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Originally Posted by laurenchristine  Thanks everyone for the input! I'm afraid I mislead everyone when I made mention that I'll be living alone.
I mostly mentioned it to let everyone know I'm not planning on living with anyone, so my Yorkie won't have anyone during the day. But my response to all the self defense remarks:
1. I plan on getting an alarm system.
2. The house I plan to buy is a home some family of mine has inherited and are not going to occupy, not a shady apartment, Yada yada.
3. I'm not afraid of guns, I was raised around them. I'm not saying I'm going to shoot anyone that walks In the door. Just that I'm comfortable around guns and own 2, myself.
4. My wanting a big dog is not for the sole purpose of "protection", my family raised Labradors, so I love big dogs. I would have one now, but my Yorkie was a gift from my now late grandfather.
5. Since I live at home, my parents have their own dog. My mom owns a 3 year old 50# pit bull and she and my Yorkie adore one another. They've been left alone since I got my puppy over a year ago, and it's been smooth sailing so far. (But our pit is extremely laid back)
Thank you all for the feedback, and I hope that cleared some things up. Also, I planned on getting my second dog before I graduated and moved out. But I still have almost 2 years until graduation to weigh my options. Thanks all! |
It is good you are in no rush. I wish you the best. And for me a Lab is at most a medium sized dog..lol... I own a large guard and protect, yet they are not in the Giant sized dogs. But Labs from puppies take some amount of training, they stay goofey and young for maybe 3-4 yrs so I have heard from breeders and owners of Labs.
And while I appreciate that you have had so far good results with a young Pittie - sic 3 yrs old \I would still advise caution. Right now, my hubby has our 6lber on his lap, my big dogs all over 100 lbs are at my feet.. Razzle is on lead for his safety. This is so because I have a young female Blackie 15mths with high prey drive - she might never earn the priviledge of being out with our Yorkie. My champion male protection dog is a different story. Our female is just a baby and might never ever be protection trained - but she will be obedience trained to a CDX or above. Not all dogs are up to the rigors of protection training - and nor are their owners. Hopefully she will be able to be trained for my service dog.
One of my points are, if you elect to mix large and small you have a heightened responsibility to insure the safety of all. I don't find it stressfull but then again it has been a bit over 6yrs. But accidents can happen in the blink of an eye, you can do the best you can to insure those accidents don't happen. And as much as I am glad your Pittie gets along with your Yorkie - I would never let those two alone together as a matter of [practice.