hi all,

anyone have any good ideas about introducing a newborn baby and our 20 month old GSD?

So far, we have given him the blanket to smell at first introduction, we let him near her when we are holding her or getting close to changing her. All he wants to do is lick her when he is near her. We try to make it a positive experience for him by petting him and making him sit and stay and going through commands when they are both in the same room.

He does whines when she is fussing about which I hope is him getting used to her and being protective.

We would not and will never leave the two of them alone in the same room without supervision.

Do you have any other suggestions as to how to handle this?

Thanks for the help.

Please use this link and go to Ed's great article on introducing babies and dogs
http://www.leerburg.com/dogs-babies.htm
I have no advice that's better than what's right here on this website.

Excellent article. Does the dog have an out-of-the-way place to go to in the baby's room when you are in there taking care of the baby (such as a rug)? Have you trained him to go to his place? Of course he should not be in the baby's room unsupervised but, having a place in the room for him to be when you are there will make the baby seem more like part of the pack than if he's totally kept out. You can also teach him to help you by, for example, bringing a clean diaper or picking up something you've dropped.

Another thing to do is start poking him everywhere, pulling his ears and tail and anything else you can think of that a toddler is likely to do. If you have friends with dogs that have toddlers, invite them over and under careful supervision with your dog on lead, see how he reacts to their movements, actions and voices. This will give you some idea of possible future problems to work on.

Of course if he's like many of the GSDs I've known, including the one my uncle had when I was small, your main problem may be having to send the dog out of the room before you can discipline the child when the baby's older. <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Hi Mike~
My GSD is 14 months and she absolutely loves my best friends 8 month old baby. She starts crying when he gets here and they sit on the floor and play together. She rolls her ball to the baby. He sits there and pulls fists full of hair and her whiskers out and she licks him! <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />
Good Luck!

My 14 month old female GSD is absolutely great around my 16 month nephew. I purposely grab Jackie's ears, paws, skin, tail and anything else a youngster would do, all in an effort to get her used to such things. She is very careful around him and actually stays out of his way for the most part... with the exception of a couple of licks!!! Which his reaction is to swat her away. So she pretty much just leaves him be. I am careful to make sure she gets her attention too. I was tossing her a kong in the house the other day while I had him with me. He loved watching her go fetch... he thought it was a great game... and it got her involved too. Just understand that even the size of a GSD can be a positive but also a negative. They are able to handle the abuse of a youngster, but they can knock one over too, without meaning too. Best of luck with your "KIDS"