poochiemama

Huski i do agree with this post completely. I would classify as 'rude' if a dog is trying to hump another dog, or jumping on another dog who is on lead. I agree that sometimes 'snapping' or a 'warning growl' is completely natural and warranted in some situations. Hannah herself does this when she's overwhelmed by a young puppy for instance or when a dog is repeatedly humping her (whilst dog owner just stands around chatting of course); i don't punish her for this as its natural. If she was the one humping/jumping etc she would be told off. I wouldn't classify these dogs as 'reactive'. But a warning is a very different thing to a full on attack and bite with injury, especially when the situation does not seem to warrant that. These are the dogs I am worried about walking around in offlead parks. Whether or not they are on lead, they can cause serious injury. And then the cycle perpetuates, with dogs becoming fear aggressive etc I don't think there are any solutions to these things. I really am considering not taking them to these dog parks anymore.

Look, I can understand if the dog is in the other dogs personal space , jumping near it, trying to play with it when its' on leash. But in this situation, my dog , yes, she did run over there as he was quite far away but she stopped short of his personal space, she was actually walking behind him and trying to sniff him and he turned around and snapped. I just heard the whole 'the dog is rude and in his face' reason used as an excuse SO many times when a dog has bitten another as i have said in previous posts - there were serious attacks at my old dog park which i witnessed by dogs which have been aggressive time and time again, with very little stimulus required from other dogs to precipitate this. It just really upsets me that this is used as a reason to excuse people taking their dog reactive/dog aggressive dogs to these sort of places. I love dogs, reactive or not, and if I had a dog reactive dog, yes, I would be anxious about dogs coming up to it too, of course. But i would do my utmost to take my dog to places this is unlikely to happen. And if my dog did bite another dog, you can be sure i wouldn't be blaming the other dogs, no matter HOW exuberant or friendly. If my dog did the biting, I would take responsibility for that because I put him in a situation where it was likely to happen. I know dog-aggression and human-aggression are two different things. But would you take your child-aggressive dog to a kindergarden? And if it bit a kid, would you blame the kid for getting in his face? I feel very strongly about this issue, not just because of Hannah, but on principle. I think we make too many excuses for our dogs and need to take responsibility for their actions. I took responsibility for Hannah's actions; I agree that it wasn't a great idea for her to run over there. However, it gets my back up when people with dog reactive dogs then started saying it's never their dogs fault if it bites, and things like 'if your 'friendly dog' comes up to mine, don't be surprised if it gets a nasty bite on the nose' like it's something to be proud of.

I agree Huski. I have lost count the amount of times i have heard the old 'my dog is friendly/ just wants to say hello'. Thats ok but not my problem when my very reactive dogs bites your friendly dog on the nose. If your dog is "very reactive" shouldn't you have it muzzled? It is normal for dog to have a sniff when greeting, even if a dog is boisterous or over enthusiastic, I would expect a balanced dog to at most, give a "telling off" not a full on bite. If my dog had ever injured another dog, no way would i take it to an off leash park unless muzzled. Not when i am walking somewhere that dogs are suppose to be onlead, or allowed off lead but under control . Mine is under control he is with me, bot off bothering anyone else. We dont go to dog parks for the simple reason is most think it a big free for all and let their dogs run feral. i don't think letting dogs run in a dog park, PLAYING with each other, is really letting them run 'feral'. To me, feral is when a dog can't handle another dog coming up to it and gives it a nasty bite for saying hello. I understand there are reactive dogs around, that's just life, but i think it's twisted logic to blame the friendly dogs for coming up to them. I'm sorry, i just don't get that logic. Flame me all you want.

Aidan2, i think that is possible, and i've never made any judgement call on that particular dog because we don't know it's circumstances. And I have said, we don't know if this was the first time or if it has happened before. Still though...it wasn't a little 'warning' or getting a bit annoyed, it was a serious attack, he had his jaw around her throat and face, it was so difficult to separate them and she was quite injured; he drew blood and punctured the skin. I can't imagine my ('rude/boisterous' or whatever you want to call them) labrador EVER doing that, no matter how annoyed he got. He has had dogs/puppies/children jumping all over him, playing with him, pulling his tail etc. and kept cool through it all. Humans, though, are much more than capable of this sort of thing I can tell you, the next day after this incident, I told a colleague at work, 'Had a crappy night last night, this dog attacked my dog' and his response was 'Oh. Just get another dog'. And i can tell you it didn't go down too well

