An Afternoon At The Dog Park

[Simply Grand]

Because I know everyone on DOL loves a good dog park discussion I thought I'd tell you about my afternoon at the park with the dogs :D it's part vent, part proud owner moment but mostly just sharing an experience for the sake of it

(I know there are plenty of people who don't like dog parks and think they are too dangerous, I totally understand and respect that. They ARE risky and are not for every person or every dog. It's my carefully thought through choice to take my dogs to them as I feel the benefits for them outweigh the risks. I am not trying to convince anyone else one way or the other about it!)

I took the four dogs, including foster puppy, to the nicer, bigger park we used to go to regularly when we lived in that area. They were due for a really good run around and seeing as today was a holiday I thought we'd make the trek. We had a great time and I have have some nicely tired out doggies this evening but as often happens, especially on a weekend/holiday there were some little moments.

The first thing was that I mainly kept off to the sides/less busy areas with mine playing amongst themselves, occasionally another dog would wander over to say hi then move on again. There was one young largish girl that kept hanging around playing with foster puppy with no owner in sight. There were no problems, although I moved everyone on to settle things down several times when they started getting a bit too excited. She stayed with us for quite a while and eventually I figured out who the person with the dog was, she was standing near the fence chatting the whole time she was there except when she spoke on the phone, from what she said it sounded like she was exercising and feeding the dog each day while the owners were away. I thought how furious I would be if someone looking after my dog took it to a dog park, let it off and paid no attention whatsoever to what it was doing, let alone let it run with a pack of four dogs and a person they didn't know from a bar of soap!

After that some people arrived with their young puppy, maybe 12 weeks max?. As we wandered past Quinn went over and said hello. The puppy was on a lead and I told Quinn to be gentle, which she was, they said to me "he's fine, he was just being a bit dominant before" (I don't know what they meant by that). Then Quinn moved off and they let him off the lead again. He and foster puppy then said hello and started to have a little play. She was probably twice his size and can play very roughly so I was watching closely but she was being really very gentle surprisingly! They started a gentle game of bitey face, foster puppy was half on top of the other pup but it was certainly appropriate puppy play (I don't think I'm being biased, I'm super careful with her). As soon as the mouthing became involved though the pup's owner came running over flapping her hands at foster puppy saying "no no no, get up, stop, stop" so called her away. (That's the vent, I know people are protective of their puppies and don't always understand dog language and things can turn fast so I do understand their reaction but my petty brain was thinking "don't bring your puppy here then get annoyed at other dogs for being dogs!!" )

The next was a bunch of dogs all ran over to near where we were (I think a chase was starting), I called my 4 away from the melee, which was all under control except there was one owner running after her dog calling a stern "leave it", which made me think "hmmm". The next moment a small staffy had pinned foster puppy to the ground in front of me and was growling. I was close enough to grab the other dog but the owner was almost there and foster puppy, bless her, was doing exactly the right thing and lying still looking over at me. Quinn was next to me wanting to go in but I decided we'd all just stay calm, told Quinn to stay there next to me and talked to foster puppy telling her good girl. The owner pulled her staffy off, foster puppy came over to me and we just moved off, no harm done.

Now I know that sounds bad but without going through the last 10 weeks of foster puppy's life (she's 18 weeks old), I've been socialising her carefully to be able to deal with such things and she did beautifully :) it's by no means foolproof but that is why I think it's so important that puppies are carefully socialised with other dogs so they learn to communicate, even if their owners can't!

The same staffy shortly afterwards made a beeline for the much younger pup mentioned above, who was by no means ready to be in that situation. No owners were close enough to grab either dog or puppy, puppy panicked and ran, staffy chased, other dogs joined in because of the noise. Thankfully the little puppy seemed unharmed physically and the owners then took him into the small dog/puppy area where he seemed to have fun. The staffy spent the rest of the time on lead being forced to interact with all the other dogs who ran up to him (although to be fair he seemed ok with adult dogs). Note - 2 dogs who IMO should not be at a dog park right now.

