Are stairs really bad for Daisy?

[Jordan & Daisy]

We have about 10 carpeted stairs in our house and then about 10 wooden stairs to go outside. I have found a lot of differing literature on this, some saying stair climbing when young can lead to hip dysplasia and some saying it will prevent HD by strengthening her joints and muscles. Should we let her do stairs? Any advice??

[Nicky, Riley & Boris]

I don't think a dog can get Hip Dysplasia or one of the other genetic bone conditions unless they are predisposed and carry the genetic markers for the disease. Having said that I personally would limit a young puppy from this sort of activity as I have always done with my puppies over the years at least until they were a year old.  It didn't prevent Boris from getting Osteochondriatosis though! I think going up is preferable to coming down but that's from someone whose knees have taken a battering from too much hill climbing over the years.

[Lori, Quincy & Frankie]

Quincy bounds down our carpeted stairs in a rat-ta- tat motion that is right out of a roadrunner cartoon episode because it is so fast, but I never thought about long term effects.  I will be interested to see what the DK experiences and comments are about this.  

[Leslie, Yogi & Maci Bear]

I will watch the responses with interest as well. We do not have any stairs in the house, but we have a deck off of the house that has the landing, one stair and then the ground. Yogi almost always takes this stair in a leap and sails off the deck into the yard. He just gets so excited playing that he likes to fly off the deck when he's playing. I love to see him do it cause I think he's so happy, .... But I do wonder.

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

We have stairs and both of our Doodles have been going up and down since they were puppies with no problems.  I've had dogs all my life and never stopped them from using the stairs.  One did have hip dysplasia but he was a Lab who didn't show symptoms until he was quite old.

[Debb, Lucy & Oscar]

Stairs! An interesting question! When Lucy was young we gated off the stairs until she was 4-5 mos. old, only because we didn't want her on the carpeted areas until we could trust she was fully potty trained. We also gated off the stairs with Oscar as a pup for the same reason, but an even longer period because he took longer to potty train. Oscar, on descending stairs, has what we call a 'controlled crash'...lol. He goes bounding down, throwing caution to the wind, his feet connecting with about half the stairs he intends to hit. Its not pretty!

[Robin & Josie]

I love this question. Our breeder cautioned us about stairs because of the hip dysplasia thing. Also, no long walks, etc.

So Josie came home the first day and I gated her in to this small space, which included our couch. I went into the kitchen for a MINUTE and who joined me the next minute? The princess, of course. She jumped over the top of the couch. 

Naturally, I was totally freaked out. OMG, she's going to have hip dysplasia. We went to the vet the next day and her response, "I don't like her jumping from that high because she could hurt herself, but a dog will only get hip dysplasia if she's genetically destined to get it." 

Unfortunately, in the following months since we've had her, I have been unable to control her jumping on and off things, running up and down the stairs - jumping over a three foot gate (and she's only 13 - 14" tall) etc.

She's very athletic and it is what is. I just say the Serenity Prayer and do the best I can keep her out of danger. 

[Ginny Nightingale]

I think that you should limit reckless running up and down stairs, very long hikes on strenuous terrain or very high jumping for as long as you can--in other works, normal every day activity is fine--but avoid extremes--they won't get dysplasia, but could have joint injuries and that can plague them for years--the dog may get better after an early injury, but could more easily re-injure themselves later on. No data on it though, so just use your common sense.

[Sue, Murphy and Bella ()*o*()]

I'm not sure anyone really knows or there has been any evidence based research done to clarify the issue one way or the other. I'd say just use common sense and let dogs be dogs. Kind of like letting kids be kids, but using common sense when supervising them. Luckily my kids survived me in one piece and my fun loving, jumping , leaping, stair climbing, hiking, dock diving dogs will too. Only time will tell.

[Laurie, Wally & Charlotte]

On Jan. 24, Megan-Finn started a discussion on just this topic. If you search for that discussion, you will be able to see all of the responses that her question generated.  

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

We have a second story and Ned has always gone up and down the stairs.  I will say though, that we often blocked that area off during the day so we could keep him confined in uncarpeted areas and we did carry him down in the mornings to prevent unwanted accidents on the way down the stairs.  So I guess to answer your question, while he did go up and down the stairs as a small pup, his access to stairs was pretty limited.