[Elly Elsenaar]

I read several forums, and when it comes to males people always seems to be afraid to have several males in the house, I know some males could be a bit agressive to other males, but so can females also to other females! I don't seem the panic of it, cause I always have several males in the house, who are active in sport but the never agressive to each other, I have to watch my female and protect the males, cause she is the one who gives me a headache sometimes :twisted: ! Is it that when your not the leader of the pack you have problems? I can understand when you bring in your house a adult male there could be problems, but when they grew up with eachother I really can not see the point to be afraid for, cause you will teach them to behave themselfs aren't you.


I am curious cause I read a lot of people about this issue, and wonder how you guys think about it.

 

[Jerry Lyda]

Dog aggression as well as people aggression, in dogs, you can control, as long as you are there. There will come a time, and you might as well look for it to come that there WILL be a dog fight. Male vs Male or Female vs female. Seldom male vs female. Only very rare for this to not happen due to the pecking order.

 

[Molly Graf]

Yes I agree with Jerry - I have had two dominant females in the house, until the older one passed away recently. Older one was the mother of the younger one. Younger one is "nasty" with other females, or can be - so there will probably be no other females living in the house from now on. I have a dominant male also living in the house, he is "the boss" and knows it - however he gets along great with my two male Chihuahuas, one neutered the other not (yet) - they are about the size of his head but think they are Great-Dane sized. They know the rules (don't mess with Eagle) and Eagle knows the rules (don't kill the Chihuahuas). However I never leave them alone unsupervised, ever. Only would take one "get away from my toy" nip and the little dog would be severely injured or even worse, in a heartbeat of time. I also have Eagle's son - he is not the dominant dog (yet) but because I am working him, I want him to feel dominant. So though I can walk him with Eagle, both can be off-leash together - there is no fighting but they also don't play together - Brix can come in the house with eagle, no problem - but never ever are they alone together unless one is crated. Just doesn't work well, male or female - unless they are raised together, one is not expected to be the alpha or have a mind of his own, and/or none is of a dominant personality.

molly

 

[susan tuck]

My experiences are similar. Not too many problems with multiple male dogs, but multiple bitches can lead to some nasty fights unfortunately.

 

[Mike Schoonbrood]

Cujo is very male-aggressive, he tried to bite a puppy in the head at training on Sunday, they were doing fine sniffing, I walked away happy, walked by the puppy again a few minutes later n Cujo growled n went for the pups head.... now, I don't know if he would really bite hard enough to injure another dog... Lÿka's head fits inside his mouth n he never hurts her, but he also doesn't growl at her like he does at males...

My question would be -- do you think I could ever add a male dog to the household? Or would I always have trouble with him? He's a very mild mannered dog but other male dogs make him flip out, if he was as aggressive in his bitework as he is toward other male dogs then I'd be thrilled lol. I'm wondering, maybe if I were to get a male dog and introduce them slowly, have the dog around the house but keep them seperated etc, that eventually he would accept the pup as a pack member rather than an outsider he needs to kill. I got a female dutchie because I know he likes females so there'd be a better chance of them being fine together... but if I ever get another male then I'm not sure if they would ever be able to be together.

 

[Jerry Lyda]

Mike, I think you answered your question. You can control aggression but it will never go away.

 

[Selena van Leeuwen]

if you´ve 1 mellow male/female and a dominant male/female or male-female they´re is no problem.
Put two or more (very) dominant ones together and you´ve (eventually) troubles.

 

[Elly Elsenaar]

Thanks for your answers, I was wondering about it cause I always read about males vs males, and I know that females could be just as worse. I have a female myself, Lindsey I have got her when she was 5 months old, and she must leave her owner because of the fights, they figt for life together with a other female who was just one year. She is 10 years old now and I must say we have controlled her soon after she comes in our house, her own group is not a problem, but other dogs who not belong to her family, that is what I always have to watch for. And she is a female but for her it make no different if it’s a male or female,


So it is not new that such things happened, but the last days I have read some people on a other forum, and they told the lady if she would take a male she would bring her other dogs in danger. They don't know her or her two small dogs.
When some one else ask for a certain thing, and they mentioned they have 2 males, people start yelling and don’t give the answer where she was asking for.

For me it sounds a bit strange, cause when you take a dog you know what you are doing, here we all doing sports and a lot of people are very experienced in dogs and dog sport.

Over the years we have several dogs who all go along together, and when I have to take a other dog tomorrow it probably will be a male again, in the past we have had more troubles with females and not with males.

You heard always the bad story’s, but when everything goes well, we will never hear it so much.

Again I am not saying that it never happened, but in my environment lots of people have multiple males, and never had a problem with it.

I agree with Selena who said.

if you´ve 1 mellow male/female and a dominant male/female or male-female they´re is no problem.
Put two or more (very) dominant ones together and you´ve (eventually) troubles.

 

[Stacia Porter]

I can only tell you my experience. Growing up we had three dachshunds. One was a female (the oldest), then came her male puppy (long story), and then a younger male not related to the other 2. The males were fine toghether only 4 months or so, and then BAM: fights. Lots of things triggered them until we finally had to resort to keeping them fully separated. The mere sight of one another spurred a VERY nasty fight. THe older male just passed away a year ago (as did the female: 17 and 16 years old incidentally, but I digress) and by the time he died he was missing part of an eye, half of his tongue, had his jaw wired, and had scars everywhere from accidental meetings with the other male (no, my parents wouldn't rehome either dog...it was ridiculous). The female was spayed, but the males were in tact.

After I got married we took my husband's neutered male sheltie. Soon after I added Abbie the beagle mix (who was about 1 1/2 at the time). They were fine together until his death 2 years ago. We brought Achilles home in May of last year and she hated him...constant growling, had to keep him away from her b/c would nip and act silly. As he got bigger she quit her crap; figured out he was much larger and much stronger and now just stays away. She's also aggressive toward other dogs...I've never been able to "cure" her of it. We brought Andi (spayed female GSD) in April of this year and Abbie hates her even more...even attacked once (resulting in Andi attacking back and Abbie requiring lots of stitches and a drainage tube for 10 days...nasty business). Now if Andi gets within 3 feet of Abbie the little dog growls her behind off.

I have always been told that aggression is worse among bitches than dogs. It's not to say that a same sex pack can't live harmoniously, but a person should know what s/he is doing before attempting it.

 

[Connie Sutherland]

Wow........ you've had experiences a-plenty!

 

[Maren Bell Jones]

I've found that the worst fighting is when the pack leader is gone for a time. For example, all three of my males are neutered, but Buck has "the best offense is a good defense" mentality when it comes to strange dogs (either males or females), so he has to be carefully watched when I bring home a foster dog. However, he and Strider have never had an issue with each other. Ever. They leave each other alone and respect each other's space. Pretty much ignore each other. However, I was out of town last week at a research conference and my fiance is much more permissive when it comes to letting them wrestle in the house. I don't let them do it at all. In fact, when Zoso wants to wrestle with one of the other dogs, I get out the tug and tug with him instead. Anyways, so while I was gone, apparently Strider and Buck were wrestling in the living, fiance was in the bathroom, and the wrestling escalated into a fight somehow. Strider ended up with a nice gash on his snout and Buck had a cut on his lip. Suffice it to say, fiance was told absolutely no more wrestling in the house, especially while Alpha Bitch is gone.