But seriously - toddlers are fast!

[urge to herd]

What Gideon's girl said. Any kid not accompanied by an adult and/or not old enough to reliably take instructions is not allowed to approach Gibbs. As well, the adult has to be paying attention to what the kid is doing.

 

I've had 2 dogs who were bomb-proof around kids. Tillie loved, well, everyone. Samantha loved, loved, loved any child. She was a little shy around adults she didn't know, men particularly. She just ate up any attention from any child.

 

Sammie sat down next to a toddler at a park once, rolled onto her side and put her head on the little girl's leg. Never saw the kid before or since, but Sammie's tail was thumping gently on the ground while the little girl stroked her.

 

Ruth and SuperGibbs

[GentleLake]

Tilly has never snapped at anyone but all I could pictures was this kids face being scared for life because no one had told him to be careful and respect the dogs space

 

Good for you. Your reaction may have been a little heightened, but your reasoning was excellent.

 

I still don't know the details, and I may (probably will) never know exactly what happened, but one of the kids who reads to Bodhi at the elementary school was recently bitten on the face by a border collie. Bad bite, lots of stitches and scarring from her eye down through her cheek, and more plastic surgery down the road.

 

I've only seen her once since the incident, but she told me that it was a dog "just like Bodhi" and that it had happened when she and her dad were shopping for a car. I knew exactly where it was. A local used car lot owner's family has border collies and they often take them to work with them.

 

These dogs are around people all the time. They have the offices they can go into if they don't want to interact with people, and AFAIK, there have been dogs there for quite some time.

 

The girl says she did nothing wrong and from her perspective she probably didn't. But she must've done something that made the dog feel threatened. She said she just reached out to pet the dog . . . over it's head? Looming? She must've been right down in it's face from the location of the bite and its extent.

 

And this wasn't even a toddler, though she's a girl who has some emotional and slight behavioral challenges, which may also have made her seem different to the dog.

 

So, yeah, it's wise to always be vigilant with dogs and kids.

[simba]

All of a sudden he puts his face down and kisses the top of her head....

Mother is all upset I try to explain I did not want child bit she tells me if dog is not trust worth she should not be around people. I tried to explain that you should never put your face down to any strange dog and that I was trying to prevent what might have happened.

 

Dan & Tilly

My dog got a fright and growled at a child who went to kiss the top of her head and instead fell over on her. Sensible child (though young enough to get a bad fright and cry), sensible parents, everyone accepted that stuff happens.

 

But after that I started a policy that the dog regularly gets 'kisses' (human puts face on top of dog's head or face essentially), all the dogs get humans putting faces up to theirs. Well-known humans in positive and happy situations, I hasten to add. So now that same dog just thinks this is another one of the weird affectionate things people do. I was afraid she'd generalise from that initial fright.

 

It had never hit me that this was something people did to strange dogs, but which she had never ever had done to her (because we were very firmly brought up in the 'don't bother the dog you idiot' camp).

 

The trouble is that now I've got into the habit of it, very occasionally I go to do it to strange dogs and then catch myself.

 

My reaction to that woman would be "I've trained my dog so that she can behave around others. I suggest you do the same with your child." I mean, seriously. Obviously if her child isn't trustworthy around dogs she shouldn't be allowed around them, the parent should keep her under better control...

[B Point]

Interesting. Here in Japan kids seem inherently really afraid of dogs. Too many Shiba-ken's and they are all a-hole animals. Tio LOVES kids but it's the kids with the whale eye and their tails tucked betweem their legs..

[Gideon's girl]

HaHaHa Simba, your story reminded me of a story about the bad doggy habit I picked up. I had one that was super sensitive to being blown on to the point of fretting about me breathing on her, so I started linking me blowing on her with getting high value treats. Then when she finally no longer fretted about it, I kept up blowing on her and giving her good scratches. It got to where she would come up to me and stick her nose up to my mouth to tell me to blow on her, and give her a good scratch. Well, over the years I kept that habit and without thinking, when my dogs walk up and put their nose in my face, I puff on them. One day I did that to a working police K-9. He snapped right on the tip of my nose before I had even realized that I had anything. I almost went over backwards and his handle and I had a good laugh about it, but I still haven't learned my lesson.

[simba]

I also for a while afterwardds made loud 'SMACK' kiss noises and 'kissyface' while doing so, because the child did it and again maybe she would generalise to 'that noise/face is scary'.

 

So for about two months I looked like the strangest person. Picture the crazy dog lady/gay guy from like every work of fiction which features such. You know the one, they wear lipstick (if female) and talk in falsetto about "mommy's little precious poopsie"

[RemsMom]

I was always afraid that my daughter would get bit by a dog when she was a toddler because we had a GSD and she had no fear of dogs. I instructed her to always ask before petting a strange dog but still made sure I had a tight hold of her hand anytime a strange dog was around.

 

I used to go on an education forum and you wouldn't believe the number of parents that thought that a dog should never bite or even growl. Some people think that their child should be able to tease or even abuse a dog and the dog should run away or put up with the abuse.

[Gideon's girl]

I also for a while afterwardds made loud 'SMACK' kiss noises and 'kissyface' while doing so, because the child did it and again maybe she would generalise to 'that noise/face is scary'.

 

So for about two months I looked like the strangest person. Picture the crazy dog lady/gay guy from like every work of fiction which features such. You know the one, they wear lipstick (if female) and talk in falsetto about "mommy's little precious poopsie"

ROFL!! You paint a pretty picture!

