Odin-Genie

Reclaiming a dog? Hell no! What? one rears the pup and then the breeder feels it is within her or his rights to claim it back? over my dead body I would walk away immediately from a breeder who put that condition to me or any of the other conditions in the list except the desexing issue. Once I get a dog, it is part of my family. I take care of it and I decide what is right for it. If I am unsure I'll ask the breeders for advice. And a breeder who expects to get a dog back has no clue about how people bond with dogs, or is only looking for a boarding place.

I wish I could participate but I'm in Sydney. I think my dogs understand reflections. Often, they make eye contact with my mirror reflection. As puppies, when my dog first saw his reflection, he went crazy barking non-stop. Now he calmly looks at his own reflection in the mirror. He also often watches my other dog's reflection to see what she is doing when she's not in actual sight range. It would be fascinating to see the test results.

I feed both my dogs twice a day to avoid bloat, usually a mix of kibble, barf and bones. My dogs never refuse food. The bowls are taken away immediately after they finish their meal. I never leave food around. My dogs also get bones in the afternoon on weekends.

My dogs go to Andrew as well. He's great. Best part is he comes home for annual vaccines and check ups, so the dogs are less stressed.

I don't leave my dogs unsupervised either while they are eating. I wouldn't take that risk. However, they've never had even a minor aggression either over food or toys or anything else. I find that really convenient since we take our dogs out a lot, to friends' places, cafes etc and it's good to be able to feed them and have them around food without much stress. As for the OP's post, I can't tell who is the dominant one. Neither of them seem to be dominating.

Not strictly related to OP's issue, but I'm curious why no one suggests training the dogs to not be food aggressive. Is that something that can't be done once food aggression sets in? I feed my two dogs together, always done so. Their bowls are usually about a feet apart. They also have raw bones sitting in the same room on their mats and know not to go to the other dog's mat for a lick till both are finished.

My dogs don't wear collars at home either. They are young and tend to play a lot. So I wouldn't want to risk their collars getting caught during play. I however have a secure fenced yard with locks on all gates, so unless someone breaks the locks and intentionally lets them out, there is no possibility of them getting out.

Excuse my ignorance, but are restricted breeds automatically destroyed? I thought they needed to be kept under severe restrictions, but I wasn't aware a dog could be PTS just because of its breed.

I take my dogs to outdoor cafes all the time. Last week I drove from Sydney to Coffs Harbour and it was a pleasant surprise to see all McDonalds, KFCs etc allowing us to sit in their outdoor area with our dogs. I hope NSW laws don't ban dogs from outdoor cafes.

Well, mine is 32 kg , so I have to check her behaviour.

If a dog jumps on me it gets my knee firmly planted in it's chest. If I have my child with me it gets my foot in it's face. One of my dogs is a jumper, there is no excuse for allowing it to jump on people in parks. Dog parks are no place for kids. Throw the baby in a pram, clip your dogs on a lead and go for a walk. I am surprised they didn't bill you for the dry cleaning, I would have! I have to agree with Clyde here. Everyones space should be respected and allowing your dogs to jump on someone else is very disrepectful. Doesn't matter whether you are in a dog park or not. It is a public place and everyone should be able to move around freely without disturbance. I would have been horrified had I saw the models get jumped on. People with no respect are the reason that people like me have been driven away from dog parks Everyone except for the children you mean - because Clyde said they shouldn't be in this public place Everyone should be able to move around freely. But that does not mean everyone should do whatever they want (including having picnics in the dog park, cycling, skateboarding etc) if that impinges on the rights of dog owners who come here to exercise and socialise their dogs. Running children fall into that category. A dog park is built for a purpose. A road is also a public place, but it is for a purpose. You would expect to be able to drive peacefully on a road without being bothered, but if you expected to have a picnic on the road, you would be impinging on other people's right to use the road. I don't see any contradiction there.

I disagree. I have a dog who tends to jump when she is excited. I am trying to train her out of it and she's much better now. However, everytime she jumps on someone at the dog park, I stop her immediately, put her in a timeout and apologise to the person she jumped on. When she was a puppy, she jumped on a 8 year old kid whose father got really upset, even though this kid was waving a stick in front of my dog, trying to get her to play. I don't think jumping up on people is acceptable, even at a dog park. Saying that, I would also add that I personally love having dogs (not just my dogs) jump up on me and greet me. But I understand that everyone doesn't like dogs the way I do.

