no reason to rush the introduction of a new dog into your home. It can take weeks or even months for that matter. We have 4 house dogs. We have 4 crates in our basement one in my office and one on the main floor of the house. While our dogs can be together when we are present, we never leave them together when we are gone. In fact, we only leave one dog out of the crate when we are gone. Establishing a relationship means that you are subtly teaching the dog that you are the pack leader. This is accomplished by controlling every aspect of this dog’s life. During the first weeks the only time dogs are around one another is when one is in a crate and the others are loose. We know when they are beginning to accept one another when they begin to ignore one another. Your goal here is to show the existing house dogs that this new dog is now part of your pack. Once that happens you can start to think about how to introduce the dogs outside of the crates. We always handle introductions with both dogs on leash with a dominant dog collar. It's best not to do this inside the house. We handle the introduction by taking the dogs for walks together. If there is even the slightest possibility of a fight we will muzzle the dogs. The bottom line is to error on the side of caution and safety. Dogs use their body language to communicate so take a little time and learn a little bit about dog’s body language.