Dachshund I’ll admit something that probably disqualifies me from writing a balanced piece about this breed: I once spent forty minutes negotiating with a nine pound dog about whether she was going outside in a light drizzle.
She won. Obviously.
That particular detail never makes it into the puppy brochures, and neither does the rest of it. Because the honest answer to whether these dogs are high maintenance has almost nothing to do with brushing, bathing, or fancy salon appointments, and almost everything to do with the fact that you have brought home a very small animal with very large opinions.
Let’s get specific about what that actually costs you.
What "High Maintenance" Really Means With This Breed
Ask ten owners and you’ll get ten different answers, mostly because people are measuring different things.
Some are thinking about grooming. Some are thinking about vet bills. A few are thinking about the sound their dog makes when the mail carrier commits the unforgivable crime of existing near the porch.
The truth sits somewhere in the middle, and it shifts depending on which part of dog ownership you personally find exhausting.
Grooming: The Easy Part (Mostly)
Here’s some genuinely good news. On the grooming front, these dogs are close to low maintenance, and smooth coats are almost comically easy.
A rubber curry brush once a week, a bath every month or two, done. Their short coat sheds, but it sheds in tiny needle-like hairs that mostly disappear into upholstery instead of forming tumbleweeds on your floor.
Longhairs need more. Plan on brushing two or three times a week, with extra attention behind the ears and along the feathering on the legs and tail, because that’s where mats love to set up camp.
Wirehairs sit in their own category. They need hand stripping or at minimum a good clipper trim a few times a year, plus regular beard maintenance, because that charming little face carpet holds onto water, kibble crumbs, and whatever they found in the yard.
Nails matter more than people expect. Long nails change how a dog distributes weight, and given everything else going on with this breed’s structure, that’s a small thing worth staying on top of.
Grooming is the part of dachshund ownership people worry about. It is almost never the part that actually gets them.
Exercise: Sneakier Than It Looks
Short legs create an illusion. People see a low, stubby dog and assume it must be a couch ornament that needs a lap around the block and nothing more.
Wrong. These were working dogs bred to go underground and confront animals significantly more dangerous than themselves, and that engine did not get removed when they became house pets.
An adult typically wants two solid walks a day plus something to think about. Skip that and the energy doesn’t vanish, it just relocates into your baseboards, your shoes, and a barking habit that will make you consider moving.
The good news is that mental work counts. Fifteen minutes of scent games in the living room can leave one more satisfied than half an hour of aimless walking, because sniffing is what they were built to do.
The Back Conversation Nobody Has Early Enough
Now we get to the real answer.
Intervertebral disc disease is common in this breed, and it’s the single biggest reason the "high maintenance" label sticks. That long spine paired with short legs comes from a genetic quirk that affects how the discs between vertebrae develop, and it means a percentage of these dogs will have a serious back episode in their lifetime.
Estimates vary, but a meaningful chunk of the breed population deals with it at some point. Sometimes it’s mild and resolves with crate rest. Sometimes it’s surgery and a recovery process measured in months.
That risk changes your daily habits permanently, and this is the part that surprises new owners most.
Rules You Will Actually Have to Enforce
You become the furniture police. Jumping off a couch is a controlled fall, and repeating that fall a few thousand times over a decade adds up.
Ramps or steps at every surface your dog is allowed on. Not eventually, not once they get older: from the start, while they’re young enough to think the ramp is normal.
Pick them up correctly, one hand supporting the chest and one supporting the rear, so the spine stays level. The classic "scoop under the front legs and let the back half dangle" move is exactly what you want to avoid.
Keep them lean. This is probably the most powerful thing in your control, and it is deeply unpopular advice because these dogs are outstanding beggars. Extra weight loads the spine every hour of every day, and a few pounds on a twelve pound frame is proportionally enormous.
No stairs when you can avoid them, and no wrestling matches with big dogs who play by body-slamming.
Every rule you enforce today is a rule your dog’s back will not have to pay for in five years.
None of this is difficult. It is just constant, and "constant" is what people actually mean when they say high maintenance.
The Emotional Labor Part
Here’s the piece that rarely shows up in breed guides, though it might be the thing that most defines living with one.
These dogs bond hard. Not in a pleasant, casual, "happy you’re home" way, but in a way that means one specific human becomes the sun and everything else in the universe orbits it.
That is wonderful roughly ninety percent of the time.
Separation Anxiety Is Genuinely Common
The flip side of intense attachment is intense distress when you leave. Left untrained, that shows up as howling, destruction near doorways, or accidents in the house from a dog who is otherwise perfectly reliable.
Prevention is far easier than treatment. Practice short absences early, make departures boring, and give them something good that only appears when you go, so leaving predicts something pleasant rather than abandonment.
If your lifestyle involves ten hour workdays with nobody home, be honest with yourself about whether this is the right breed.
The Barking Situation
They are loud. Wildly loud for their size, with a chest cavity that produces a bark you’d expect from a dog three times bigger.
That’s not a flaw, it’s the job description. A dog sent underground after badgers needed a voice its handler could hear through several feet of dirt.
In an apartment, that heritage becomes a problem. Manageable with training, absolutely, but "manageable with training" is another way of saying you have work to do.
Training: Stubborn, or Just Negotiating?
The breed’s reputation for stubbornness is mostly a misunderstanding of what independence looks like.
Working underground, alone, out of sight, these dogs had to make their own calls. Deference to a handler was not useful down there. Independent judgment was the entire point.
So when yours pauses and appears to weigh whether your recall cue is worth the interruption, that’s not defiance. That’s a specialist evaluating a proposal.
Which means your training has to be genuinely worth their time. High value food, short sessions, real enthusiasm, and payment that beats whatever they were already doing.
Housetraining, The Great Humbling
Ask experienced owners about the hardest part and a startling number will say housetraining.
Small bladders, low tolerance for cold and wet grass, and enough cleverness to notice that the rug indoors is warm and always available. Some take months longer than average, and this is where a lot of frustration builds.
What works: relentless consistency, a schedule tighter than you think you need, generous celebration outdoors, and total calm about accidents. Punishment mostly teaches them to go somewhere you can’t see.
A dachshund isn’t hard to train. A dachshund is hard to train carelessly.
Who Actually Thrives With One
They fit people who find the quirks charming instead of exhausting, and who have some flexibility in their day.
They fit homes where somebody is around often, where a ramp on the couch isn’t an eyesore worth arguing about, and where "we’re skipping the walk today" happens rarely.
They fit owners with a sense of humor about being outsmarted by something the size of a loaf of bread, on a regular basis, for the next fourteen years.