Some advice about the dog park please?

[Gremlinsateit]

Thanks everyone who gave me good advice about the terrier puppy we were looking at earlier this year. We passed on that one and had some luck with another breeder, and now have a lovely pup which is now 13 weeks old.

We are in the inner suburbs and chose a small breed because of that, but there are a lot of large breed dogs living around here.

We can’t go to the dog park yet because of vaccinations, but the vet has said he’s ok to go to the beach and we have a small off leash dog beach nearby. We’ve been going in the evenings when it’s quiet. Today was the first day when there were a lot of dogs there. When I went down the stairs onto the beach there was a crowd of larger dogs, so I picked up the pup to walk to the other end. The other dogs jumped all over me, which is understandable as I was carrying a puppy, but owners didn’t call them back at all. Several large dogs then followed us to the other end. The puppy has been great with other dogs around the neighbourhood so I put him down, which was a mistake, as he set off confidently, but the dogs chased him back down the beach, barking and snapping, rolled him a couple of times and chased him back up the stairs. He got pretty agitated. One of the other owners said to me “he’ll have to learn the hard way”. We left.

I was really counting on being able to go to the local dog park for exercise and socialisation but I’m now feeling a bit concerned. Do owners often let their dogs jump on people and chase dogs that aren’t enjoying the game? Any tips for how to handle a small, not very submissive breed in the dog park?

Simply, I would never set foot in a dog park with mine and think they are terrible for socialisation.

Socialising a puppy should be full of positive happy experiences for the dog. Any experiences like the one you had are likely to set him back. Parks are full of lazy owners and untrained dogs so I say avoid like the plague!

If you must go I would become very assertive and not allow the larger dogs to approach mine at all and I would keep mine on a lead so I could remove at the drop of a hat.

I too would avoid any kind of dog park as you can't 'police' the other dogs and whilst the majority of dog owners are sensible you will always get some that aren't and think it's fine to let the dogs 'sort it out' amongst themselves.

Thank you both. Today was a valuable lesson. I don’t want to take the risk of his terrier “confidence” turning into aggression. I will try letting him have a run at unpopular times and otherwise it looks like we’ll just have to walk by, at least for now.

Sounds very unpleasant for you and your dog. I'm the owner of a small breed too and it can be quite scary when big dogs gather round and the temptation to pick your overwhelmed dog up is very strong. However, it's not really a good idea as you've found.

Unfortunately there are a lot of dog owners who seem to have the attitude that 'they have to sort it out themselves'. No actually they don't.

If you're worried about socialisation at this stage. It might be better to keep away from dog type places and just carry your dog around town and into dog friendly shops and areas so he can get the sights and sounds. Some people like the idea of puppy parties, I never did it with my dog, but I imagine it works for the more sociable puppies.

My dog is very easy going, not too bothered about other dogs, but she was being badgered by a very annoying dog once who wouldn't leave her alone and in the end she bared her teeth and growled at the other dog, at which the others dog's owner declared 'Oh it's good for him to be told off, he needs to be taught a lesson, he's always annoying other dogs'. Maybe he does, but it's not my dog's job to teach him.

Meant to add: there's a lot of idiot dog owners out there, who don't have the first idea how train a well behaved respectful dog.

Oh any pictures?

Totally agree that these are not ideal places to socialise your dog. Do you have any friends with older sensible friendly dogs? Perhaps meet up with them if so and walk together - you want your puppy to have positive experiences with dogs with good dog manners so your pup learns the same. Consider do your pup playing with every random dog or running over to them? If not, don’t let them as a puppy.

Having no experience is better than a bad experience. This is an interesting article - www.collared-scholar.com/more-harm-than-good-3-reasons-why-i-never-socialize-my-puppies/

Thanks, all of this is very helpful, and lots of food for thought in that article. There is so much emphasis on the importance of socialisation with other dogs at this age around here. I’ve had more than one neighbour tell me on the street to take him to the dog park before he is fully vaccinated because it’s so important.

Training methods have changed beyond recognition since my last dog! We went to puppy preschool for the first time last week and the set up wasn’t great. The puppies weren’t permitted to interact for the first half (the class was also quite long) and then the trainer put them two at a time in a pen, waited until one of them got too boisterous and then removed the other one. My pup was the smallest there and he was pushed around in the pen, with no way out of course, then the trainer was irritated when he started to yap at the dog who was pushing him around. I’m beginning to feel quite doubtful about the whole concept!

I didn’t tend to teach mine to play with others as such although both of mine are very friendly with others.

What I did was walk with lots of different people but trained alongside other dogs. I attended training classes where they learned dogs were there but they weren’t a thing of amusement just something in the background.

