Dog Parks - More Harm than Help?
I have been taking Ace to a dog park for a good two, two and a half months now. While it's basically his favourite place on Earth, as he is a huge fan of other dogs, I'm starting to feel like it's doing more harm than good.
For starters, Ace is easily the most trained dog out of the group, despite being the youngest. What does that mean? Well, he is at risk of picking up pretty bad habits. The others knock into humans, are loud, have HUGE resource guarding issues, and often pretend to be deaf on their recalls. When I am alone, and call Ace off of something, he responds almost immediately. When I am in a group of 7 other people all yelling and screaming at their dogs to come back, Ace can't hear me. So, naturally, he just wanders over to the dog I was telling him to avoid.
Aside from the training issues, I'm also starting to feel a bit testy at having the others talk to me about my private life. I made the mistake of going to a birthday party for one of the folks there, and now it seems like the others are VERY comfortable in asking about my job situation, and telling me to what kind of positions I should be applying. I do not come to a dog park to have a group of people tell me to work the shelves of a supermarket, or to be a shop clerk. I go so that Ace gets to stretch his legs with others of his kind, but it's starting to feel like the drawbacks outweigh the benefits.
What do you all think about dog parks and the people in them? Have any of you had "Nosy Nancies" start prying into your life when you became a regular?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Ludi on
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I agree with you about most dogs being under-exercised and coming to the park. I have to walk close to half an hour to get to the park, which means Ace is usually spent long before the others, who live closer. Sometimes I'm lazy and take the city tram, but he's STILL tired before everyone else. He's a pretty lazy dude!
Like I said above, once I have my BC pup I will be using the dog park to get her socialized with other canines, but not much more, I think. There's just too much chaos for my taste.
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Permalink Reply by Bax & Zigs & Rosie on
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I used to go to the dog park every Saturday and Sunday morning. It was the same group always and the people were pretty nice. We hardly talked about our personal lives or work at all. We pretty much just talked about the dogs. It was a lot of fun. But then I ended up working more on agility training and began to miss days at the park. Because the corgis were getting so much exercise, I didn't mind missing out on the d-park. Thankfully some of the ladies I train with let their dogs run around with the corgis, so its like a mini dog park.
One thing I will say about dog park people is that sometimes they can be really snippy. One man was convinced that Baxter started dog fights through his barking and herding behavior, which was just untrue. I heard about more serious dog fights occuring while we were away from the park than I ever witnessed in person. This man was friends with another man who also had a pit that would just terrorize the other dogs. He would never try to control his dog and then blame the other dogs for his dog's behavior. It got to the point that I couldn't be in the park when that dog was there. That was very frustrating and would put a damper on the morning. This man was also not a fan of the corgis and their herding. And the way I found out about his dislike for my corgis was because he would tell people mean things about them! Rude.
The important thing is to know the temperments of the other dogs and if you have a bad feeling about a dog, get your pup out of there. There have been many times that I left after seeing a new dog come in, only to hear a dog fight break out on my way to the my car.
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I have noticed that, the more I got to know the park crowd. I don't know if it's because I'm in another country, or if it's just this group of people, but folks here get really invested in others' personal lives. My mother is Japanese, so I have retained that very private approach about my own business. I was taken aback when people I barely knew for two, three months were telling me what jobs I should be getting to get a bit of money, etc. They don't know a lot of things about me, and were probably just trying to help, but it felt really annoying.
As for talking about the dogs, there's some of that, as well. Someone called Ace a robot the other day because I make him work for everything, and am hesitant to let him go bonkers like the rest. I didn't know what to say about that - I approach his training in a pragmatic way, and it shouldn't be that person's business unless I'm abusing him (which absolutely I am not). I dunno, in between no one doing anything about Ace getting humped all the time, and yappy little dogs jumping up on me and guarding their tennis balls like crazy, it is just too much going on for me to enjoy.
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Permalink Reply by Geri & Sidney on
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Then there is your answer. You don't like it, it is not worth going. Ace will pick up on your mood and won't have fun either.
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Permalink Reply by Nora on
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I am NOT a fan of dog parks either.
The trainer I go to says: If you socialize your dog very well in the early life stage (10 - 16 weeks old) with dogs and human, you dog would stay that way for their whole life. BUT if they got hurt by dogs at any point, they will also carry that for their whole lives, might not get over it or would never be the same loveable dog-lovers any more. I am not saying our dogs would never get hurt by others outside the dog park. It is just the higher possibility it might happen.
I would feel irresponsible to have my dog exercise herself in the dog park, just because I would not have time to exercise her. I go there occasionally (once every two weeks...) but I think I will stop going --- Since every time I go, my nerve becomes tight... My pup is socialized very well and like to play with other dogs. Her play style is very gentle --- chase or to be chased, sometimes plus a little wrestling/jumping at the end of the chase for about 5 seconds. And she knows not to wrestle if other dogs are not interested. She will also tolerate other dogs to play and try to get on the top of her at the first. But if the other dogs get roughly, she would teach them to play gentle and calm down by just lying on the other dogs so them cannot get up for a second (that's how she uses her weight.)...LOL... I appreciate how she becomes so far and don't want to risk it at the dog park.