[SkunkOnTheFly]

It's so hard teaching a toddler who has three dogs of her own and only has been aaround friendly dogs that not all dogs will appreciate advances. I don't let my daughdaughter run up to any dog and we ask other owners if she can pet...but boy when she ssees another puppy she wants to love it! I'm very lucky. All 3 of my dogs I got as puppies. My one though was already 5 months old and was a rescue. The first time she dove on him with her arms around his neck my breath caught. But he just pushed himself backward on top of her and killed her with kisses. I couldn't ask for better dogs. They're so tolerant and truly love my daughter. They're her shadows

[Bogwoppit]

I was never bitten by a dog, but I was bitten, swatted and head butted by rabbits, rodents, cats, sheep and horses as a kid, and I'll be honest it taught me a healthy lesson in where to put my hands (and face). One or two of the incidents were entirely my fault (teasing), the rest wre down to animal character and inexperience. I was always told that animals are not people, they only really have one way to say "no!"

 

My parents also taught me to never touch an animal without offering a closed hand and letting it sniff you. If the animal thoroughly sniffed and then leaned into the hand (cat, dog, rabbit, horse) for fuss, that was "ok". If it didn't, don't touch.

I think this may have been a way of giving enough time to extricate toddler-me from whatever I was doing. I still do it today, especially with cats.

 

Looking back I have been very stupid with a dog once or twice. I wouldn't do it now, but last year a large bull breed came charging across the car park with it's eyes on the OH, who cannot move quickly at the best of times and is very scared of "status dogs" (not my words).

As it ran. I dropped to my knees between the dog and OH with my arms open, and it chose to run to my hands for a good ear fuss and lots of praise, turns out it was deaf and had slipped the lead getting out of the car.

I could easily be telling this story from a different position, due to a split second daft idea. At home I don't even offer my face to my own pets, due to wariness of a misplaced paw.

[Gideon's girl]

I think, a lot of times, when we have to make a split second decision like that, that our subconscious sees something that tells us which way to go. You probably somehow realized that his posture/ear carriage or something was nonthreatening, excited puppy. But it take a lot of experience with dogs to see those things without time to analyze them.

[Bogwoppit]

I think, a lot of times, when we have to make a split second decision like that, that our subconscious sees something that tells us which way to go. You probably somehow realized that his posture/ear carriage or something was nonthreatening, excited puppy. But it take a lot of experience with dogs to see those things without time to analyze them.

I hope you're right. It could well just be I make bad decisions. I'd love to say I wouldn't do it again but I wasn't aware of doing it the first time.

It's hard to recall, but maybe I recognised a lollopy, goofy dog run due to the speed, rather than some kind of purposeful attack charge.

 

It puzzles me because I am absolutely terrified of Staffies in a way others are scared of spiders or snakes, but I plopped right down for some fusses to save the OH an anxiety. The last one I met before this, left an impression.

[5Bordercollies]

Yes to all of the above. Gibbs has never bitten anyone, but I believe that if he felt he couldn't move away he would. I don't want a human, child or adult, to be bitten by my dog. I don't want my dog to have a bite record. Therefore I am ALWAYS aware of what is going on in a public place.

 

My favorite toddler/dog park story is from years ago, when I just had Samantha, my first bc. A woman came into this dog park with her dog, a fairly largish one, a toddler and a Frisbee. She puts the toddler down and starts teasing the dog with the Frisbee, trying to get it to jump up. Toddler is toddling around, woman is not paying any attention. I notice that there is a swarm of dogs starting to form around the mom/dog/toddler, and they're starting to circle, and their movement is getting noticeably tighter and faster. Samantha went to join them, and I shouted for her to come back to me.

 

That shout broke up everyone's focus, and the dogs kind of came out of their trance and all moved off to romp and play. The woman stopped and looked at me, like, "What the heck?" I just smiled and said I called my dog away because I didn't want her to knock over your baby. She shrugged and went back to teasing her dog.

 

I still get a chill down my spine when I remember that scene.

 

Ruth and SuperGibbs

That story gives me chills. Having 5 BC's I know exactly how that looks and I can imagine onlly too well what would have followed had they not been broken up by your yell. I recently had to save some barn cat kitttens from being mauled, snapping a BC out of "fixation mode" isn't easy. Mine don't do kids. Rusty is OK with older kids, here from 7-8 years up, she's fine with them. Toddlers? NO way. Every winter we do almost like a crate\rotate thing when my cousin comes to visit with her two toddlers. Who have no doggie manners. They have two dogs, Basset bitch and a Bulldog male, that the kids are allowed to pester and "maul". The Bulldog recently took to growling at the boy, got thrown with the side table for his warning.

When they come here they aren't allowed to set foot outside the house untill I've put the dogs in their dog run. Then they can go outside, play, run do what toddlers do, as long as they keep away from the dog run. But off course that and the garden pond both hold an endless facination for especially the little boy. He screamed in furstration one day when, not listening to "come away from the dogs, they will bite you" I physically removed him from the scene. I have told everyone 'MY DOGS BITE TODDLERS" Keep your kid away from them at all costs. I will try my best to keep my dogs away from your kid, but I need some cooperation.

Almost had a feart attack one morning this winter while they were visiting, I had just come downstairs and walked in to what I can only describe as Zorro in full herding mode staring down this one year old boy. Thank heaven the kid was practically hypnotized, he just stood there. I just grabbed Zorro's collar and dragged him outside, thanking my lucky stars I had been in time.

Zoro's a pretty big boy, he's over 50cm at the shoulder, he was literally looking that kid right in the eye, a bite right then would have been disasterous. I can only assume someone didn't close the back door properly, some visitors are like that, despite being told to keep it closed so the dogs don't come in and the cats don't go out. but hey what do they care?