I completely agree with this. I don't believe off leash dogs should be running around in suburban areas but an off-leash park is a different story. The last park we used to go to was a fenced go park with up to 30 or 40 dogs running around off leash. There was this lady who used to come in to the park with her DA dog on leash and , seriously, EVERY SINGLE TIME we were there, this dog would make serious attacks on other dogs, most of which were in his 'personal space' which was anywhere within it's vicinity. She would always blame other dog owners and other dogs for these attacks. She then got to the point where she would actually take this dog off it's leash, leading to more frequent and more vulgar attacks. I just couldn't guarantee the safety of our dogs anymore so we had to stop going there, which was a real shame because out of the other 40 dogs, all the other dogs were friendly. Her argument was 'this dog got in my dog's face'. Bloody ridiculous, this is used as an excuse all the time and i'm sick of it. Especially in an offleash area where you know this is bound to happen at some point. The sad thing is, at the dog park at the time Hannah got attacked, there was a small puppy too and he was just about to run up to the same dog when Hannah got attacked. I'm not sure that dog parks like that are the best place for a small puppy, but the truth of the matter is, there ARE puppies there who don't know any better, there will be dogs who will try and play etc with DA dogs...it's just a fact of life, these are busy parks, there are dog owners who don't read DOL. And if that little puppy had run up to that dog , he would have been very, very badly hurt.

Thanks JulesCav, well i'm definitely going to be so much more careful now; unfortunately dogs can be unpredictable. i appreciate that some dogs can be snarky and it's nice that there are many responsible owners out there. we all do our best but sometimes these situations are, unfortunately, unavoidable. I think as a dog-owning community, we really should be supporting our own group who are responsible pet owners, who do all the right things , but who sometimes find themselves in these situations. There are enough dog-hating people out there without us all turning on each other as has happened in this thread. I'm going to have a lovely day with my pooches. They give me so much joy that these incidents are just part and parcel of owning dogs and the benefits far outweigh the risks for me. Have fun with your cavs today!

i've actually changed to artemis and i'm much much happier. artemis adult mix. the dandruff is minimal, his coat is smooth, shiny and soft. full of energy and happy.

Thank you Kavik, That's all I wanted to know and that is very helpful. She seems fine now actually and has been playing with other dogs with no problems. Her wounds are clearing up too.

This thread has completely degenerated. Now it's become a bashing of dogs on lead vs dogs off lead. 'Where's your lead you moron' and incidents of dogs running up to other dogs on a walk through the suburbs. This was an OFFLEASH dog park. As for socialisation, maybe if some of these dogs were more socialised, this sort of thing wouldn't happen. My dogs are socialised, friendly, NOT RUDE/BOISTEROUS (again more assumptions and judgemental opinions in what's become lynch mobbing) and yet dog owners like me are now being accused of 'too much socialisation', 'too friendly'. Not to mention all the crap about labradors; i am SO SICK of lab-bashing; I have a lab myself as have many other people, and I don't need to list their virtues. It amazes me that labs are blamed for being 'exuberant' 'overfriendly' when nothing is said about the rude and aggro dogs who haven't been socialised and can't handle a dog coming up to sniff them, which IS normal dog behaviour. I agree that it is good to bounce ideas around to find the best solutions for our dogs, but this thread is NOT that - this is a 'i'm right , you're wrong, my dog is so well-trained, yours is not' kind of thread. There is no constructive debate going on. My original post did not ask for sympathy. I just asked for TWO things: 1. Is this going to traumatise Hannah in the future? 2. How do you best break up a dog fight? There have been some supportive people on this thread and I thank you for that; because there are some lovely people on the forum, i'm not going to let this put me off the forums. But there are also a lot of self-righteous people who just want to prove a point.