Foster puppy also got a firm telling off from a huge male (Rotty looking but huge, Dane x maybe..?). She did some nice appeasing greeting behaviour and he was just going "yeah hi puppy" then she jumped up at his shoulder and he turned around and gave her a big "gruff". She looked very surprised but listened and backed off. She was still very interested in him but was most polite in her approaches after that, just sniffing around near him :laugh:

The good stuff was my dogs :) (there were lots of other lovely dogs too, it was busy and there really were minimal problems). Foster puppy did some lovely polite interacting with various different dogs, which was lovely as she can be very full on with my dogs. I was so thrilled with my three when they were so responsive to what I asked them to do, including staying back when I told them to, when the staffy was on top of foster puppy.

Riley has been reactive to dogs that are younger than him running up to him in the past but he didn't react once the whole time, even though there were plenty of dogs running around. And making me most proud was Quinn, who has been slowly progressing in learning not to jump on people in excitement. She has been going quite well with adults but she loves kids so much that she finds it really difficult to control herself around them. Today she ran up to not one, not two but THREE different children, including one maybe 4 year old (the younger they are the more she loves them, toddlers are great to her because she's perfect face height) and she didn't jump on them! The worst she did was a lick to the 4 year old's face, which made him laugh, but she was able to stand there wagging happily with her feet on the ground before running back to me for her reward :D

So, that was my long winded story of my afternoon! Thanks for reading if you made it all the way through

[hankdog]

Sounds like your pack had a blast. Working from home meant my daily trip to the park was my social time and I do miss it.

[Chris the Rebel Wolf]

Sounds like your handling is excellent to manage four dogs including foster puppy so well! I agree some people bring dogs that should not be there! What worries me is the lady who was looking after a friend's dog and brought it along and paid no attention... probably following the owner's instruction (I hope?) but still worrying to think if not!

I too like to visit dog parks occasionally but now that Maya is fully grown and far less tolerant of dogs she considers rude, I do not usually allow her off with 'strangers' though I do still meet her friends there somedays. Nothing like seeing a dog romp with pals :)

[Simply Grand]

Sounds like your handling is excellent to manage four dogs including foster puppy so well! I agree some people bring dogs that should not be there! What worries me is the lady who was looking after a friend's dog and brought it along and paid no attention... probably following the owner's instruction (I hope?) but still worrying to think if not!

I too like to visit dog parks occasionally but now that Maya is fully grown and far less tolerant of dogs she considers rude, I do not usually allow her off with 'strangers' though I do still meet her friends there somedays. Nothing like seeing a dog romp with pals :)

It was a real mental workout paying attention to so many things at once! The actual "handling" relied mainly on their good recall, and we've built a history of how things work at dog parks so they are used to keeping an eye on me and staying quite close which definitely helps. I don't normally take then when there are so many dogs, often we have space just to do our own thing at the local park we go to now.

I really hope the owner of the dog being baby sat knew it was being taken to the park. And I hope it doesn't get into trouble any other time it's there. It made me think how risky it is to have someone else look after your dog, I have no idea what the dog's owner usually does but they may have said yes, take her to the park without even thinking that they needed to specify that the baby sitter needed to actually watch what she was doing.

[Simply Grand]

There's some good stuff and slightly concerning stuff there but what jumped out at me the most was that you let Quinn run up to children on three separate occasions, knowing she has a history of jumping on them. Granted, she didn't jump on them this time but why would you take the chance?

I would also be very wary (well, in all honest I just wouldn't do it) about taking a dog that is reactive to dogs running up to it, in to a dog park. It's great that Riley didn't react this time but that doesn't mean he wasn't experiencing any stress or that he won't react next time, reinforcing the behaviour and potentially leading to an escalation of his reactivity.

I appreciate what you're saying and I have done months and months and months of work with both dogs on their individual issues in much more controlled circumstances than this in order for them to get to the point where we could do what we did yesterday.

[apocalypsepwnie]

I am a dog park fan but it blows me away the amount of people who just have NO idea what is appropriate for their dog.

Vinnie is still a bit excitable and even though he always greets well, I make sure he's on lead when new dogs come down in case they aren't 'puppy' dogs. Now he's much bigger he can really give a good shove if he jumps on them.

I don't mind bitey face or chasies. When there is clear domination from either dog and pinning I'll step in.

