Advice needed please - New puppy

Hi, I have had great advice from here in the past so wondered if you might help again!

I have a 9 year old dog who is much better with other dogs than he's ever been, but is still a bit unpredictable so is always on the lead unless in a safe, fenced area. He is however, good with puppies so as a way of helping him to have a friend and because we wanted to have another dog, we have a 9 week old puppy now.

We have done gentle introductions over the past 2 weeks since having Tess, the pup and at first, Max our older dog was scared of her, so we kept them in their own areas of the house. We have now gradually introduced them in a carefully monitored way and they have become firm friends, whining if they are not able to be with each other. Obviously the energy level of Tess is much higher than Max so we are watching carefully and they re sleeping separately in different parts of the house. My question relates to their play. They roll all over each other and are both mouthing the other one. Max hasn't shown any aggression at all and rolls over to play. No growling, except occasionally from Tess getting over excited. Max seems to have her whole head in his mouth and it looks awful, but she just goes back for more. The only yelp we have seen is when he inadvertently stepped on her, and he withdrew immediately until she jumped on him again.

Am I ok to let them play like this? How long should I let them go on for? I've been removing her when Max seems to get tired. She can't go out yet, so this is all in the house at the moment. Should I be doing anything else?? Any advice really about anything I'm doing wrong.

Thanks!!

It sounds like you're doing a great job. As long as both dogs aren't showing signs of stress or discomfort at the situation - panting, staring, ears back, looking away, stillness etc - I would leave them alone. Young dogs aren't very good at reading or respecting other dogs signals so its up to us to look out for them and respond to them.

My dogs bite each other throats etc when play fighting. Play fight only usually last a minute or two unless a game of tug is involved so the other thing id watch for is the pup having a lot of stamina for play which you've already mentioned so that's good. I tried crate training with my youngest dog and wish I'd done before. Ot gives them.a place to retreat to when they need an escape place and it helps them to be calm. If you don't have a crate that would be a great addition for the pup to have.

Sounds perfectly normal play to me. My choc lab always was putting the other dogs head in his mouth when she was a pup ( he still does) . But still supervise play, pups bones and joints can easily be damaged in rough play. Have plenty of time outs and rests from play . What breed of dog are they ? The bitch dog will probably be top dog when she grows up anyway . And yeah crates are great for time outs for pups .

Hi, don't worry, mouthing is a natural way of playing.

Dogs are tought how to not hurt another dog, during being with their siblings.

They play and mouth, and understand when they are going too far, and may hurt one another.

I have a 20 month old dog, and a 7 month old dog, who play together, and I was realy afraid at first, in case one inadvertently hurt the other.

They cant keep away from each other now, and love playing together, with some rivalry for toys, but its all wind and water.

I would keep my eye on them, for a few months, and not leave them alone.

Eventualy, you will feel confidant enough, to leave them alone to play together, so don't worry.

We've got 3 dogs, our last introduced 18 months ago. They all play mouthing/wrestling, sometimes for half an hour or more with the eldest pushing the youngest around the wood flooring. They all love it, it's like WWE in you're living room. We do have to pause the TV as the 'growling' is pretty high volume at times and it does sound as though they are killing each other!

We've got 3 dogs, our last introduced 18 months ago. They all play mouthing/wrestling, sometimes for half an hour or more with the eldest pushing the youngest around the wood flooring. They all love it, it's like WWE in you're living room. We do have to pause the TV as the 'growling' is pretty high volume at times and it does sound as though they are killing each other!

Lol I can't remember a film or TV program I haven't had to pause because I can't hear the dialogue due to WWF Labrador Bouts .