Nervous dog being introduced to and existing dog

[Dominika]

Hi

I live with my boyfriend and share a house with a friend of mine as well. I adopted a lurcher (Fly, 1year old) 3 months ago and he's doing really well. The housemate is now adopting a dog too/looking for one.
We have found a very sweet little Jack Russel girl who isn't even a year old yet but quite nervous. She responds very well to people (children also, at least the ones she encountered in the dogs home ). We had to carry her out of the dogs home when we took her for a walk though because she wouldn't walk on her own very well. We did put her on the ground when we turned the corner from the road but she would still stop at moments. She did respond very well to us encouraging her though. She has been beaten/mistreated because whenever she pulled too hard on the lead, she crouched, however would follow us again afterwards.
Do you have any advice on how to introduce a large-ish dog (23") to a shy girl like that? I am very nervous as she's so small. I do hope that they like each other though because I'd really like her to have a nice home. And she would have a lot of fun with Fly.
Fly would love a companion and a jack russel has a lot of energy potential for him

However she is small and nervous - he is big although has no problems with dogs whatsoever.

Do you think this would work? I hope she doesn't start snapping at him because she's afraid.

I don't have real experience with Jack Russels. However hasn't heard/seen the best of them....Fly has only met 1 jack russel - a girl and she wouldn't let him near her or her owner. I know they're potentially very dominating over other dogs (or am I wrong?) I would really appreciate advice from anyone who has a good, calm, obedient Jack Russel

[jacksdad]

because of the abuse and fear issues you want to be very careful and move at the dogs pace. how to introduce the two dogs I will leave someone a bit more experienced. However, I do want to ask that you do not try and introduce them until you get some advice AND be fully prepared to walk away from the Jack Russel if the two dogs do not appear to be a good match. I know you want to help the JR, but you can't force two dogs to be friends anymore than you can force two humans.

Not saying you can't pull this off, but an abused dog takes a lot of patience and needs to rebuild trust and if the two dogs do not get introduced correctly and or not a good match, this will be a very miserable situation for both.

So, having said that. again please don't introduce the two dogs until someone can offer some good advice how to proceed and be prepared to accept that your house may not be the best place for the JR. which isn't a reflection on you or your desire to help the JR at all.

There are people here who have taken in abused dogs and have more than one dog, so it is possible but you want to go in to this with all possible info.

[Dominika]

My housemate has already found a potentially adoptable jack russel through an independent rescue but the introduction didn't go well at all therefore there was no question whether to 'work on it' or not. Plus the lady where the dog was being fostered had them introduced in the house, which I think didn't help the situation at all. Despite the fact that she claimed the dog to be friendly with other dogs.
I'm sure my housemate is prepared as well as I am that we need to be patient to find a good match for our dog even though there shouldn't be a problem on his side. But obviously the other dog needs to be comfortable with him. We are also only looking for a girl which would be an 'easier' match than two males.
I am prepared to work on desensitizing if it's required and to make the little one feel more comfortable around Fly if she doesn't react badly. I just need to convert my housemate to follow +R techniques. I don't mean that she doesn't believe in it but sometimes she thinks I'm too over the top with this and too cautious. Where I don't think you can ever be too cautious.

And as I said in the first post, she did respond very well to us. I didn't say she was afraid or snapped etc. She just crouched if she pulled to hard because she thought she was going to be punished. But she got nothing else but an encouragment to walk on and a cuddle once she did.
Anyway, we'll see how it goes in the dogs home and I hope we'll be able to speak to their behaviourist. And I hope I will get some advice from you guys as well

[emmabeth]

She will be afraid though, her behaviour you describe when expecting punishment is fear, ditto the refusal to walk through certain environments, thats fear.

You are right that introducing dogs in confined and familiar spaces such as in one dogs house is a bad idea - ideally you would introduce with a LOT of distance, on lead... just walking paralell and letting the nervy dog follow behind the big dog (still with a lot of distance between them as well as distance in front/behind).

The idea being that the new dog gets used to the existing dog slowly, and there is no misunderstandings, so she doesnt feel trapped or threatened in anyway.

Would it be possible to introduce the dogs like this, is Fly ok meeting other dogs on a lead? It really needs for him to stay quiet and calm and not react at all, allowing her to follow along behind him, then maybe sniff his butt, then maybe walk along side.

Also seeing if you can work with each dog within sight of the other dog, will tell you if both dogs are able to relax and be calm around one another.

Once a successful session of that has been achieved then the next best thing to do is let them off leash together in a secure, open space that neither dog regards as territory, preferably again, working with them off leash rather than just setting them off to go greet one another, so that the greeting happens slowly and at their own pace.

[Dominika]

Yes, that's what I was thinking of doing depeiding on how bad she is.

I wouldn't say she's been beaten extremely, I'd say the people just didn't care to handle her correctly. That they used dominating training.
She doesn't show fear in any other situation. She's very warm with people and I think she just hasn't had a proper domesticated dog life so far - as in living in the house, going for walks, being housetrained etc. She's a little puppy, they recon she's under a year, which she is, but she seems like she could be even around 6 months if that, although it looks like she's got adult teeth already though.

Introduction in the dogs home didn't go well/didn't happen purely because of the atmosphere there. I got my dog from the same home and he was VERY stressed in there so we took him straight out and the little on with us and took them for a walk. The great thing was that she followed him around better than she did us the day before We took her home for a few hours as well, we walked them, then took them inside and they both had a nap and then we took them into the garden to try to play. She was very timid in the beginning but when we showed her a handball (twice her size ) she went straight after it, occasionally ran back inside when Fly got too excited, so we stopped playing because an excited Fly was a bit too much for her. She's not yet sleeping with him but she's not afraid of his company.

I think it will go well

[Fundog]

Dominika, my family added a new canine addition to our household a couple of years ago, and we had some work to do, as the new dog had had a rather scary past. I wrote the story in the "Articles" section, in hopes that it could reassure, inspire, and help others. Here's the link: viewtopic.php?f=20&t=6103