It is so true that some dog owners just don't pay attention to their dogs. There was one time we went, a beagle mix picked on my dog for the first moment we entered. My pup was very patient for trying to make the beagle calm down. But the beagle wouldn't and keep chasing her around. The problem was the beagle didn't have very soft mouth and played really rough. Suddenly I saw blood coming from my pup's mouth and spilled onto her front legs. I went and check her while the beagle was still picking on her (WHERE IS THE OWNER?!). So I HAD to pick her up for checking, still the beagle was jumping around me like crazy till the owner finally noticed something happened here and took her dog away. Fortunately, DouBao looked OK and no wound or bleeding spot was found. A while later, when I took DouBao out from the park passing the beagle and its owner, the owner asked how my dog was and then lectured me that I should never pick up my dog in the dog park and that's why her dog was jumping around me --- REALLY? Of course I know that! BUT where were you when your dog being aggressive?!
Anyway, I usually take my dog to the soccer field and the trails of the university I work, and she can go off-leash since it is summer time, no a single people is there. If we ever encounter other dogs off leash, they are usually very friendly and with good recalls. Otherwise, the owners couldn't get them off-leash. On the opposite, the dogs in the dog park are usually WITHOUT good recalls, or with certain behaviors out of owner's control....
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Permalink Reply by Maddie, Sam, and Ruby on
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I do take Sam to the dog park, but only during off hours. We go to play frisbee in a fenced back area, and if there are only a few small dogs in the park we go in. But if there are big dogs, or Huskies, or Boxers, we steer clear. Sam is nervous around bigger dogs, and always sticks close to me anyways, so I`m not worried about him causing trouble. It`s the other dogs that I watch.
But the rescue dogs I work with go every week, and they always do well. In fact the only fights that have started when we`ve gone were caused by people bringing big, wild, unaltered male dogs in and then ignoring them. I`ve had to break up three so far, because the owners just won`t do anything.
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Permalink Reply by Julia on
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I like dog parks. We go two or three times a week so the dogs can run off-leash, and Lilli can chase her ball. I don't like the sound of the parks you guys are describing, though. We don't interact much with other dogs, or people. One park has a center area where some dogs play together, and Lilli will join into a ball game there with another dog if we let her. My rescue had a lot to learn about interacting with dogs, so we keep him close. For the most part it's a matter of walking around the paths, greeting dogs and people that we pass, and throwing Lilli's ball as we go. Sometimes another dog will join us for a while, but they end going back to their owners soon. The other parks are more wooded and hilly, not really social at all, except for the fenced agility areas.
So, yes, I do like the parks. No, I have never had a problem with "Nosy Nancies." Yes, we do often have to go from the park to the vet because "accidents do happen" :)
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Permalink Reply by Chloe's parent Liz on
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We have had mixed results. The rules from the park are just not followed. Several people bring treats and toys for their dogs. Chloe is not the best when it comes to sharing. One owner had these hard chicken roll up things from Trader Joes getting soft in a water bowl. Chloe took one-with the owner's permission. She went back towards the bowl and growled, snapped at the owner's dog. We left after I apologized.
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Permalink Reply by Lora and Tobi on
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Tobi is still to young to be able to go to the Dog Park. We have one in our town, and luckily they separate the small dogs from the big dogs so there isn't any intimidating scuffles. He gets some good socialization with other dogs in our complex ... and it's been a challenge since he was nipped in the nose the first week we had him.
But he does have plenty of energy to run off ... so we got permission to bring him into the tennis court if there's nobody around. That way he has the freedom to run and play, yet is still enclosed so we can continue to work on his recall (he does great, but still gets distracted once in a while).
We'll give our park a try next month when he's old enough, but from reading the stories here, will proceed with a bit of caution.
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Permalink Reply by Lemmy Winks on
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We took both our dogs (sepratly) to the dog park for the first time. Pilot was the only one there, there'd been someone prior too, but he must of sensed we were new comers and nervous so he left; which I felt bad but grateful for at the same time. While there we worked on Pilots recall and it was actually better haha. There's a small bush, so we let him use his hound senses; We'd run and hide and he's track us. He loooved that.
The first time with Lemmy we worked with his recall/following and had very few problems aside from his "howdy dos!" when ever another dog got interested in him.
Maybe it was because my first time but no one asked me questions aside from " that's a corgi right?" or " Oh, what happened to his eye?" and some Lady chatted it up with my husband about the tattoo on his leg lol.
The one thing that did bug me, and I don't know if it's just where I live... but people felt it was ok to pet other peoples dogs. I had people trying to pet Lemmy, and he's fine with it, but he gets so excited he mouths and jumps up ( which for a corgi isn't really a danger lol), so I was constantly like " He still a puppy and he nips sometimes!" There were dogs running up to me, and some of them I wanted to pet so bad but... I don't know the dog, so I'll let him/her sniff me and I fought the urge to give pets.
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I am glad you were able to have fun working on recalls with Pilot and Lemmy! I worked on Ace's all the time in the presence of other dogs, and he performed well after getting used to reorienting to me in a pack of dogs. But what I didn't like was that with so many regulars, there tended to be a lot of noise. And when the dogs all ran off to chase something, my voice got lost in the din. I hate raising my voice to call Ace - he is very soft, and takes it badly even if I am just yelling to be heard. But yeah, that's what ended up happening with so many other owners around.
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Maybe teach him recall with a signal?( if some one brought this up already sorry)
Pilot knows to come when I smack my chest twice with both my hands, and Lemmy knows 3 firm smacks on the side of my thigh. All it would take is for Ace to see you once, you do the motion ( make sure it's clear and nothing like what the other people do) and he's know that's his cue to come back to you. We learned having a motion associated with vocal recall helps for situation, like yours when your voice wont be heard. But make sure it's something that is very distinct and doesn't look like a "normal" motion...like bending over, flailing etc... if you get what I mean lol.
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