Bringing a new dog home can be an exciting time, and having two dogs is often considered preferable to keeping one alone. Dogs are pack animals, and keeping two together can go a long way to establishing natural behaviour patterns, keeping them well socialized, and giving them a permanent playmate who will entertain them when you are unable to.

However, introducing a new dog or puppy to your resident canine is something which needs to be approached carefully, in order to allow the dogs to get used to each other and bond as a pair rather than causing the resident dog to become stressed and potentially harm your new addition, or making both dogs unhappy.

If you're keen to get an additional dog for your family but are not sure how to proceed, follow our top tips on introducing a new dog to your resident canine safely and successfully.

• Try and ensure that the dogs meet for the first time on neutral territory, and not in the presence of anything which the resident dog might consider 'theirs' or be tempted to guard, such as their bed or favourite toys.


• Make sure that both dogs have a safe place which they can retreat to if needed, preferably another room.


• Have a person who is familiar to each dog present during the initial meeting, but try not to have a lot of bystanders or other family members present, and keep outside stimulus to a minimum.


• Keep both dogs on a lead initially so that you can intervene quickly if needs be. A lead which you can extend and retract is very useful for this!


• Do not try to force the introduction, or push the dogs into each other's personal space. This is counterproductive and can lead to future problems with their interaction.


• Protect yourself and other family members from inadvertent harm. Take care if intervening between the two dogs that you don't get nipped or bitten by mistake, and consider muzzling one or both of the dogs if you have any reason to believe that one of them may potentially become aggressive.

When introducing two dogs to each other for the first time, allow them to get used to each other and move at their own pace. They will need to be allowed to communicate with each other, and this may include sniffing, defensive behaviors and physical interaction. It can be extremely hard at this stage not to try to 'manage' the meeting, and to keep yourself from intervening between the two dogs, but you must try to keep out of things as much as possible.

In order to eventually settle down and get used to each other, the dogs must be allowed to work out their own pecking order in the hierarchy of their 'pack', and the sooner you can safely allow them to do this, the better. You should only intervene while they are sniffing, interacting or playing out dominant and submissive behaviours if one of the dogs is behaving aggressively and may potentially cause harm to the other dog, otherwise you will only serve to prolong the process!

Once both dogs are comfortable in each other's presence, prepare to let them off the lead. Do this one at a time, so that you will be able to remove one of the dogs from the area quickly and with ease if needed to. Dogs tend to relax more when off the lead, and you may find that after initially establishing that they are going to play nicely in each other's presence, you can accelerate their acceptance of each other by enabling natural play.

Once you have successfully introduced the two dogs to each other for the first time, it's important to keep an eye on them while they are together for some time afterwards until they are fully comfortable in each other's presence and come to regard each other as part of the same pack, rather than as resident and visitor respectively. Make sure that both dogs have their own food bowls, beds and toys and learn to respect each other's space and possessions!