It is an exciting time for children and rightly so!
With their excitement comes the natural combination of being off school, presents, shopping, visitors, staying up later and everything else in between. In amongst all of that is your family dog.
The holiday season whether Christmas, Easter or Summer can see an increase in dog bites. Not because the dog woke up one day and decided it fancies biting a child.
No, it will be because the children have no real concept of how their high energy, high excitement, running, shouting etc impacts the dog. And let’s face it, there comes a time when it wears a bit thin with the adults too.
Not only does your dog need that quiet safe space away from the children, they need to learn how to behave with and around your dog.
They do not: sit on the dog, bother it when it is resting or asleep, cover its face with their long hair, keep poking at it or driving their new toys into the dog or near it, they do not run around dogs and expect the dogs to be able to cope all the time, they don’t pull ears or tails, their excited screams can be alarming particularly if the dog is asleep…..you get the idea.
They can create snuffle mats, cardboard boxes with treats and chews inside, hide treats in the garden or around the house, practice activities like wait/stay/recall, read to the dog etc etc.
They are the dog owners of the future, so teach them the skills now.
Remember, we have completely changed the normal day to day for ourselves and our dogs, they need to be able to sleep without interruption and reset their brain and body to handle all of this. If you were honest, there will be days you need to do this too.
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