Are Greyhounds good with young children?

[Loobyfly]

My much loved Border Collie died a month ago. I would love another dog but not sure what breed would be suitable as my kids are very young. I have 3 children aged 5 years, 3 years and 6 months. I was thinking about adopting a retired Greyhound as have read that they are friendly and placid with children. Does anyone have experience of this breed as a family pet? Or perhaps Whippets as they are smaller? I worked as a vet nurse for 10 years so have lots of experience with dogs. Would most love another Border Collie but I know they are not the best with toddlers due to strong herding instinct. Any advice gratefully received, thank you.

Our Greyhound is very placid and friendly. Really is the most wonderful dog with DC.
But he is a bit boring for them! lol! He sleeps loads and isn't overly keen to play fetch! (And he has the most smelly wind ever!)
We now have a jack russell too.

Greys are often super with kids, so placid and goofy. Also, many of the grey rescues foster dogs so they can give some assurances on which dogs have spent time with children and got on ok. I know loads of them and can only think of one who's grumpy but then he is old and has a painful condition so can be excused. Please go and meet some, they're the most under-rated breed ever.

My friend has recently had a rescue greyhound and she is very good with her ds (ASD). Very gentle and very lazy.

We have a 10 month old lab and 2 dc's (ds severe ASD). Lab is a loon (still very young) but very gentle with my ds - the dog just "knows" ds is different and is very protective of him.

The greyhound rescue allowed my friends ds time to get used to dogs, visit often and take the dog for walks. This was very important as she is a first family dog. Only downside I can see is the greyhounds recall is terrible, far worse than my loony lab - even getting her back in from the garden is a nightmare, but they are working on that and i'm sure they will get there.

They get on great with children and completly ignore all their running around etc! They are very gentle dogs and love attention but do not jump up or get too excited which is good for small children as they don't get knocked over. They are also generally great with other dogs and some of them are cat-friendly.

Countrygirl - Our Greyhound gets very excited at walk time and knocks everyone nearby flying! He also jumps up at me if i am not quick enough to stop him. He is a bit of a nutter!

Thank you to everyone for your responses. I am going to visit a Greyhound rescue centre on Friday to meet some dogs and ask questions.

We have a Whippet, he's fantastic with our children, DD is 7 and DS is 21 months.

We already had a little dog, a chinese crested hairless who we picked from his litter whe he was only a day old, we got him at 8 weeks old when DS was 4 months old so they've grown up together. We got our whippet last December and he fitted into the family realy well.

What I really love about our whippet is that he's so submissive, our little crestie is very much the boss dog in our house. DS also lays all over him and he just puts up with it. He's super chilled out when around the house but so much fun to take out for walks. He loves to run around in the fields near our house and is so fast.

Another great thing about him is that he doesn't shed hair and is completely odourless. You can actually bury your nose right into his fur and still not smell a thing.

When I said odourless, I don't mean the farts though, they're evil

The main reason we chose a Whippet over a greyhound is his size, we wanted a smaller dog so he could fit through a small dog flap to get into the garden. My friend was burgled because the thief got in through her labrador sized dog flap, whereas the smaller dog flap is only really accessible to our pets.

I have two greyhounds, children, grandchildren, two cats and a rat and they all get on well together. I also take in homeless greyhounds as fosters until they get a permanent home and I cat test greyhounds from the rescue to see if they would be suitable to live with cats, but it also lets me see their reaction to children. I have had numerous greyhounds that have had problems with the cats but not one of them have had problems with the children, they have such a good nature and they just want to please, due to their size I have had a few children knocked over in the excitement of getting leads on pre walk but its all been accidental. 90% of the time they dont do much so the children get bored with them - they dont do fetch or paw unless it suits them! And the noxious gasses that are emitted from their rear end can be eyewatering to say the least but they are very loyal and lovable so they can be excused for that

Sorry about your collie
My SIL has a rescue greyhound
Very placcid and sweet wiht my DS
But MASSIVE - has to reverse in her house as can't turn around!

good luck with whatever you decide.

We had an ex-racing greyhound when I was a child but he lived outdoors. He was lovely, and really good with us and our friends.

have you thought about a lurcher? we adopted one 8 months ago and have ds 7 and we also foster children 2 years+ (we also have a curly coated retriever).. The lurcher is fab, he is lively, energentic and loves the children. He plays ball with them, he bounces on teh trampoline with them, he listens to them etc. DS loves walking him, and loves playing with him as he is so interactive.

As you can tell i am so in Love with him, (as i am with the curly) but he is jut such a fun dog. He just ROCKS .

Friend has two lurchers, both fab family pets, although will hare off after wild rabbits given half the chance. The male dog sleeps outside his young daughter's bedroom door and goes and fetches them if she cries Occasionally she has got knocked over or side-swiped with a waggy tail, but otherwise they are very placid and laid back dogs.