Agree. Dogs can react to hats, beards, long coats, strange smells, how a person relates to dogs. It's not always about character. I would not automatically write off someone just because my dogs were wary of the person.

I agree. An off-leash dog park is for the dogs. Some owners would feel uncomfortable that there are kids present in case their dog bowled them over and may feel as tho' they must leash their dog. What is the point of an off-leash dog park then? It's not fair to the other users of the off-lead park. Please take the kids to a playground with your dog for an on-lead walk and visit the off-leash park without the kids But I have heard people on this forum say that you should ask people at an off-lead dog park if it is OK for your dog to approach their dog. Apparently they have the right to be there even if their dog doesn't like other dogs and the onus is on you to have your dog under perfect control. By that line of thinking - your dog should not approach the child unless you check with the parents. Quite true. And that's what most responsible owners would do. However, if a kid is running around and you have to keep your dog from going anywhere near the kid, you'll basically have to put your dog on leash. Dogs have better balance than kids. A dog doing zoomies is less likely to hurt another dog than a child. So if a dog doesn't like playing with other dogs, it is still ok for other dogs to play near that dog as long as they don't approach this dog (unless this dog is dog agressive in which case it shouldn't be at the dog park). But it is not ok for dogs to play near a running child. To keep the children safe, most responsible owners would have to put their dogs on leash or leave the park. And that would be unfair. Which is why if children come to the dog park, they should be kept close to the parents.

I think it's ok to take kids to dog parks as long as they are completely supervised, know not to approach or play with strange dogs, and don't run around the park. Even if the dogs are well socialised, a medium sized dog doing a zoomie can throw a kid down. Some dog parks in my area have children's park next to them, which I think is the best option.

My dogs are on Artemis Maximal (grain free) along with Barf patties and raw bones.

My dogs love to play in the dog park. However, I am one of the regulars there and know most people who come in the evenings. For me, the following rules apply to get the best out of dog parks: Allow my dogs to play with dogs I know. Watch any new dog very carefully and leave at the first sign of trouble. Don't go to the dog park if any known troublesome dogs are there, or walk out if they come in. Most of the times when I go to the dog park, there are only three or four dogs there whom I know very well. I love to see my dogs playing chase with other dogs.

Is that a recent incident? I didn't hear about it.

This is interesting. Do you think the personality of the 'stranger' also matters? My dogs would greet some strangers with great enthusiasm, but with others they would be withdrawn. Also, do you think the results would be different if the test was done at the dog's home?

Well, my dogs go to the dog park everyday where they wrestle with each other. So they get brushed everyday and sponge bathed if required. They also get properly bathed every two weeks, but with a soap free organic shampoo. My dogs sleep in my bedroom so they need to be clean

Double post!!!

That's exactly the case with my dogs. They love to play tug and know to release when I tell them to do so. However, if I was to let them have the tug toy, they wouldn't want it. They want to play with me, not with the toy. And my dogs are total family pets. I don't do any dog sports with them.

Same here. Genie, my goldie would jump up on Odin, throw him to the floor and sit on him ;) then Odin would do the same. There is a substantial amount of growling and play biting, but it usually ends in both of them lying on the floor facing each other and snapping teeth while they catch their breath!!!

Well, no credit to me then But I'm glad both my dogs learnt good bite inhibition, however they learnt it.

This is interesting. When I got my elkhound pup, he was always nipping. I had scratches all over my arms and legs. However, his trainer showed me how to deal with it, teaching him to not bite. Today, at two years, he is a dog with a very high bite inhibition and bite threshold. Even if I accidentally step on his paws, he would never ever bite. I won't say that he won't bite in any situation. He most likely would, but only when driven to extremes. There have been few occasions when my arm got in the way when he was play biting with my other dog and I was trying to wrestle with them. At such times his teeth are so gentle that I barely feel it. My goldy on the other hand learnt her bite inhibition from my other dog. She never bit us as a puppy. So when I accidentally get my arm between her teeth during play, it's a stronger bite (not enough to cause a bruise though). My elkhound definitely has stronger jaws going by the way he dessimates his bones. So how does one explain his strong bite inhibition if not through training? He didn't have it as a pup.