Patterdale vs. Lakeland, Advise Please!

[nicnox]

Hi, As some of you may know, we adopted Peter the Paterdale 3 weeks ago. He is coming on leaps and bounds(happily chasing his tale as I type!) He has a great temprement and still has a lot of puppy left in him at just 12 months old.
My sister in law has an 8 year old, nice but sometimes rather stubborn Lakeland Terrier. We have tried to introduce them afew times as it would be nice if they could get on. The first time they met there was abit of a scuffle and then they were ok but today they really fought and both came out with afew little knicks. We have had conflicting advise from other dog owners as to how to handle it. Do we leave them to get it out of their systems and establish their pecking order or should we give up and keep them apart?

[skunkstripe]

nicnox can you tell us a bit more about how and where these two dogs are being introduced?

[nicnox]

The first introduction was in open countryside off of their leads. As we thought they had established pecking order, we then took our dog to the lakelands home(his territory). We have done this afew times, they got on ok,off lead both in doors and on large back yard. Yet today they began to fight for no known reason.

[skunkstripe]

How would you say they both are otherwise-well behaved or not, tend to be dominant, friendly etc?

[nicnox]

Our dog is extremely friendly, he just wants to play all the time. His tale is always wagging, not usually a nasty bone in his body.Hes well behaved most of the time and does not have a dominant nature. The lakeland is friendly towards humans, well behaved but very stubborn and doesnt seem to have much patience. Although he is fine with the other dog he lives with (jack russel) he is the dominant one of the two.

[skunkstripe]

OK this is my opinion, just that and nothing more.
If both of them get along well with other dogs then I don't think there will be a serious problem with these two.
When you say they have "nicks", this is something that does not bother dogs like that in the least. I often find little nicks on both of my dogs and they get along fine, they do however roughhouse.
More than likely the Lakeland wants to be the dominant one over your Patterdale and gets annoyed over some gesture or body language that you don't see that he finds a threat to his higher position.
So I think as long as you do not introduce toys, bones food or anything else that could become an object of contention you should be ok. My tendency is to let them work it out unless there is a danger of serious injury. If you do not trust them be prepared to break up a fight if need be.
http://home.att.net/~vlea/DOG_FIGHTS.htm
http://www.ehow.com/how_2253_break-dogfight.html
Others may well have differing opinions on this, this is my best guess based on what you have told me.
Good luck!

[KatzNK9]

I think Skunkstripe's advice is good advice as it doesn't sound like there is true intent to harm but possibly more roughousing than you'd prefer along with choosing who's going to be the dominant one. There's nothing wrong with one dog being the dominant and one being submissive as long as they're equally happy with their individual roles.

If you're trying to get the dogs to be more calm around each other, I suggest you take each dog for a long walk separately. Then introduce them to each other for a short time while on leash & then walk with the dogs together to further tire them out. Once they've been pretty well tired out (or at least rid of any extra energy) and have walked a good distance, I'd return to the spot where you can let them play together off the leash.

I definitely feel as strongly about not having any toys, bones, etc. available so that they feel like they have to compete or challenge each other over some of their favorite things. Once they've become buddies & more trustworthy, you can then try to introduce tennis balls, etc. to make more of a game of it.

[nicnox]

Ok, sounds good thanks, well give it a go. We were just worried that it was cruel to let them keep on hurting eachother. Well try the long walk idea and see how they go.:)