Are Two Puppies Twice the Fun, or Quadruple the Work?

The Two-fold Issue

Lately we’ve been training a lot of people with littermates, puppies from the same litter.  We’ve worked with sisters, brothers, and sisters and brothers.  There is one thing in common ~ a much higher degree of separation anxiety, and not between human owners and dogs, but between the siblings themselves.

At first glance, it may seem like a good idea.  The dogs will have company when the people are away at work, etc.  It may be easier for them to acclimate to a new environment in the presence of one of their brothers or sisters.  These are short term, short sighted observations.  Because, while, on the whole, those are valid observations, the long term, not so obvious consequences of purchasing littermates are terrible separation anxiety, and other behavioral issues.  The second issue becomes the puppies actually bonding with their human counterparts.  There is little incentive for a puppy to leave its sibling to learn to have a relationship with a person.  So, you end up with puppies that are much more attached to each other than to anyone else.

Two Tales of Two Shepherds and Two Sisters

Recently we trained two German Shepherd Dogs siblings, a brother and a sister, about one year old.  The owners were concerned about their obedience, and some additional behavior issues, in particular with the male being aggressive with visitors to their home.  We ended up board and training these two for one week.  These were very smart, quick to learn shepherds.  The obedience with them was easy – provided they were together.  If we separated them (and by separated I mean about 10 feet away) the female would literally scream like she was being viciously attacked.  Now, these owners wanted nothing but the best for these dogs and that much was obvious.  They had never heard of “Littermate syndrome” or the potential devastating issues that can develop from keeping littermates together.  When we returned the two dogs, we showed them the effect of separation.  With training, it was much improved, but after only a week it was far from solved.  And in fact will be something these owners have to address for the duration of the lifetime of these dogs.  Because there had never been occassion to separate the dogs, the owners were practically oblivious of the terrible anxiety separation caused their dogs.

Another example of Littermate Syndrome is two boxer sisters that we also board and trained.  The “older” sister was thought to be highly dog aggressive, barging out the door of their business to attack dogs, even with the threat of oncoming traffic.  The “younger” sister was excessively shy and did not want to encounter new things.  After a day or two with us the aggression in the older sister was shown to be manifestation of fear, a “get them before they get me” type of attitude.  She was integrated into our own pack of five dogs within the first day, with no fights or other incidents.  And interestingly, without the overbearingness of her older sister, the younger girl was actually willing to try new things, meet new people with a wagging little nub of a tail.

Can it work?

To make having littermates work, the people must literally keep them separated for good portions of the day.  Walk them separately.  Feed them separately.  Play with them separately.  Which completely defeats the idea of getting two in the first place – to keep each other company, etc.  But the answer is yes, it can work.  Having one puppy is a great amount of work and dedication and consistency.  Having two puppies is a full time job.  Any breeder worth their salt will at the very least highly question someone who wants to get two pups from her litter.  If she doesn’t question it, it may be time to consider a new breeder.

The reality is that now more seemingly than ever people are getting littermates.  And despite the dire tone of this article, some littermates don’t have issues.  I just haven’t come across any.

A Better Way

Now please don’t assume that I would only recommend people have a single dog.  Many people with single dogs that we board and train report a certain well, depression, of their dogs when they return home and realize they don’t have five other dogs to play with.  I am a huge believer that no matter how much fetch I play with my dog it is not a substitute or replacement for a good rough and tussle with another dog.  Dogs are social animals.  So I am a supporter of multiple dog households.  Your best bet?  Wait about a year in between puppies.  This gives you time to get one dog well trained before adding a second into the mix.  A potential side benefit of waiting?  The older dog may help train the younger which equals less work for the human.