added a dog to the clowder

stephanie42

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so dh and i had been talking about adding another cat as a playmate for jake.  thankfully we were talked out of that.  unfortunately we had been considering getting a dog on and off for almost a year.  the last two months, the discussion had become more and more serious - especially after jake's assertiveness seemed to subside substantially after being put on amitriptyline.  

a puppy almost fell into our laps almost two weeks ago and we got serious fast.  we had been looking at adoptable dogs online for a couple of weeks at that point and our schedules were arranged so it felt like it was the right time.  that puppy fell through but we kept filling out applications and last thursday we adopted a chihuahua/mini pin mix (we think there's some shepherd in there too)...




she's very excitable and is doing well with training and housebreaking.  alice weighs 12lbs and is currently sleeping on one of the cat's beds.  samantha tolerates her, jake hisses at her, piglet is terrified of her.  which is interesting because piglet grew up with a dog.... we're hopeful that things will get better and that allie will be friends with our cats.
 
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stephanie42

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it's definitely a huge adjustment.  alice's housebreaking is going vey well, but we're walking her all.the.time.  around 11pm before bed, around 2am, 4am, 5:30am, and then i get up for the day because it's not even worth going back to bed.  she has to be watched constantly - she can't be in the back bedroom because of the litter boxes and she can't be in OUR bedroom unless we're in there.  our apartment isn't huge - the living area and kitchen are pretty open so she can roam there and we can keep a pretty good eye on her.  however, alice has learned to jump the baby gate so we have to figure out how to train her NOT to cross gates.  

alice has started going in her crate without us having to push her tiny butt into it - we're calling it 'bed'.  that's another thing we're really working on, making sure we're using the same specific word/phrase for things.  like 'go potty' if she needs to go out, 'bed' for crate, 'nice' for interactions with other animals when she needs to calm the heck down because she's a puppy.  i say 'nice, nice' very calmly when she gets sniffy at the cats and i *think* she's starting to get it.  but alice is all puppy and when we meet another dog, she gets VERY bouncy and jumpy and bites at them under their jaw (not like BITE bites, like play biting).  i'm not sure what that's about.  luckily our dog walker (comes in twice a week) is a certified trainer; my close friend is ALSO a dog trainer, so i have lots of resources for help.  my dog walker doesn't charge extra either - she's here 30 minutes a day, twice a week when we work longer shifts, and can work on commands and stuff. 

today we had a good morning so far.  i was getting the cats' breakfasts ready and had just put them on the floor in the kitchen.  i opened a can for alice's food and a minute later i hear the clickety clack of puppy paws - she had jumped the baby gate.  i used stern and slightly louder 'alice' to get her attention and keep it away from the cats.  the cats were wary and stopped eating but did not run away!  and i put alice's food down in the kitchen (we had been feeding her in our bedroom) and she ate her food and the cats went back to eating their food and life went on!  it was amazing ;)  so hopefully they're starting to realize this dog is here to stay and isn't that different than us, just more bouncy.

 
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mservant

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Wow, all eating in the same room is pretty good, even if it did end up happening because Alice broke in!  LoL.   She sounds lovely but a bit too exhausting at night for me. 
 
    She sounds like she needs more attention than a new baby, that's some night duty there....   you must be dedicated to your fur family. 


Hopefully you cats will all start to relax soon and Alice will learn to be nice and calm around them so she doesn't get her nose scratched or anything.
 
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stephanie42

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yeah, her foster mom told us she was fine in a crate for 9 hours a day.  we got there, saw alice, fell in love, and then i realized she was using a crate big enough for me to nap in with a wee wee pad in it.  so, sure, alice is fine in a crate WITH AN EN SUITE BATHROOM for nine hours a day.  her tiny little bladder just needs some time.  last night didn't see as bad - 10:45, 2:30, 5am.  she whines until one of us wakes up, does her business, and we come right back to bed.  honestly i don't feel any more tired than i usually do 


my cat samantha has already swatted alice a hundred times - no claws.  samantha is really good at that for some reason; when she gets mad because we're petting her she smacks us a few times without claws and if we keep going, then she extends.  jake is NOT good at that - he's all claws, all the time, so i'm very observant if the two of them are interacting.  piglet has been hissing and running, not bothering to swat at alice.  
 

mservant

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Doesn't sound too bad there, most good with claws.  
   One of my previous 2 cats was very good at (no claw) paw swatting and would do it so hard sometimes you'd even hear the slap. 
   Her sister just used to hiss and run away LoL.  All the kids that came round to my apartment did really good impressions of a hissing cat!  
 

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Doesn't sound too bad there, most good with claws.  
   One of my previous 2 cats was very good at (no claw) paw swatting and would do it so hard sometimes you'd even hear the slap. 
   Her sister just used to hiss and run away LoL.  All the kids that came round to my apartment did really good impressions of a hissing cat!  
Lilith is very quick to bring out the claws but she doesn't with my dog. Bailey is very invasive with her affections and has gotten slapped by Lily quite a few times but she has never used claws. You can definitely hear the slap though. Bailey always acts so shocked at first. It's really funny because she's 40 pounds and Lily's about 6. Neither Lily or Sophie is intimidated by Bailey's size. Sophie's smaller than Lily at about 5 pounds tops. She's tiny. Lilith is the alpha in my house and she knows it. 
 
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