Play Date Zuhause

For the first time, Denzel had a friend come over to our house for a play date. Bogey, a Pug puppy that lives in our building, and Denzel have been friends since the summer. His Mom and I decided that they both needed an outlet from being cooped up this week, due to the snowy and icy weather. So last night, when our friends arrived, I opened the door and instead of the crazy sniffing and licking and whining and falling all over each other with excitement greeting Denzel usually gives Bogey, Denzel turned into Mike Tyson. He immediately chased after Bogey, snapping at his face and barking. He was trying to bite Bogey. I could not believe my dog. Denzel has never even snapped at another dog, EVER. As I held Denzel back, Bogey, probably confused but overexcited all the same, ran around our house, jumping on the couch, playing with Denzel's scattered toys a bit, and even drinking from Denzel's water bowl. This only infuriated Denzel more. So, Bogey's Mom and I stopped, put the dogs on their leashes and asked ourselves, "What would Cesar do?" Yes, we are both fans. We decided that we totally messed up the introduction. We brought on the stress. First of all, Denzel has never had another dog in our house, his domain. So by bringing Bogey in and letting him have the run of the place while I held Denzel back, was really stupid. He was being aggressive because he was being territorial. And my shock and nervousness - negative energy - only made Denzel more agitated. So we needed to defuse the situation. Bogey's Mom took Bogey out of the house and into the hallway and waited. Then I followed out into the hallway with Denzel. We wanted to let them greet each other in a neutral place first and then allow them to come back into the house together. Denzel was still a little agitated but after 10 minutes in the hallway, the growling stopped and they were back to being buddies. We then allowed Denzel to enter the house first, kind of look back waiting for Bogey to come along, and then we let Bogey enter. It worked! They played nonstop for 3 hours.