So for my 3rd child I decided against a bottom stairgate and at 10 mths...

[Piffle]

he can go up and down perfectly (and bloody quickly.
I am amazed, we never had stairs with ds1, and DD we had stairgate as she had SN
Tis like a whole new world.
I have saved myself £40!

Well my stair gates rendered useless at 14mths, she has fell down them but she has figured out how to open them and can walk up and down them pretty well but then she will try to carry toys down and thats what causes her to fall. She has now mastered the cupboard and draw locks, so now i'm in real trouble the little madame

Can you keep your DS off the stairs when you aren't there, Piffle? That's why we had a bottom gate, because I couldn't keep my eyes on DC every second of the day (who managed the stairs pretty well at 8-10 months, but I still wouldn't trust them alone there).

I generally took both our gates down around 16-17 months and I always thought that was extra-ordinarily early, I'm sure I've been told off for it by people.

When I had DD we lived in a flat, didnt get a house until I had DS (DC2) and he was about 8 months, had a stairgate until we moved out at about 16months then not had one since.
However, I do remember being at a friends house once, and her daughter was almost two, she got up the stairs and turned to speak to someone and fell down them, it was horrid, I was just frozen watching her bounce off the staircase, but it was a really steep old staircase, so I think it depends on the stairs tbh.

I took mine off at the weekend DD2 has just turned 2 was worried about her going up and down stairs although yesterday she was coming down them with a shopping trolley in each hand so I think she will be fine. They are loving the freedom to totally wreck and mess up play in their bedrooms now.

I will be tp put them back on once DB3 is at the climbing age.

It's interesting because I have a friend who has never had a stair gate her little boy (third baby so has older ones to copy) used to wait at the top and bottom of the stairs for her to take him down and other friends haven't used them either and their children never broke anything.

We've never had stairs gates, I had one that used to go on DS1's room, to keep him in there, lasted all of 5 minutes until he leanrt how to unlock it.

Do have doors shut though to keep the cat downstairs, so DS1 can come and go as he pleases, but DS2 can't get out, yet.

we've never taken our top one off as dd 5 is visually impared with sever depth perception loss so for her and ds2 that one is vital.
I was planning to get one, but was just saying that if I had he would not have mastered it so quick.
He is watched all day as it happens, but if I needed to I'd lob the shoe trunk in front of it to stop him. as i've never restricted him going up, he is quite bored of doing it

DS turned 3 last december and we still have the gates up . He is more than capable of doing the stairs no problem But as we live in a house with four floors I like to be aable to keep him contained on one floor to be able to keep an eye on what he is up too.

We have never had a gate at the bottom as we have a wierd shaped stairway.

Stairgate at the top but mainley so that I can keep them upstairs when I am up there.

Both boys have mastered the stairs quite easily and we have had no problems.

DS2 mastered the stairs really early........but fell down recently - from top to bottom - he's 4!!!

I daresay we will get one for the bottom eventually... maybe

so did ds1 till he was in bed and got out of bed when he was 2 and fell down the stairs. we took to the a&e and luckily he was fine but he still has the scars on his back where he got grazes on his back. hes 9 now and i will never forgive my self for not shutting his bedroom door and knowing what could have happened.

to reiterate we have a TOP gate and would never not use that :0) only talking about bottom gate and fully supervised ie: me hovering about 3 cms behind hime "just in case"