Gate for fragile elderly Pekingese

A 15-year-old Pekingese is a very different challenge from a dog you're trying to contain — you're working in reverse, creating a protected zone where he can rest without risk of being knocked over by bigger dogs, children, or foot traffic. Gate choice still comes down to three things: his size and any mobility limits, the width of the opening you're gating, and whether wall-mounting is an option (pressure-mounted gates are not safe at the top of stairs, just so that's on your radar). Can you tell me where you're planning to install the gate — doorway, room divider, or stairs — how wide the opening is roughly, and whether there are other pets or people in the house who'll be on the other side of it?

That's a really clear picture, thank you. So the gate needs to hold back two large, enthusiastic Labradors reliably — that's where the structural requirement comes in — while also being easy for adults to open one-handed (you'll be doing it a dozen times a day). And the bar spacing matters: you don't want him getting a paw or his flat face stuck if he approaches the gate, and you don't want a gap at the bottom he could stumble through. What's his mobility like — can he stand up against the gate at all, or is he mostly lying down these days?

Perfect — that simplifies things. Because he's not the one pressing against it, you don't need a gate with a very small bar gap for containment purposes; you need one that's robustly wall-mounted so two large dogs leaning on it won't flex or pop it open. My recommendation is the Safetots Extra Wide Screw Fit Safety Gate. It's wall-mounted on four fixing points which makes it genuinely solid against Labrador-sized pressure, the vertical bars are spaced closely enough that his face and paws are safe, and there's an adjustable bottom bar you can raise slightly so he isn't tripping on a threshold. The one-handed auto-close mechanism means the adults can move through it without thinking. It fits openings from about 75cm to 82cm, so your 80cm doorway is right in its range. Avoid any pressure-mounted gate here — Labs will eventually shift it, and that gate coming down on a fragile elderly dog is exactly the outcome you're trying to prevent.

Good question to press on. The Safetots screw-fit gate has bar spacing of around 7cm, which is standard for gates designed to brachycephalic breeds not pressing against them. Since he's shuffling slowly rather than throwing himself at the gate, that spacing is fine — he'd have to actively push his face through, which a wobbly 15-year-old isn't going to do. If you wanted absolute maximum caution, you could position the gate so he can't reach it easily — a doorway gate set in the frame means he'd have to walk right up to it. But honestly, at his mobility level, the bar spacing on the Safetots won't be an issue.

You're very welcome. It sounds like he's got a lovely quiet retirement ahead of him in that living room. The Safetots Extra Wide Screw Fit is a solid, no-nonsense gate — once it's up properly it won't budge. Take care fitting the wall fixings into studs or using appropriate wall anchors if it's a plasterboard frame; that's what makes the difference between a gate that holds and one that doesn't. Best of luck to the old boy.