Children and dogs can form wonderful bonds that provide companionship and teach valuable life lessons. However, it is crucial to prioritise safety when allowing these interactions to ensure the well-being of both the child and the dog. As the primary carer for a dog and or child it is your responsibility to manage their interactions to ensure that it remains a positive and safe experience at all times.

Ensuring safety is the priority when children and dogs interact

Unfortunately, children are most at risk to receive injuries from pets and the majority of incidents relating to children and pets are preventable. The key preventative tool is supervision, ensuring that there is an adult to supervise and intervene when necessary will decrease the likelihood of an incident occurring.

Educating children on boundaries with pets is the second most important tool for preventing incidents. No child is ever going to be bulletproof when it comes to interacting with pets which is why supervision will always be necessary.

Regardless of how well they know each other an incident between a dog and a child can always occur, it only takes a matter of seconds for something to go wrong. This is because not every nip, growl, bark or bite comes from malicious intent.

Teaching children boundaries with dogs is crucial to safe interactions however, the responsibility for everyone’s safety is your responsibility. This means that you should always take responsibility for the dogs and not let children do things such as hold the lead, feed the pet or assume any other responsibility for other people’s pets in your care.