Need serious advice

How real is littermate syndrome (where raising two puppies from the same litter, at the same time results in them bonding with each other only and shutting the owner out)? Does it happen frequently?

Do they really become untrainable? Is it breed-specific? If there are two owners (ie. myself and my girlfriend) and we decide to individualize them with playtime/feeding/training apart for much of the evening, is this the remedy?

Lots of questions, but our decision to get one rather than two 8-week old Boston terriers may rest on the response we get!

PLEASE ADVISE!!!! I'm starting to get desperate!

We have a member who just adopted a male and female of the same litter a few months ago... I hope he will post again soon, he could probably help you the most

I think the key is to seperate them a lot. Spend time with each of them seperately, not letting them sleep in the same crate etc. I started a thread about it a couple weeks ago, let me see if I can find it again...

Ok there you go :

http://www.chazhound.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7836&highlight=litter


It might help you make your decision one way or another. Good luck!

In 1964 we got two Goldens from the same litter...I didn't know better back then. The male was very much of a bully with the female. Luckily with 3 children they got invidual attention...but it wasn't easy. Then when I was breeding a couple wanted 2 puppies..I adviced against it and I was right. They didn't listen to the humans at all ! Finally, when they were about 6 months old, one went to another member of the family. Soon afterwards the book " How to Raise a Puppy you can live With
" came out and it confirmed my thinkings.

I was told the same thing when I adopted Sawyer, I had thought about trying to get Daniel to take his sister, but ARPH strongly advised against it because of how bonded they were and how much of a bully Sawyer was towards her.

why don't you check ou Oprah's website..she has three THREE pups that are glorious and beautiful..had them on her show yesterday with her trainer. Might be some good advice there..i have raised siblings without problems. It does take extra work and making sure each gets one on one time with you..it is my belief a dog understands and responds to anything that is "fair" so i have always followed that line of thought..taking turns and sharing my effections equally. NEver had a bond problem not with mary and her sister..or at the kennels with the dogs i worked with. It is all in how you approach and train. Helps if you are more then one person too.

It really depends if you have prior experiences with dogs as well.

We have shown and bred Shelties in the past(only showing now) so we knew what we were getting into. We have always had two dogs at once. Although, two different people do their training and at seperate times and then when they get that trick down pat, they can practice together. Its also a good tool for them to "wait" for their turn as well.

We just recently(back in end of June, beginning of July) purchased male/female litter mates. THe Female doesn't get beaten up by the male, rather she gets beaten up by my Tervuren puppy lol

We do have to seperate them for walks until they learn how to "heel" properly and "sit, wait" by the curbs etc etc. But other then that we have never had a problem. The male is the dominate one, but the only one that has a problem with that is again, my Tervuren puppy lol Riot lives a almost completely seperate life from the two shelties though. I have a basement apartment so he only sees the pups in the morning, stays with them during the day, but gets fed in my apartment, gets groomed, played with etc etc seperately in my apartment. lol He can obviously play with the puppies in the backyard though.

I am raising all the pups I get from my litter and the best is to split them when you are not at home. Also with the training you have to split them but when you are with them and go for a walk they can be together. When they start to fight than correct them with a big NO and get them both in there nek and shake them.

Hi csoulellis. I've sent you an email; I hope you got it. If not we have boy and girl (bro and sis) 1/2 golden and 1/2 lab puppies that are about 4 1/2 months old. I had the same reservations that you have when we were thinking about getting two but we went ahead and did it anyway. We haven't had any major problems with them. In the beginning I was a little worried about them b/c when they would play they would fight. But after I got over my worries, I realized they were just playing rough, something I had to get used to. They would roll around and wrestle but if one of them would whine, they would both stop and just hang out together. It never got carried away. As for bonding, they will follow us anywhere we go. They know their commands: sit, down, come, leave it. Sometimes they are stubborn but we take that as them being young puppies but not as them not bonding with us. They say a dog will wag it's tail for it's leader and that's all do to us!! They are great with our kids as well. We did do training with them. When we took them I would take one of our children and one dog and my husband would take our other child and other dog on the opposite side and it worked out well. When we go for walks I take both of them w/o incidence. They sleep in separate crates at night but other than that they are together almost all of the time. Unless we are training them at home. Hope this helps. We have had a postive experience and would adopt two again!

The baloney about not getting two puppies from a litter is just that---BOLOGNA! How do ya like that for fancy spelling, lol. I have kept three pups out of a litter on occassion. Of course you must remember the breed does make a difference. Boston Terriers are so crazy and gleeful that you MUST have at least 2 to keep each other worn out, and out of trouble, lol.

When dogs reach adulthood, they pretty much are owner oriented---because they find out the OWNER is the source of the food, lol.

NO, NO, NO..... Having the same llitter mates has nothing to do with training. If you don't agree with me, than take your pups to a certfied trainer.

Having litter mates can be a good thing. Train each pup seperatley.... maybe 15 minutes each 3 times a day. I don't know your "method" of training, but it's easy if you know how to train a dog. I don't have the space here to tell you step by step how to train your dog, but I would be willing to speak with out via email or phone. I don't know who told you this, but it's not true. Think about it.... it doesn't even make sense. I realize you are prob. fustrated... I have a 2 year old daugter....ready to hang my self. haha

Let's trade for awhile. haha. Let us know...But no, it's not true!
Amy

The problem with two litter mates is for people who just leave the dogs together all day and don't take the time to train them, walk them etc. So I guess that saying it's a bad idea is pretty much the idiot-proof way, as we know that lots of pet owners are not very responsible. For responsible owners I'm sure it would be no problem though.

When you have two mates from the same litter you must gradually start seperating them without them feeling to much anxiety. Do it gradually and make sure you don't seperate them for long periods of time in the begining. With time things should be great.

I saw that Oprah episode. My husband got scared that I would end up like that when we go pick up our new puppy next weekend. My friend and her sister got two female black lab puppies from the same litter when they were younger and they each took care of their own, trained there own and fed their own and the dogs had no problems bonding with all the other family and friends that stopped by. I think it has to do with the time and effort that you put into bonding and training your pups though.

It really depends on how you raise them. Our two farm dogs at the ranch are sisters and they're bonded very closely. As puppies they were pretty much oblivious to humans and only focused on eachother. Now all they care about are humans LOL However, if one can't find the other she goes ballistic until she spots her sister because we failed in working on the seperation anxiety between each other.