My training tended to focus on getting my dogs to focus on me rather than other dogs or running off and playing, mainly as I am not actually bothered about them having ‘friends’ and would rather they listened to me and played with eachother Less risk of getting into trouble and failing to recall when they realise other dogs are fun!

I do now let them greet and say hello but on occasion I do just recall and walk straight past so they don’t expect this every time. I think sometimes people make playing with other dogs too much of a ‘thing’ when it does not need to be.

I did/do let them socialise with friends and family dogs and also dogs at clubs etc so they weren’t totally excluded from meeting others- just in moderation and only when I allowed not on their terms. I took them to lots of busy places (dog shows are brilliant for this) where there were dogs everywhere but not in a pressured environment where dogs are forced into playing with others.

He is very very cute!!!

Oh goodness he's cute.

Your neighbours seems to be under a bit of a misapprehension about what is meant by socialising a dog. It really doesn't mean getting them learning to stand up to the dogs in the dog park. They need to learn to get used to the sights and sounds they'll encounter on a daily basis: traffic, people, baby buggies, wheelchairs, going on public transport if that's something you'll likely to do. I was given a list when I joined my dog training classes, it was quite long, and included things like men/women in hats and glasses, men with beards and of course the things I mentioned above. At no point did it mention the dog park.

When I took my dog to training classes, nearly 7 years ago now, it was nothing like you describe. Confining two strange dogs in a pen sounds like torture for a shy dog and a guarantee to make some dogs fearful of other dogs if they feel intimidated. Sounds more like training them to fight than socialise. In your shoes, given that you say your dog ended up being pushed around by another dog, I certainly wouldn't be going back there.

As pp says, walking in a small group with older calm dog is an excellent way to get them used to other dogs and a hundred times better than chucking them in a pen together; I'm actually quite shocked by that.

Yes, it was all a bit “two dogs enter, one dog leaves” I think we might find another puppy class, or else have him miss the “play time” at the end.

Thanks so much everyone for helping me think this through. It makes much more sense to have positive experiences rather than any old experiences. We went for a nice stroll this morning and met some pleasant people and well-controlled dogs on leads, as well as some buses, prams, pigeons and a motorised scooter!

You pup is super cute

I use dog parks but mainly to give my whippet a decent run as I don’t let him off lead in unfenced areas apart from the beach.

Sorry you’ve had a bad experience. Don’t quit dog parks entirely but learn to know the dogs, owners and times to avoid. Even then there will be times you might go, feel the vibe is ‘off’ and leave straight away.

There wa a huge dog the other night that ran into my legs twice. It hurt but the owner thought it was funny. I decided that if the dog hurt running into me then it wouldn’t be great for my 13 kg whippet.

My dog has rolled smaller dogs at the beach a couple of times. He gets put straight back on the lead. Same if he’s pestering dogs at the dog park that don’t want to play crazy sighthound style. He’s still young and doesn’t always pick up the ‘don’t play rough with me’ vibes so it’s my job to watch the dog body language and intervene when necessary.

Maybe wait until pup is a bit older and more mature until you try again.

Hi

It might help if when your dog is distressed you crouch down and the dog will automatically go under you for protection feather than run

Mine did this automatically like it would with his mother but not sure how you'd teach this!

As a matter of fact I believe they do usually sort it out between them - but not when there are loads of dogs of all sizes in a small area, which is what your poor little chap experienced. A local dog trainer is currently working with us (we run a dog walking agency) coming out with us regularly with a young dog who missed out on early socialisation and is having to learn it later than usual. We walk small groups of well socialised dogs and this one is rapidly learning the cues and reacting appropriately, it's great to see him interacting and playing, and equally knowing when to stop without having to be physically grabbed and put back on lead. He was entirely incapable of that when we first met him.

People can be dicks and I suspect the culture of that beach you sent to has been over ridden by this lack of understanding about communal space. So you'll need to keep looking for places where other dog owners are more civic minded. Fwiw, I have an 8 year old arthritic boy. This idiot owner assumed it was ok for her young dog who was excited and wishing play and jump on mine. He's young for arthritis and it isn't obvious. The first time we encountered her we asked her to call her dog and she didn't so we tried to explain and she dismissed her dogs behaviour as acceptible. The next time it happend I was ready and I scolded her dog verbally and continuously (successfully!) until she called him back to her. The last time we came across them in the park she smartly saw us and the a ball for her dog in a different direction to us and we in turn respectfully went a different direction so as not to antagonise her efforts. Dogs need to learn manners but sometimes owners do as well.

Sounds like a horrible experience OP.

I have a one year old lab, a breed known for being over friendly and boisterous. He has learned how to socialise at Dog daycare and with a dog walker. Both settings are run by very experienced doggy people and it's been very good for him. He has learned some manners, how to read other dogs and how to behave. He remains on the boisterous side of the scale but I'm sure that his experiences with carefully chosen groups of dogs have been very helpful.