Actually it's quite unhelpful and upsetting the way this thread has turned into a blame game 'it's the OP who was at fault' or it was the man at the edge of the park. As I have explained above a few times, this is an unprecedented event. Hannah was turning around to come back to me. She did not 'get in the dogs face' but stopped in front of the dog. I am not going to explain and justify it. OBVIOUSLY it was not a good thing that she ran over there but she doesn't do this often, in the last year this has not happened and she is usually very cautious. Again, as I have explained, it happened much too quickly for me to be able to do anything about it. So it wasn't like I 'allowed' this to happen and therefore I am to blame. Honestly I was so upset by this last night and just needed a little bit of understanding without everyone jumping to conclusions about what an irresponsible dog owner I am. I did not judge the guy at the edge of the park, and no, i don't think he was as responsible as he could be. His dog did SERIOUS damage , there were puncture wounds and a deep wound on Hannah's face as well as a large lump. It could have been worse. A dog like that is not just 'telling off' another puppy, it is aggressive. If that was a child, it would have been a whole different story. I don't know if this was the first time for the dog or not, but if it wasn't, that dog should be muzzled. It is a public park, and these situations are sometimes unavoidable, things like this do happen and if the owner knows his dog is so aggressive, then i would suggest an offlead park with lots of dogs running around and one of them bound to do something unpredictable is not the best place for it. But I don't want to cast judgement on the man because i don't know if he was aware of this dog doing this in the past or not. Anyway I used to love going on this forum and learning things but honestly this will be the last time i will be visiting it. I have seen how these threads can get so vicious and it's completely unacceptable.

Thanks guys... I am in two minds about the dog park thing... I know there are some dog owners who have a coffee and chat while the dogs are running around, not knowing where the dogs are, but we are actually so obsessed with our dogs that we are always looking out at what they are doing and where they are and often we intervene very early if there is any evidence that the play is getting too rough or leave the park at the first sign of trouble. But this was so sudden and unpredictable. In fact, in a way, we were lucky because the owner of the dog was actually semi-responsible; he had him on a leash, he really stepped in to separate them, he was absolutely mortified and apologised a million times. I said 'it's ok, she's fine' (even though i was horrified) and he said 'no , this is not ok. i'm so sorry'. But not all owners are like this. The good thing is, she immediately went back to playing and I just let her do that so that she doesn't know something is wrong. spottychick, real shame you are not in victoria as i love dallies. I agree in some ways Fiona about the concept of socialisation - some dogs are 'over' socialised and my dogs are guilty of this - they love playing with other dogs and they get so excited on the leash if they see another dog. They are getting better but i don't know if they'll get to the point of 'ignoring' other dogs.

Thanks Brennan's mum; it's a great suggestion to take them for play dates but we don't have any friends with dogs closeby. I'm going to have a chat with my husband and brainstorm about what we should do. It used to give me so much peace going to the park - after a tough day at work, just hanging out and watching the dogs play. It's the best stress relief in the world when it goes well. But these experiences have really ruined it for me. Now when i go, i'm always tense because i know the potential dangers and it worries me. It's amazing how your heart just stops when these things happen. It could have been worse, but it was pretty bad regardless and on closer inspection she has a bad wound on her face and a massive lump on the side of her neck now.

To be honest malrock, today I thought we should stop going to the offleash park and just do onleash walks instead. But it just gives them so much enjoyment, I can't bring myself to take that away from them. There is risk in most things, and this is something they loooove. But there are so many horror stories of dog parks, and today's scare really made me think twice. It actually happened to my lab as well when he was six months old, he just came in to this fenced dog park and as he got through the gate this dog ran up to him and attacked him, completely unprovoked. It does make you think twice. But by the same token, as you say, even on a walk around the block, there might still be a loose dog who might attack your dog. You can't win either way. In fact, this park is actually a really great one, we've been coming here for months and all the dogs are very friendly. but it just takes that one dog.. It's like someone posted recently about brighton dog beach - we've been there and had a blast and I know heaps of people who take their dogs there and the dogs love it more than anything. But now that this dog has been attacked there, does it mean we should stop going? What is left to do with our dogs that is really safe anymore?

Thanks Kavik, you're absolutely right and 99% of the time we do this and don't let them go up to dogs on the edge of the park, and usually they are more cautious, but this time she ran up before i could stop her and she was about to turn back to me when he went for her. It just happened so quickly.

