AIBU to be upset after a dog jumped at our baby?

[KellyK2026]

Okay, so myself, DH and baby were at a country park the other week. Baby was getting hungry so we sat ourselves down on a park bench and got some food out. A woman was walking with her family and dog and the dog must’ve smelt the food as it suddenly
comes bounding over and is jumping at baby (who is on DH knee) to get the food. We don’t know this dog and don’t know what it's capable of. I scream at the owner that we have a baby and to get her dog under control. At this point, she’s pretty far away and is taking her time to come over. My DH then kicks the dog to get it off them as it just will not stop. The woman wasn’t particularly apologetic and seemed shocked. Did we overreact?

Maybe you have something to learn from your baby then.

Poster said to pick up the baby, not control the dog.

I was answering your question which is that you overreacted to the situation .

There is no basis for assuming the dog was "untrained". It almost certainly has been trained- most dogs are.
And maybe the dog is well behaved 99% of the time. Just this one instance it smelled some food and was less than perfect. That happens with animals as it does with children and adults too. We can't expect perfection from dogs. It's not realistic. No animal or human is perfect.

the advice to you is to develop a safer, more pragmatic and less fearful approach to animals- for the benefit of your child more than anything. or alternatively go to spaces where you entirely avoid them.

No because unlike my baby, I’m not defenceless and I have a duty of care to protect them. If your dog gets hurt then that’s on the owner and the law agrees with me.

But yet your baby was sat there, completely happy and not scared or affected by your screaming and continued to eat? Something not adding up!

I’ve never known a well trained dog start jumping up out of nowhere, trying to grab food and also lose the ability of recall. You’re clutching at straws here.

Because a baby doesn’t understand the risk? There’s not an awful lot to compute. Babies would also sit in front of a gorilla happily eating not knowing the risks.

It didn't start jumping out of nowhere- it jumped because you had food.

Is it really your claim that trained dogs, never put a food wrong, ever??

do you apply the same beliefs about parenting, because you have a big shock coming!

The DH sounds a bit of a dimwit tbh

Well trained dogs don’t simultaneously lose basic skills all at once, no. If they do then they aren’t well trained.

But baby was sat there ignoring the entire situation escapade continuing to eat?!? Dog couldn’t have got that close.

A lot smarter than you no doubt

Well it did and the owner apologised. So…

Unlikely if it was going mad, jumping about and you were screaming blue murder … most babies would start crying. Are you a first time parent?

If you say so … All sounds so over the top.

Unlikely … straddling a baby and kicking a dog, super smart!

Who said I was screaming blue murder? I shouted to the dog owner to get her dog under control because we had a baby. What a weird question.

It's not "losing a skill" my dear. dogs arent machines that you program to do things, they are sentient creatures capable of a range of complex behaviours and moods.
sometimes even usually-well-behaved dogs refuse to listen / chose to be stubborn/ chose their own agenda. So do children- even those with good hearing, language and listening skills will chose to ignore instructions sometimes I can assure you!.

And your husband then has no other option but to kick the dog?!? What a weird reaction … hence my question, which I assume the answer is yes.

Well trained dogs don’t do this and good owners keep their dogs on leads if they can’t leave food alone

Animals aren’t like humans, FYI.

I I know dog loons expect the world to bed to their fur baby but a family having a picnic in the park is a perfectly reasonable thing to do and expect without some twat and their mutt coming to spoil things.

I’d have kicked it as well. Would you really risk your baby being hurt? Normal people put their own children before random potentially dangerous dogs

Honestly if my dog had bounded over like that and behaved in such a way around parents with a baby, I wouldn’t mind one bit if my dog was kicked away from the baby and would’ve been mortified that they’d caused such a problem. Our dog was food obsessed so we’d usually keep him on a lead in picnic areas because even though he was well trained with recall, because he was a Labrador when it came to food he had a one track mind. So sorry you had to deal with that, how stressful for you and your baby.

Yes but my child doesn’t have massive canines and claws. If I’m being honest with you, the minority of responses that have been negative have actually convinced me that we should’ve taken it further and reported it under the dangerous dog act. We didn’t at the time
because the owner apologised and we didn’t feel it necessary. However, the victim blaming and thinking that we should’ve just let a full grown dog jump up at an infant has shown me that, actually, people need to take a stance because others clearly think this is acceptable or are quick to make excuses. If it happens again I most definitely will report it, as others have suggested.

The funny thing is that if the OP had a dog, being attacked by another dog, the dog loons on here would be applauding the DH for kicking it. Baby’s are annoying but fur babies are acceptable to so many people

OP doesn’t know dog breeds, isn’t confident around dog … but is apparently an expert in dog training.