Having said all this, I think that if not run by experts these settings can do way more harm than good.

We did both Puppy and young Dog training with the dogs trust. They were brilliant. Puppies were allowed to interact at the end of the session, in groups chosen by size and confidence level.

I would never ever allow my dog to do what the bigger dogs did to your puppy today. It was completely out of order, and risked scaring the life out of your Puppy which in turn can trigger a nervous or aggressive reaction from the poor thing.

I've come to realise that the most important relationship to nurture in a Dog is the one that it has with its human family. Yes ideally it learns how to behave amongst other dogs but this is less important.

Thanks for all the insights everyone, this has been really helpful.

Turns out my neighbour’s small dog was attacked by a large dog, who “doesn’t like small fluffy dogs”, next to the same beach yesterday. Apparently the owner of the other dog was really good about getting his dog out of there, and my neighbour’s dog is not injured, but nonetheless.

We won’t be worrying about racing to the dog park before his vaccinations are finished, that’s for sure!

I’ve also emailed the owner of the puppy preschool to ask for advice on handling play time/interactions with larger dogs and will see if I get a helpful response.

Pup says thanks for the compliments! He really is a cutie

My attitude is that it's my responsibility to keep my dog safe and not to interfere with anyone else. Sometimes you have to be quite assertive as it seems a few people take offence if you don't want your dog to 'play' allow their dog to bounce/bite/jump on yours

I have even had someone get quite aggressive when I asked them to get hold of their dog when it was upsetting mine and the response was that it was just a puppy at 15 months old !!! and wanted to play ran from the other end of a massive field with no recall

I am selective now on where I walk and at what times because some times and places do seem to attract certain dog owners and I have seen too many dogs in the emergency vets having been attacked by other dogs.

Saying that the majority of dogs and dog owners are great but some aren't.

I actually threatened to take someone's dog to the dog warden once, as a dangerously out of control dog - even got my lead ready to put on it. That got the message across! This was obviously an extreme case but we had been victim to this dog 3 times in one walk (long walk not in dog park). The owner hadn't even been within shouting distance the first twice the dog jumped all over and terrified my dog and my 2 young DC. I had had to really shout at the dog to send it away. The third time owner was the opposite side of a 5acre field. Refused to recall his dog, when I bellowed to him to get his dog back, it was scaring mine and my children. Stupid owner said he's only being friendly! Kept refusing to recall it and I couldn't get the blasted dog to leave us alone for more than 30seconds a time. I'd got both my DC terrified and my poor dog shaking and cowering behind me trying to get away from this manic dog. So eventually I did the whole threat with the dog warden bit and he ran over and got his dog. He was still insisting that the dog was fine and "just friendly". So I really gave him a talking to all about how that behaviour was definitely not friendly, by dog standards it was rude and from a humans view point is actually illegal because his dog was frightening my children, whilst he had no control of it and that made his dog "dangerously out of control in the eyes of the law". I also told him if his dog ever came within 3ft of me or my children again I would put my lead on it and take it to the dog warden. He changed direction with his dog next time he saw me!

Sometimes you have to be really assertive with other owners.

Also one good experience is worth far more than lots of not so good experiences.

The main focus of puppy socialisation isn't actually teaching them to play with other dogs. It's getting them used to everything they might come across in life and learn to be able to ignore it/not be scared of it. And the bit people tend to forget to do enough of - handling. As in messing about with their ears, paws, tail. Making it so they aren't bothered about being touched anywhere and messed about with.

Really dog wise they only need to be happy to have a few second sniff then carry on and not be allowed to do even that to every dog on a walk.

One of the best bits of socialisation I did with my second, was I carried him down to by the lake (that is pretty much part of any walk we do from home), sat on the bench holding him (or walked up and down) and giving him a piece of his kibble, every time he looked at me, instead of the various wildlife and other dogs walking past (i weighed out an entire meal worth of kibble to take with me every time). He is now a fantastic dog, that is very focused on me on walks, it makes walks so much easier, than my first, who was allowed to play with other dogs.

Your puppy class doesn't sound like a good one at all.

Look up dogs trust dog school (they do it at lots of venues, not just their rescue centers and it doesn't matter where your dog came from). They are really good and there is 3 trainers per class of 6 dogs!

Yes, the focusing on you bit is very important.

If my dog encounters something she isn't sure about she'll look at me to find out if it's okay. I'll tell her 'you're okay' a couple of times and on she'll go. Sometimes I'll give her a treat to reinforce it if it's something really scary, but usually my reassurance is all she needs.

Sometimes wish I had someone to do the same for me in life. :)

Second the dogs trust classes. So useful with lots of focus on helping your Puppy settle which was invaluable.

I wish my lab would focus on me more. It's the main area he struggles with- far too interested in everything else.