Living with a pug: the truth about owning one

Pugs have a reputation for being clowns, and it's earned. They're one of the funniest, most affectionate dogs you can share a house with, and living with one is a genuinely cheerful experience.

They also come with a list of caveats that's longer than most breeds', and anyone thinking about one deserves to hear it properly rather than after the fact.

Here's the honest version.

What they're like

Enormously good company. Pugs were bred for one job — being companions — and they are extremely good at it. They want to be with you, on you, or as close to you as the furniture allows. If you'd like a dog that keeps a dignified distance, this is not it.

Genuinely comic. They have a sense of theatre. The head tilt, the sudden mad sprint round the room, the long-suffering sigh when asked to move. It's hard to be in a bad mood around one.

Good with almost everyone. Children, visitors, other dogs, cats, chickens. Pugs are rarely aggressive and are usually delighted by new people. They make poor guard dogs and excellent greeters.

Low exercise needs. Two short walks suits them. Which is fortunate, because as you'll see, long walks are often a bad idea.

Adaptable. Flat, house, town, country — pugs are largely unbothered as long as you're there.

The breathing, which is the whole thing

You cannot responsibly own a pug without understanding this.

Pugs are brachycephalic — the skull is compressed, but the soft tissue inside isn't, so it's crowded into too small a space. A large proportion of pugs have some degree of BOAS, and studies have found the breed to be among the most severely affected.

Snorting, snoring and snuffling are not personality. They are the sound of a dog struggling to move air. This is worth repeating because so much pug content online treats those noises as charming.

What follows from it:

• Heat is the emergency. A pug cannot cool itself efficiently, because panting is how dogs shed heat and a pug's panting is compromised. Heatstroke can kill in minutes. In summer: walk at dawn and dusk only, never leave one in a car or a hot room, and know the signs — frantic panting, brick-red gums, staggering, vomiting. If in doubt, cool them with tepid water and get to a vet immediately.
• Harness, never a collar. Anything pressing on the throat makes it worse.
• Weight is critical. An overweight pug breathes considerably worse, and pugs get fat with remarkable ease — they are relentless about food and very good at persuading people. Keeping one lean is the single most valuable thing you can do for its health, and it's hard, because they are extremely convincing.
• They can't really swim. Dense bodies, flat faces. Water needs to be fenced.
• Airlines usually won't carry them.

Corrective surgery exists — widening the nostrils, shortening the soft palate — and for many pugs it's genuinely life-changing. If your dog struggles after mild activity or sleeps with its head propped up to breathe, it's worth a conversation with your vet rather than accepting it as normal.

The other health issues

• Eyes. Very prominent, and shallow sockets mean they're exposed. Corneal ulcers are common and can escalate fast. Any squinting, pawing at the face, or a cloudy patch on the eye is a same-day vet visit — pugs genuinely do lose eyes to injuries that were treatable a day earlier.
• Skin folds. The face wrinkles and the tail fold trap moisture and get infected. Wipe and — importantly — dry them daily.
• Ears. Narrow canals, prone to infection.
• Spine and joints. Hemivertebrae (malformed vertebrae, linked to the curly tail) can cause weakness in the back legs. Patellar luxation is common too.
• Pug Dog Encephalitis. A rare but devastating inflammatory brain disease essentially unique to the breed, usually in young dogs. There's a DNA test available for risk markers.
• Dental. Full-size teeth in a small jaw means crowding and gum disease. Brush them, genuinely.

Insure from day one, with lifetime cover, before anything can be excluded as pre-existing. Pug vet bills are not a hypothetical.

The shedding, which nobody warns you about

Pugs are short-haired and shed constantly. Not seasonally — always, everywhere, in enormous quantities. The double coat on fawn pugs is the worst offender.

You will find pug hair in your food, your car, your work bag, and clothes you're certain the dog has never touched. A rubber grooming mitt a few times a week helps. Nothing solves it.

If anyone in the house is fastidious about a hair-free home, factor this in seriously.

Training and temperament

Pugs are bright and mildly uninterested in instructions. They're food-motivated to a degree that makes training easy and weight control hard.

Short, cheerful, treat-led sessions work. Anything repetitive or stern doesn't. House training often takes longer than average — routine and patience.

They struggle to be left alone. This is a companion breed, and separation anxiety is common. A pug in an empty house all day is an unhappy pug.

Buying one responsibly

This matters more than for most breeds, because the difference between a well-bred pug and a badly-bred one is the difference between a dog that breathes comfortably and one that doesn't.

• Look for a longer muzzle, open nostrils, and a less extreme face. This is the opposite of what the market has been rewarding, and it's the strongest predictor of a healthy dog.
• See the puppy with its mother, at home. Watch the mother breathe — she tells you a lot about what your puppy will be like.
• Ask about health testing — BOAS assessment, eye testing, PDE screening, hips.
• Consider a retro pug or a rescue. Retro pugs (outcrossed to slightly longer-nosed breeds) are controversial among purists and considerably healthier. Breed rescues have plenty of pugs, frequently surrendered when the vet costs began.

Some vets and welfare organisations now actively discourage buying flat-faced breeds, and their reasoning is sound. If you want a pug anyway — and plenty of us do — the responsible route is choosing the healthiest example you can find rather than the flattest face, and being honest that you're taking on higher-than-average care.

Living alongside other animals

Pugs are typically excellent with other pets. They have very little prey drive, which makes them one of the safer breeds around poultry — though "safer" is not "safe", and no dog should be unsupervised with chickens until you genuinely know it.

Introduce slowly, on a lead, and be more interested in the birds' stress than the dog's enthusiasm. A pug that chases hens once will chase them again.

So should you get one?

Yes, if you're at home a good deal, you want a small, funny, affectionate dog that doesn't need long walks, you can afford proper insurance and vet care, and you'll take the heat rule seriously.

No, if you're out all day, you want a walking companion for long hot summer hikes, you can't cope with the shedding, or you're buying based on how they look in photographs.

Pugs are marvellous. They're also a breed where your choices — which breeder, which face shape, how lean you keep them, how quickly you get to the vet — make an enormous difference to how comfortable their life is.

Go in with your eyes open and you'll have a very happy dog and a house permanently covered in hair.

This is our experience of living with the breed, not veterinary advice — for anything specific about your own dog, speak to your vet.