I agree that working through behaviours means exposing them to triggers at appropriate times and giving them the chance to behave correctly, coming away with a positive experience instead of a negeative one.

[Staffyluv]

It sounds like a fun time..

I take Zig to the local dog park every day.

I have no qualms about pulling him out if things get exciting and dogs stop listening to owners.

I despise owners who dump dogs in dog parks and then spend the rest of their time socialising with everyone except their dog..

It might be leash free but it isn't responsibility free..

We do go at specific times, with the same group of dogs - makes dog park life much happier..

[Simply Grand]

There's some good stuff and slightly concerning stuff there but what jumped out at me the most was that you let Quinn run up to children on three separate occasions, knowing she has a history of jumping on them. Granted, she didn't jump on them this time but why would you take the chance?

I would also be very wary (well, in all honest I just wouldn't do it) about taking a dog that is reactive to dogs running up to it, in to a dog park. It's great that Riley didn't react this time but that doesn't mean he wasn't experiencing any stress or that he won't react next time, reinforcing the behaviour and potentially leading to an escalation of his reactivity.

I appreciate what you're saying and I have done months and months and months of work with both dogs on their individual issues in much more controlled circumstances than this in order for them to get to the point where we could do what we did yesterday.

It's great that you've been doing so much work with them. I know how challenging it can be to get some dogs' issues to a manageable place.

Luckily their issues haven't been all that serious, plenty of people have much more to deal with than I do! With both dogs it was a matter of teaching them an alternative behaviour that is rewarding for them. It took me quite a long time of stuffing round before I found the right method for Riley (counter conditioning and what I now realise is a BAT type of approach - teaching him that he can remove the stress of the other dog by just moving away rather than staying there and reacting) but once I figured that out he progressed pretty quickly.

Quinn is harder because her problem behaviour is sooooo rewarding for her so it's been a slow process of restricting her access, teaching a different behaviour (not jumping), really rewarding the alternative behaviour then showing her that the alternative behaviour is the only way she is going to get what she wants (access to kids) plus at this stage she still gets an additional reward for demonstrating the alternative behaviour.

Sorry, dodgy explanations but it's something along those lines!

[Sabbath]

It might be leash free but it isn't responsibility free..

This should be a sign on every dog park.

[Staffyluv]

It might be leash free but it isn't responsibility free..

This should be a sign on every dog park.

It would be like every other sign at the park (pick up after your dog, don't bring it if it is aggressive).. Ignored by those who don't give a toss :)

[aussielover]

I find there's a huge difference between off leash areas and fenced dogs parks, I hate the latter and only go in them if there's no other dogs or people.

School holidays is the worst time to go.

There's a fenced dog park near me with concrete agility equipment ?! Who thought that would be a good idea! I'll admit that I will practice contacts on the dog walk thing they've got if it's not wet. But the other equipment is dangerous. Last time I was there a 5 month old Great Dane was running around on the equipment and the owners were tryng to get it to do stuff

[lovemesideways]

nevermind

Edited May 1, 2014 by lovemesideways

[Simply Grand]

Yep that exactly what happened lovemesideways *eye roll*.

[lovemesideways]

Yep that exactly what happened lovemesideways *eye roll*.

Did you lie in your original post then? Because I'm going off the information you gave.

[Simply Grand]

Yep that exactly what happened lovemesideways *eye roll*.

Did you lie in your original post then? Because I'm going off the information you gave.

You're free to interpret what I said however you want but seeing as you weren't there to see any of the interactions nor did I film and post them online you are only speculating so I will take your opinion with a grain of salt.

Edited April 24, 2014 by Simply Grand

[lovemesideways]

Yep that exactly what happened lovemesideways *eye roll*.

Did you lie in your original post then? Because I'm going off the information you gave.

You're free to interpret what I said however you want but seeing as you weren't there to see any of the interactions nor did I film and post them online you are only speculating so I will take your opinion with a grain of salt.

How am i misinterpreting the information? Did your dog with a history of jumping run up to 3 children you don't know or not?

[Simply Grand]

She did, and after months and months of training an alternative behaviour she did not jump, she sat when she reached them. All three children patted her then she returned to me.

Edited April 24, 2014 by Simply Grand