Dogs Worldwide

As we begin to leave winter behind and think more about outside activities a large number of parents think to themselves that now would be the time to buy the family dog they’ve been promising the kids for ages. While parents will make every effort to find a child friendly dog quite often they neglect to see the other half of the equation – children and dog safety.

If you are thinking about buying a family dog then there is loads of information out there about dog training but have you ever given much thought to child training. Most people don’t so in this article I’d like to share with you three must doe’s that you need to teach your child when a new dog arrives. Remember to keep children and dog safety top of your agenda.

The first and perhaps the most important is to teach your child never to approach the dog wile it is eating, drinking or sleeping. If your dog is surprised or feels threatened then it may snap

The second piece of advice I’d offer is to teach your child that the dog is not a toy, that it hasn’t got the same brain as it has. Kids just love to hug a dog to death but it’s un-natural for a dog to be hugged like that so discourage the child. If only for hygiene reasons a child should also be discouraged from playing with a dogs tail. It is un-hygienic and if it hurts the dog then it might snap. A dogs ears often cry out to be played with, as far as a child is concerned, but ask your child would they like their ears pulled and rubbed. Show the child that pulling ears is not nice (but go easy!)

The third piece of advice I’d offer, and it should be the most obvious, is never ever leave a young child and a dog alone in the same room. Every so often we hear of a dog mauling a young child when they were alone. Sometimes it is jealously, sometimes the child just annoys the dog to much and it reaches breaking point.

Dogs are great, dogs are fun, dogs are loving but they can also turn on their family and especially on the children. I hope these three children and dog safety tips will help you with your new dog. As always if there is anything you like to add feel free.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 17th, 2009 at 23:01 and is filed under Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.