To think parents should teach their children how to behave round dogs

[Xihha]

There have been a few posts lately about people needing to control their dogs more (and I agree, if you cant control our dog and clean up after it then you shouldn't have a dog imo), but is it unreasonable to expect parents to teach children to be a bit more careful round dogs?

Whilst walking my dog (on his lead) a child who looked about 10 ran up and stuck his head in my dogs face to make a fuss of him whilst i was picking up doggys poo, without checking if it was ok, there have been other times kids have just walked up and started pulling doggy around, this sort of thing happens a lot, especially in the summer when there are more kids out playing and the parents rarely say anything about it.

It's not really an issue with my great soppy lump of a dog because he loves kids and will put up with anything for a bit of fuss but shouldn't these kids know that you should check with the owners before approaching strange dogs and that even a nice dog can get pissed of if you start pulling it around?

Starlight, I agree completely with your points here.

The bottom line here is the interests and nature of the children have to be taken as a given and dog owners should not expect that all children will adapt, or should adapt, to their pets. It should be the owners and their pets who adapt.

You do not know from just looking at a child whether that child might have a problem understanding that all dogs are dogs no matter what shape or size. You do not know if a child is capable of understanding that granny's dog's infinite patience is not a quality shared by all other dogs. You do not know if a child has any sort of SN or an impulsive and exuberant personality. All adults who have any experience of children at all know that children can say and do unpredictable things and therefore that is what they need to take into account when training a dog and when deciding if their dog is a suitable candidate for taking out. Not all dogs are.

Dogs need to be really well trained because children come in all sorts, yet at the end of the day the dog is supposed to be in the hands of someone who is responsible enough to control the situation. If the owner is not, then he or she has no business taking their dog out, and certainly no business having their dog off lead. It is irresponsible to expect all children a dog will come in contact with will be trained to behave properly around a dog.

Is it me, or does LazyJane just seem to post the same thing over and over again?

I love my dog.

Keep your probably obnoxious children out of his face and I will keep him away from you.

Deal?

It's both really OP.

As a parent, it's my job to teach DS how to behave around dogs. Both our own dogs and other people's dogs, which is helped by dog owners teaching their dogs how to behave well and keeping them under proper control.

And as a dog owner, it's up to me to teach my dogs how to behave around other people, and keep them under reasonable control while we are out in public. Which is helped by other people teaching their children how to best to behave around dogs in keeping with how the child feels about them.

People can only do their best. There will always be the child who runs up to pat a dog or runs away from it in fear. There will always be the dog who runs up for a fuss or who growls to warn someone away. There will sadly always be a child who has been bitten or a dog that has been mistreated, for example, who just can't cope with some situations and want nothing to do with strange dogs/strange people.

But it makes life a bit easier for everyone if you can do your best to help both dog and child as much as possible, allowing for these extreme circumstances, and try to teach them how and when to approach or avoid each other.

Dogs have always been around, dogs will always be around. No matter how much you despise them, neglecting to teach your child the appropriate way to behave around dogs is just bad parenting.

Squeaking and squawking about how awful dogs are is pointless.

There maybe some point, in the end, to pointing out the problems of dog ownership...maybe one day the ethics police will get around to pointing out that keeping dogs in environments unlike the one they were evolved to live in, and then disciplining the crap out of them in the hopes of 'training' them to accept the restrictions without biting people, is a really really shit idea.

Maybe one day keeping a dog as a pet will be as frowned upon as keeping whales or elephants as pets (think zoos/sea world etc) is now.

Lazy - I'm not one of the "doghouse" crowd. I've posted on there only a handful of times

Unlikely ICBINEG. Humans have never been without animals. Fyi, last time I checked zoos,Sea World etc are still open.

Humans have kept dogs as pets for millennia, they have evolved to live with humans, disapprove all you want but I really wouldn't hold my breath that they'll go the way of cigarettes.

Maybe one day, your children will even choose to be dog owners!

Also ICBINEG I would recommend you read In Defence of Dogs as you labour under the assumption dogs do not live in the enviroment they were intended to.

It's an interesting academic book.

Icbineg - you're not coming across as very knowledgable about either evolution or domestication.

I think lazyjane most of us are suggesting that parents train their children because it benefits the child. Im sure the dogs that thought my son was playing because of the way he behaved were quite happy to chase him. They looked pretty happy and full of life and not remotely snarling child killers that you seem to imagine all dogs to be. The person who was unhappy about the situation was my son, not the dogs. Fortunately I suppose he was the one triggering the unwanted behaviours. With some training in dog language and lots of practice at modifying his behaviour around dogs he was able to get the dogs to do what he wanted. The dogs lost out on an exciting (if unwilling) playmate, but my son was a lot happier.

lazy no one has said dogs are more important than kids, we have said that ad owners our responsibility is to keep our dogs under control not your kids

alis well do try the doghouse - you will fit right in!

sea world limps on while most disapprove of perverting animals behaviour for human entertainment....

Not for much longer I think.

The situation is different with dogs...of course it is. But any breed of dog for which it is hard work to suppress the dogs natural instinct to defend it's territory/food enough that a non-dog confident toddler could come around for tea (and not BE the tea iyswim) should not be put through the training. It isn't fair on the dog.

Can you read?I said I'd posted there but don't frequent the board.

I'm assuming with your all consuming concern of animal ethics you are a vegan?

I think you'll find yourself struggling to find any post where I've said dogs should come before children.

What on earth does sea world have to do with dogs?

I suggest you read up on domestication icbineg

the very premise of this thread, that other parents must train children not to annoy their precious dogs

Wow, hyperbole much? No it isn't, and if you took off those blinkers you have on, you'd see it.
Never visited the Doghouse, don't own a dog, doubt I ever will, but still think it's appropriate to have taught my son how to approach other people's animals. He loves them, in fact.

saintly I am really struggling to understand your view point. (even ignoring the snide comments).

Your son got chased by dogs when he (and presumably you) didn't want him to be?

And this is somehow your problem and not the dog owners?

What if, when I am done explaining in great detail to my own DC that they should never approach dogs, never go around to houses with dogs, and exactly how to act if approached by dogs off their leads on the beach (again!), someone moves in to my street and decides to keep a huskie, or bees, or a bobcat, or a racoon or a python (don't worry he's a big softy and has hardly ever attacked anyone..at least when food wasn't involved) and I now have 5 different sets of rules on how to react when other peoples random animals/insects come after you?

Surely if anyone makes the decision to share their life with a breed of animal known to have killed children, that it quite seriously their problem and not mine?

I have rarely posted in The Dog House because of a run in with one particular poster who was bloody awful for me for no reason. But that 'crowd' were lovely to me recently when I posted about my dog being ill and having to have him PTS. I couldn't have asked for kinder, more supportive people to speak to about it.

Perhaps the same goes with forums as it does with dogs and dog owners. The irresponsible few spoil things for the many.

As I said before, you do what you can with your dog and your child to teach both how to behave around the other, as best you can for what they can learn and understand. In the same way you do with other situations in life that we all have to learn to cope with regardless of our personal feelings for them.

Surely if anyone makes the decision to share their life with a breed of animal known to have killed children, that it quite seriously their problem and not mine?

Exactly that.

My DC are terrified of dogs because I have told them not to go near them else they might bite.
Whilst I agree that Some children need controlling around dogs, I disagree that the children should ask the owner if they can stroke it. If they d

If they don't know the dog/owner then don't go near it, at all. Dogs are unpredictable, children are unpredictable keep the two apart.