Totally Random Advice - 1 or 2 dogs?

Luis Caffesse

Luis Caffesse

Admin
So my wife and I are looking for a dog...we've been looking for a while.
We found these wonderful mutt puppies at the Humane Society where I"ve been shooting lately. There are two puppies still there out of a litter of six - a boy and a girl.

I had a dog growing up - but he passed away about 8 years ago.
My wife has never had a dog before, but she really loves them.

So now our debate is - do we split them up and take only one, or do we take the plunge and get both?

I know - probably seems like a stupid question to stress over at all for anyone who doesn't have dogs or doesn't care for them much.

My first inclination is it would be great for the dogs to grow up together, and have another dog around to keep them company. My other thought is that 2 dogs is a hell of a lot of work.

I don't want to go into this too lightly seeing as we're talking about a living thing that is probably going to be with us for at least the next 10 years or more.

So - what do you guys think?
Anyone here have 2 dogs?
Can you shed some light on how it might be different, better, or worse than just one?

How much more work is it really?

(by the way, these are small dogs - a chihuahua mix of some kind)
 
Here are pics of the dogs we're talking about.
They are about 3 months old right now.
They're probably going to grow to be 20 pounds at the absolute most:


dogs1.jpg


dogs2.jpg
 
How cute. How could you say no to either one? Take 'em both! Yes, its a big responsibility but so is one dog.
 
as long as you've got a yard, I'd say 2 dogs isn't any harder than one. a little more expensive when it comes time for the annual check up. but more than 2x the fun.
 
Thats kind of what I've been thinking - i'm trying to get a handle on whether or not 2 dogs is REALLY twice the work or not. Seems like 1 dog is alot of work, and adding a second might not be that big a deal.

Of course, it's not having 2 dogs that worries me as much as the next year of having 2 PUPPIES.

Do either of you have 2 dogs?
 
As long as they are fixed, get them both. Bonus tip- besides their name, call them both "dog". Since they are both similar in appearance, it might be hard to tell which one is getting in trouble. By calling "DOG!", they will both come/stop what they are doing, giving you a moment to figure it out. I have had several dogs/puppies at one time or another, and this works great. On a side note, I call both my sons "Boy" for the same reason, and it works great with them as well ;)
 
It depends on what the end goal is, to have one dog that you totally bond with, or two dogs that will bond with each other and then maybe you. I personally would get one dog and begin a new family that way. But that's just me.
 
If you only have one dog, they tend to get bored easilly. That leads to all sorts of problems down the road, like chewing and howling.
 
We have one dog -- I'd love to have another and as I know ours gets a bit bored, even though I'm home all day being laid off. I mean, freelancing. So I vote for two, especially if they're only going to be 20 pounders.
 
These are exactly the types of points I've been debating since we saw them last night.

They would entertain eachother...but they would be alot of work...the bonding issue...
etc etc etc

I know that this isn't a case of "oh I have to save them both" because just looking at them, you know they're both going to get adopted within the next week. No question about that.

AND - if they weren't both together right now we probably never would have considered taking two. Same if there had been 3 or 4 of them there, we would have only taken one. But seeing them both together - they get along really well, they're used to eachother.... and I can't help but feel that I'd be robbing them of the opportunity to grow up together if we only took one. So no question that it's better for the DOG for me to take both....

...still can't decide what's better for us though.

Am I stupid for stressing over this decision?
What can I say, I'm a big softy when it comes to dogs.

:thumbsup:


My wife was all decided that we only 'needed' 1 dog last night - after talking about it for a while she said 'this is madness, we only need 1 dog.'
Then this morning she calls me from work and says 'I really want them both'
 
JasonFox said:
I'm home all day being laid off. I mean, freelancing.
Click to expand...

Nice to see you haven't lost your sense of humor Jason.
:)

Oh yeah - that's something else to add into the equation - I'm home all day, working out of the house. Not sure how that factors in to 1 vs 2 dogs... but there it is.
 
And that is when a single pup gets lonely, turns devil-dog, and leaves you with a demolished home. On the other hand, two dogs makes it harder to determine which one is responsible. Like the time I set my sandwich down on the coffee table, for just a moment, so that I could answer the door...
 
also, check out The Dog Whisperer on Nat Geo. Caesar is AMAZING and while you may not quite achieve his results, that show will really help train you (and hence the dogs).

Go for 2, sounds like you want to do it. I've got 2 dogs and a cat. They are all great companionship for each other. Although I agree with you, the puppy phase will be some work (but mostly fun work).
 
This thread should have been started as a poll!

And by now I'll bet the majority would be going with both dogs. Like you said, it'd be better for the dogs, and in my honest opinion, if you can handle the responsibility of one dog, throwing another in the mix is NOT adding much work. It could actaully help lighten the load.

Go with both.
 
You can go for two now then if it doesn't work out or proves to be a issue you can separate them later.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top