How to manage 2 dogs in 1 house? 3yo F & 4month M

For those that have 2 dogs in the 1 household, how do you manage boundaries and training?

I currently have a 4 month male pup and a 3 years old desexed female. We've had the younger pup for about a month now and for the most part, they get along. The older pup has full reign of the house whereas puppy doesn't. He does have a crate/playpen area which is a work in progress because he detests it.

There's a few issues I'm facing at the moment. One of them is how to teach the puppy to be respectful of the older one? My older girl is very sweet and gentle and will not say boo so the advice of "they will work it out" does not apply in my situation. For example, I was preparing puzzle treats (treats in TP rolls) for the both of them. I gave the first few to the puppy so he was already occupied. As I went to give one for my older girl, he ran up and bit it out of her mouth! My girl just let it happened & she looked so sad afterwards I had to give her a treat in a different room.

In terms of training, would you guys recommend training with different words? Training puppy separately is more ideal?

I welcome any tips you guys may share about how to manage 2 dogs. Thank you!

@crown93 We've got 4 dogs! We've got a 12 year old, 3 year old, 2 year old and 6 month old! You've really got to be switched on with their training at all times when they're just learning!
To get the puppy to respect your older dog I'd say just watch them constantly. Any time your pup is being too overwhelming tell him "no" and redirect his attention to something fun and exciting away from your older dog. If he's persisting with bothering her take him away. Make sure both have their own safe space they can take themselves away to and not be bothered by the other! I think it's important to let them interact to a certain extent tho as they need to learn each others limits & bond etc.
For treats teach them to go to a "spot" or bed away from each other and "stay" before giving them their treats. Stand and watch them and if the pup moves towards your older dog stop him and ask him to return to his spot and stay. Don't give him the chance to take it off her! He'll soon learn that's not acceptable behaviour!
Seperation anxiety training would probs work well with the playpen! Start by putting him in it, treating him or giving him a chew & pottering around the room. If he's quiet and good treat him. Once he's got that down, leave the room for like 30/60 secs. If he's quiet when you return. Treat him and let him out.. The next day increase to 2 mins, the next 5 etc. If he's crying or acting up don't go in the room or if youre in the room don't make eye contact or acknowledge him! Just reward the good behaviour and ignore the bad!
Alsooo, make sure they're getting enough exercise! It's so much easier to do training with them when theyve got some of their energy out and they'll be more content to chill out and not get up to mischief. It's great bonding for them when they're exercising together and will have the puppy annoying your older dog less!
For training ours we usually train them both one on one and in a group! When training them in a group we make sure to say their name before each command so they learn to listen for their own name. You could also get a clicker or two with different button click frequencies and clicker train them that way! Or use different frequency dog whistles! It can seem like a whole lotta crazy for awhile when you add a second dog but just get into a routine and stick with the training and they'll soon figure out what's acceptable and what's not! Good luck!

@chaneleasterling Thank you so much for your extensive reply!

@crown93 We got a puppy (f) when my male was 8 (that was a couple of years ago).

While my male is definitely awesome at setting boundaries, I can tell you what I would do.

If you want the puppy to respect the older dog, then show the puppy that you value her more than him. Which means: no feeding the puppy before her! Pack members higher in the pack hyerarchy get privileges, such as getting treats first or the more comfortable sleeping places and so on. If you feed the puppy first you are saying "I think you are more important for the pack then our older female", so obviously the puppy will think stealing from the older dog is alright.

Things that you give out especially should never be touched by the other dog, as that shows a lack of respect toward you as well. If you give food or toys to one dog, the other one has no right to steal that away: you decided to give that thing to that dog, if they steal it they are not respecting you. Our female would never steal from my male (as I said, he's awesome at setting boundaries) - but he knows very well to not even try to steal from her something I gave her. If there's food on the ground he has no problem taking it, and actually is very harsh in scolding her if she tries to take it back, but if I give her food? No way, that was my decision and as such it must not be questioned. Ever. So you give food to your female and the puppy tries to steal it? You give the puppy the scolding of his life, because 1. he stole from an higher up 2. he overruled your decision

Basically: you are a pack. A pack needs a leader. That leader must be you. So you sets down the rules.

Puppy jumps on the female and she is bothered by it? You go over to them, break them apart and scold the puppy. Puppy steals something you are giving to the female? You scold puppy and stop him - tell the pup, with your actions, that "this female here is older and wiser than you, and her contribute to the pack more important than yours: I respect her more than I respect you and you would do well to remember this"

As for training, it really depends on the dogs. Some people will say that different words are better but... let's be honest... chances are both dogs will simply learn both words. The shiba learned everything she knows by watching my boy doing the exercise with me - not joking: first time I told her "sit" she sat like a pro, and we had never tried that before, same with "paw", "bring", "heel", "come", "lay down", "drop it" and "spin". My sister actually wanted a different word to "free" her from the order "stay" (I say "free", she wanted to use "go ahead") - end result is, the shiba learned both of them. Yes, using different words is useful in theory: if I want only one of them to stay, and the other to come, in theory I'd just use those different words... but as I said, they'll learn quickly both words so that won't help. Since they also know their names it's actually easier to simply use their name, so I say "[My dog's name] stay" "[shiba's name] come" and they know what to do (they tried to ignore the order they did not like at first, but that was simply them trying to fool me - it did not work, they've stopped)

You also need to make sure to have one-on-one time with each dog: that's for playing and walks both. It's important to take the younger dog for walks without the older one, and also to bond together, but also make sure to do this with the female as well, or she'll feel neglected.

Training depends on the dog. If the female is really obedient than having the puppy watch her might be useful, though I'd also find some time for him alone.

@neonbelly99 Thank you very much for your reply! Made me relook at a few things I’m doing at the moment.

@crown93 We only have two dogs right now but have had up to three in the past (no puppies though!).

In that situation, if your older dog isn't advocating for herself and you want the puppy to learn that what he did isn't okay, then it's your job to step in and hold the boundaries you want on behalf of your older dog. Anticipating triggers is important; if you know he's going to take treats out of your older dog's mouth and you don't want that to happen, don't put him in that position again - he should be in a different room OR he needs to learn a command to follow in that moment. (Sit, wait, place, etc.)

I do some training with my two dogs together, now that I know they won't hassle each other over treats. Name first, followed by command. I think that would be more challenging to do with a puppy because they're young and distractible. You want to set him up for success, so it might be better to train him separately now so he can do better.