I know this has been done millions of times, but I am so traumatised. We were having a lovely evening at the park with the pooches. Hannah, our one year old goldie, was playing with all the dogs and having a great time. There was this man walking on the edge of the park with his dog on the leash and hannah went bounding up to the dog but just stopped so she could sniff him. I had this terrible feeling about the whole situation so i called her to come back which she was about to do when the dog just latched on to her face/neck area, growling aggressively and wouldn't let go. His owner freaked out and was trying to pull his dog with his leash off hannah and this went on for what felt like ages, and at one stage, the owner was hanging the dog in the air by the leash and hannah was still hooked on to the dogs jaw. I ran over and managed to pull the dog off her and the owner was very apologetic and mortified. I tried not to make a big deal of it even though my heart was pounding and i just let hannah play with the other dogs which she did for a little while before we went home. when we got home i looked closely at her face and there is a bite mark there, bleeding. I applied some antiseptic and just pampered her before feeding her. I just really worry with these situations, especially because she is so young , that she doesn't grow up to have fear aggression. I know that people say dogs get over it and it is us owners who are more traumatised than the dogs, but just wondered if any one had any experiences like this and how their dogs turned out? Also what if this happens again, what is the best way of separating the dogs?

A labrador! just have treats on you when training...

nowhere on the site shows any outdoor yards or garden that they can play in. Do dogs really need expensive paintings on the wall???? blueberry facial....oh my goodness. they'd probably just want to eat it.

Check it out: www.chateaupoochie.com I want to stay there myself.

That sounds awesome. How far is Dinner Plain from Melbourne? Also any suggestions for pet friendly accomodation there? Thanks

I took Charlie to puppy pre-school and he was a boisterous lab...but the whole thing was quite intimidating for him . They also gave a lot of generic, crappy advice and let the puppies play rough with each other. I went to two classes then I stopped going. I agree a well-run obedience school is better but it's hard to find these days - a lot of obedience schools are full of a lot of dogs, not capped in numbers. The last time we went to obedience classes, they were very 'military' and the teacher kept yelling at us because we weren't yanking the choke chain hard enough. He kept shouting 'You are too soft, you have to really pull on that chain, they are dogs they need to learn their place in the pack'. It was quite traumatic and we left halfway through. We did our own training by reading lots of books and being addicted to forums THere are so many schools of thought on obedience training that it can be really confusing but you have to find a method of training that you feel comfortable with. HOWEVER, if you find a good obedience school, that's the best way. Food-wise - it really depends on each dog. But in my experience Hills science, eukaneba and all of those brands are all crappy. We even tried Royal Canin Labrador Junior, which the doggies loooved but I heard the ingredients are not that great and Charlie got dandruff on it. We tried Eagle Pack Holistic and the dandruff got worse and they kept chewing at their feet. Now they are on Artemis and doing brilliantly but I don't know if you can feed artemis to puppies??? Their coats are so soft, they are full of energy (not sure if that is a good or bad thing ) and it's really good food. Good luck with your puppy and have fun!! I agree we need some photos!

Today was our goldie's birthday so we took her and our chocolate lab Charlie to the park and they had an absolute blast, played with heaps of dogs and really enjoyed ourselves. The park started to empty out and we were about to leave when we saw the most adorable chocolate lab puppy and of course went over to see it. Our chocolate lab was so even-tempered and the puppy kept trying to lick his mouth and play with it, and Charlie was very patient. The puppy then tried to play with our goldie and gave our goldie a couple of playbites, and she growled in a 'back off' kind of way. I think she was just telling the puppy off but I worry that this is the first signs of dog aggressiveness? She is usually beautifully tempered and loves dogs; sometimes she gets a bit annoyed when she is on her back and dogs sniff her too much and gives a little growl. What do you guys think?

congratulations! one of my best memories is getting my new goldie - waking up in the morning and a little golden puppy bursting into the room and wagging her tail and trying to jump on my bed I was doing a tough job at the time and the thought of seeing her at home made it so much more bearable. Good luck and have fun!

that's so cute!

we have that in a xl for a lab and a goldie, they both share it but they are quite young around 1year old. it's been the only bed that has lasted through puppy stages with a couple of small tears here and there. Very comfy and they love it. you can easily wash the cover of the cushion as well.

I have the cutest goldie in the world, she has the face of an angel! She's just turned one and loooves being centre of attention. I also have the most beautiful chocolate lab in the world You have to do labs they're the cutest! We live in southeast suburbs of melbourne though.