Hi,
I love kids and I love dogs. I live in a house with both. Sometimes our daughter comes to the dog park with us and has never had a bad experience there. She knows to stay close and not to run around.
Our dog is a herding dog and will chase anything that runs away from him. Sometimes when I visit the dog park, there will be children accompanying their folks and dogs. Often, they will do what kids like to do—run around and have fun. But herding dogs, like children, also have behaviors that are innate. They herd other creatures who run from them. I am truly sorry that my dog runs after them and sometimes catches up to them and pushes them down. But I also think that this is the one place where dogs can be dogs. He does not nip at them or try to bite them. He is just excited about the chase. There are all sorts of parks where kids may run freely and those are parks where I do not take my dog to run off leash. I would love it if parents would instill in their kids that the dog park is a wonderful place but it is a place where they need to stick close to mom and dad and understand that dogs respond to excited, active behavior, like jumping up and down and running.
Again, I want to say that my dog is not acting inappropriately aggressive toward them. He is doing his job. I wouldn’t ask retriever owners to train their dogs to not fetch or not jump into water. And again, I am not saying that kids shouldn’t come to the dog park…I think that there are just different rules for people behavior at a dog park vs. a city park.
A different kid-dog issue is this: There may also dogs present that are not socialized to children and may perceive a child’s animated activity -or even a friendly advance from a child – as a threat.
So I’d be interested in hearing other folks’ ideas about kids and dog parks. Like I said before our daughter (10 years old) loves to come with us and has met some really nice people and dogs that way…so I am not advocating no kids…just thoughts about how the two co-exist happily.
We know hyper piper, as you know my aussies and one border… herders too, and mine do the same thing… chase and love kids. I bring my kids to the park, and they are old enough to understand that they can get jumped on, licked etc.
I think it is good for kids to understand there are all kinds of dogs and to respect each dog. Now mind you my kids are old enough to understand how to approach a dog, push one down etc. (my kids are 9 and 11)
I do think that people need to be very careful when bringing their kids to the park, as do the owners of the dogs do too. If I had a dog that was not socialized to kids, I would be wary of them around lots of people too. I think people need to have responsibility for their pets.. park or not it is never safe to have a dog around kids that could possibly bite them. I think both parties need to have responsibility for their own, parents should not assume that a toddler/kid etc would be 100% “safe” at the dog park, and aggressive dogs who are out of control should not be there either.
My kids have been jumped on by random dogs, and all is well, they push them down and we move on, now if a dog jumped on my kid and bit them in the face, who is responsible? My kid? No I would say the owner. I am short, it could happen to me too… in fact Piper has jumped on my kids, and they just push him down, no big deal.
So after all of that I would say, bring kids… know they can get licked, jumped on, knocked down etc… you should be able to bring a kid and not have them bit by a dog.
I am still torn about toddlers etc… just too little to be surrounded by a lot of dogs.
By the way we missed Piper this past weekend.
Left by packof three on February 11th, 2008