Baby on the way (11weeks) and a hyper 9mo th old staffy pup

I'm due my first baby in June, I have a very excitable 9 month old staffy called sox. She is not a bad dog but I'm struggling with every aspect of her just now, she is like a tornado when anyone comes into the house. It has made me have 2nd thoughts as to whether it's safe to keep her especially having a newborn. Can anyone please give me advice? Re homing her is my last option but I don't have a lot of time left to change her behaviour.

Thanks

Hi ya, I'm the one that offered advice on Facebook. I've had a bit more time to think what else over and above making her tired through exercise and mental stimulation, what food are you feeding her?

What a difficult situation for you. Where in Scotland are you?

How much exercise does she get each day?is there any one that can help out with walking her?

Tying in with the exercise, what and how much training do you do? It can really help to have boundaries in place and it's essential to have an off switch. Training is also great mental exercise and can help tire them out.

It might also be useful to think now about having a 'chill' zone for the dogs where they can go that's nice for them but where you can ask them to go for time out. I'm not talking about suddenly locking them in a room or using crates, I'm talking more about using teaching them that one room in the house, maybe a bedroom, is somewhere they go together with a chew or something, and it's ok. You can then use that room when you need time with the baby and when Sox needs to calm down. Teach it slowly with lots of positive associations, only closing the door for very, very short periods to start off with.

But exercise and training are your best bets.

She gets about 30 mins a day on a lead and she runs around out the back, I'm now unable to walk them both as they pull me over! I know this isn't much. It this in its self is too much for me with the way they pull me about. How much walk time would you recommend?

She is on naturediet food from amazon, was advised to try her on that as it's less crap in it. My situation is once the baby is here I won't manage or she may even get hurt when sox gets hyper.

That food's fine, almost certainly not the problem.

The exercise is most likely what's at the root of it. Staffies are high energy dogs, they need to be able to let off steam somehow and if it's not through walks/training/play, it'll be some other way. Some are higher energy than others and it sounds like Sox is one of those.

From what you're saying, she probably needs at least 2 x 40 minutes a day at a good pace, with running around, playing and mental exercise in between. Over the next year or so, she'll need more rather than less exercise.

You have completely understandable limits on what you can do even now so you may need to think of other ways of dealing with this. Is there a dog walker who could take her out for an hour or so, with other dogs to give her added stimulation? Do you have space where you can play fetch, so she's running around chasing for half an hour or so? Is there someone you know who would love a dog to walk but can't have one themselves who you'd trust to take Sox out for you?

Hopefully there will be some way you can get that energy out - as you already know it's otherwise not a great situation for anyone. I doubt very much if she'd ever deliberately hurt your baby but pinging dogs just don't look where they're going sometimes.

Thanks for all your advice, I'm currently speaking with someone who can train and walk her then after a few weeks hopefully just getting her out the walks will see a difference

That sounds like a great plan. Keep us up to date on how you get on.

When expecting my youngest my Mum was worried as her dog is hyper, I'm sure he is half kangaroo lol. I started walking him with my dog as my Mum is disabled. He did calm a little. He is a jack Russell and being giddy is in his personality. Anyway when my youngest was born Lemmie just seemed to know, he never once bounced around Mason. My youngest is 4 now & Lemmie & him still have a fab bond, he seems to know to curb his enthusiasm around children. I still walk him with my dog as exercise is at the root of so much