Littermate Syndrome

Why raising two pups from the same litter might be a bad idea

Puppies are like potato chips. If you adopt one, why not two? Experience shows that adopting two pups from the same litter could end in heartache.

I was excited when a friend adopted two female collies from the same litter. At first, all went along swimmingly. They slept together, played together, went on walks together. But, round about the age of eighteen months, one of the female collies started biting the other for no apparent reason. My friend’s little pack was suffering from what dog behaviorists call littermate syndrome. The situation escalated until the less dominant dog suffered a serious injury.