PSA: if you have kids, even if you don’t own dogs, for the love of god, please teach them how to act around dogs.
today i told some kids they could pet my dog. i then watched as, without warning, one of the kids grabbed Luna’s paws, lifted them in the air, and tried to dance with her.
Luna is a gentle soul. i don’t think there’s a damn thing those kids could have done that would have caused her to bite. that’s part of why i feel comfortable telling kids they can pet her; she’s had kids grab at her, yank on her ears, grab her face and kiss her, hang on her, etc., and she wags her tail through all of it. Luna loves everybody.
but Luna is not every dog. plenty of dogs are okay around most kids, but these kinds of things would cause a bad reaction. dogs are domestic animals but they are still animals; you can only expect so much.
i have another dog who is far less tolerant. i tell kids they can pet Luna but to please leave him alone, because he gets scared, and scared dogs can bite. roughly 50% of kids actually obey this instruction. we’ve had no incidents so far, but that feels like mostly luck.
teach your kids about appropriate behavior with dogs. and teach them that “don’t touch this dog” means “don’t touch this dog.”