Do you think more people have dogs these days?

[mylifeisamessymess]

Was just having a think back to my childhood (90s) and I genuinely didn't have a single friend with a dog.
My grandparents had a tiny dog, but we only visited a couple of times a year.
The first dog I really got close to was my ex boyfriends staffy when I was 18.
Now I have children I'd say that 80% of their friends have dogs.
Anyone else remember the same?

In fact lots of my friends growing up had cats, rabbits or Guinea pigs. No dogs though!

I'll say there's definitely an increase in dog/pet owners since the lockdown.

I think so too. Although pre lockdown most of my children's friends had dogs too.

Yes for def. A lot of my friends with empty nest syndrome seem to have turned to puppies....

I would say most of my friends had dogs when I was a child, including myself. It was rare not to have one.

We always had dogs when I was growing up, and all my friends had either a dog or a cat. There was also a dog who lived in one of the houses in our road who just wandered about all day and was known to all of us. He’d come along on our adventures during the school holidays, and often waited in the school playground until the end of school. He didn’t belong to any of us, but we all knew him.

Yes, unfortunately.

I have the clearest memory of going with my mums friend to pick up her son from a play date. They had 3 labradors and I remember the smell of dog when they opened the door. I'd never smelt a dog before and I was about 9!!!

Most people I know had dogs when I was a child.

Most people I knew as a child had dogs , but we were a horsy family and it tends to go together .

Where I live in East London, there were very few dogs 5/6 years ago, I think because of the cultural make up of the area. Now since new flats have been built and people in their early 30s have moved in, there are loads of dogs.

When I was growing up in 1970's my NDN had a boxer and ND but 1 had a labrador. I only had one other friend with a dog and that was a cavalier king Charles spaniel. So I'd say the majority of my friends didn't have dogs but plenty did.

Yes there is a notable increase of stupid people with poorly trained lockdown dogs.

There are loads of dog owners around here (south London), many have two or more dogs. Dog ownership definitely increased during LD.

No one I knew had a dog when I was at school. Late 80s early 90s. We got a dog in the early 90s and not one of our neighbours in a street of 40 bourses had a dog.

Stats say you are right - www.statista.com/statistics/515379/dogs-population-in-the-united-kingdom-uk/

I am interested in where the dogs are too. I live rurally and farms have always had collies. It's hard to see if there are more around. I'm intrigued as to whether the leap in numbers is mainly urban and suburban - it's clear lots of non dog-owners on here find dogs pretty annoying now. But there's also just no real infrastructure to handle the welfare needs of all those poor dogs. If just 1% of them are badly bred, poorly trained and harm others or the owners life circs change and they can't look after them that's 130,000 dogs for the authorities and police to deal with. It's staggering. Makes me realize although current dog was a puppy any future dogs must be rescues.

We lost our 17 year old rescue a week before the first lock down. We spent over 2 years trying to rescue again and being turned down. I’m a volunteer qualified dog trainer. We have a cat and we work but OH WFH. There was always someone better. We finally caved in and bought a puppy in October. We’re noticing a massive difference since we walked our last dog and for the most part, not for the better.