Safe and Successful Pet Introductions: Avoiding Common Pitfalls

In a perfect world, the lion really would lie down with the lamb (or the wolf with the rabbit), but our world isn’t perfect, and introductions don’t always go as smoothly as we might hope. 

If either party displays a strong arousal response or strong fear/stress response, you’ll need to incorporate more significant behavior modification protocols into your introduction scenario. The careful introduction process described in the main article  will prevent any disasters, but if you see significant distress or arousal behaviors from either animal, abort the introduction and rethink your position:

• Am I truly committed to making the effort that will be necessary for this new animal companion to live safely and happily in my family?

• If so, are all members of this family also in agreement and willing and able to do the behavior modification and management necessary to accomplish this?

• If behavior modification is not successful, are we prepared to very carefully manage this environment for the remainder of our animals’ lives?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, then the prospective new family member is probably better off returning from whence she came, or being uber-managed until you can rehome her, if she came from a neglected or otherwise undesirable situation.