Large breed puppy with small dogs?

[*blackrose]

One thing I'm concerned about with Future Puppy is that he is going to be a big dog, and Cooper and Gracie are both under 12 pounds. They get along okay with bigger dogs, but they aren't comfortable with them. They ignore Chloe (who is 45 pounds) and Cynder, who is 30 pounds, scares them when she tries to play with them. Seabees, who was about 55 pounds, scared the ever loving crap out of them, even when she was ignoring them.

They aren't going to tolerate having a galumphing puppy bounce all over them. I think it will help that the puppy will be their size when he first comes home and they'll be able to correct him as they see fit without feeling too intimidated, but the puppy is going to grow and I see things heading south rather quickly if he can't be taught to leave them alone. I wasn't too worried about it as Chloe was always really gentle with smaller animals, even as a puppy, but after seeing how much of a dimwit my sister's Retriever/Pit puppy is and how he tries to clobber Chloe and Apollo even when they are telling him to Back Off, I'm concerned the Future Puppy will do the same thing with Gracie and Cooper. Not only will this make them unhappy, they could really be injured by a 30 pound puppy that doesn't know his strength pouncing on them.

Is there anything I can do to make sure this won't be an issue?

[Grab]

My larger breed pups have been Chows, which aren't too rowdy. And they've always been good about reading and respecting the signals of the older dogs, even when they were tiny. Mainly I supervised and separated if the pup got too rambunctious.

[~Dixie's_Mom~]

I think it will help that the puppy will be small when it comes home, but honestly, I'd just try to teach the puppy from the get-go to give the other dogs their space. Chloe has always been okay with all dogs but gets snarky with pushy larger dogs (which is Violet to a T lol) and we pretty much just tell Violet to leave Chloe alone if she gets too pushy or Chloe starts to get snarky with her and it usually isn't a problem.

[JessLough]

Honestly, since it sounds like they're going to be rather afraid of him, I'd just teach the puppy to ignore them altogether.

[*blackrose]

Originally Posted by JessLough

Honestly, since it sounds like they're going to be rather afraid of him, I'd just teach the puppy to ignore them altogether.

That's what I was thinking too, but I wasn't really sure how to go about doing it.

I think it will help that from day 1 they aren't going to want to play. Wayne, my sister's pup, doesn't jump around and pounce on Rose (she's 14 and dying of cancer ) like he does Chloe and the cats, so that gives me hope that even a puppy can understand what a dog completely uninterested in playing looks like.

[PWCorgi]

I would get puppy lots and lots of playdates with appropriate adult dogs who will tell them off effectively.

Right now Siri and her playmate Ava are the same size, but Siri just doesn't take Ava seriously when she tries to offer a correction. She also doesn't give in to Frodo's corrections, and will just keep wiggling and smacking him. She only takes him seriously when he pins her down and just about takes her face off, I just wish he wouldn't try to keep the peace for so long before doing it. So we are making sure she gets playdates with tougher, but still fair, dogs.