Meeting new baby

Hi

Our dog Dashall is now about 9 years old and although he's great with people he is most definitely very dog (and any other animal or bird!) aggressive, something we've just had to learn to manage.

However he's never interacted with babies or very young children and with a new grandchild (now 7 months old) we're now facing the issue of how to deal with this situation.

He was briefly introduced to our grandchild a couple of months ago - I had him on our knee and we let both our dogs come and meet him on leads. Our other dog (a Ridgeback cross) took no more notice than if he was another person, and is proving absolutely obviously fine with him. Dashall on the other hand, after initially appearing uninterested, suddenly went into "stare" mode which as we know most Staffies and other Terriers do when they suddenly focus on a sound or movement. Although not conclusive in itself we found that quite scary as it's exactly what he does on seeing other dogs, and we quickly removed him.

Our daughter is now understandably very nervous because much as she loves Dashall she knows what he's like when he goes into attack-mode, and the thought of him doing this to a baby is unimaginable. As a result we got a crate before they visited us at Christmas, as well as a stair gate, which meant that we could manage the situation by never letting him get near the baby.

Obviously we'd like to feel that he and our grandchild can be friends (and our daughter feel less nervous about visiting) but because it would only take a split-second for our gorgeous grandchild to perhaps be disfigured for life we're not sure how to improve this situation - or whether we should even try.

Incidentally, before they left after Christmas we had the baby and Dashall on either side of the stair gate - Dashall was absolutely fine, with no sign of over-interest etc. However as soon as I stood up with the baby he jumped up to try and grab him. We've seen this when we had a cat some time ago - both our dogs were fine with the cat on the floor but immediately jumped up and tried to nip it if you picked it up. Is this just jealousy?

Perhaps others have been is similar situations and it would be really helpful to get any advice or comments. Thanks.

The jumping up to grab something in your arms is quite a normal reaction. Chaos would do it if, for example, someone picked up a small dog when faced with a big nasty staffie

You can do some training towards this by using an exciting toy, a squeaky one can work well. You hold the toy so he can see it, and play with it just enough to get Dashall excited. If he jumps up, ask him to sit and, when he does, he gets a reward. I personally use the toy as that's what he is trying to get, in other words to get what he wants he has to sit quietly. Then 'leave it', and repeat. You should soon find that you can squeak and move the toy around and he'll sit the whole while, waiting for the reward.

Once you can do that, you can move onto picking up the baby with Dashall the other side of the stair gate, again asking him to sit and rewarding him (with a treat, not the baby!).

As well as using the stair gate, which I think's a great idea, I would also think about having him on a harness with lead to start off with. Keep everything relaxed and calm as if the lead wasn't there, but it's a safety net just in case you need it. That way Dashall should be able to see that the baby is there, and that he needn't do anything about it. Even if you don't get to the point that you and your daughter are confident having Dashall off lead with the baby around, it should at least enable you to have him in the room at the same time without you being on alert all the time.

Good luck, I hope it works for you.

Nothing more I can add that Liz hasn't already replied with

mia wasn't great with kids either her previous home the kids teased her as far to poke her eyes out yank her tail and jump on her back i gradually introduced her to children again on 5 minute intervals increasing the time. i dnt have kids of my own but would take her to places i knew there would be kids i would intensely supervise giving constant reminders to the kids about her eyes ears and tail mia slowly learned to love kids again as far as i had my niece and nephew stay over when they were quite young. mia never slept all night and constantly guarding them. its not just the dog u monitor but the child as well

Thanks for all your advice!

https://staffy-bull-terrier.niceboard.com/t36669-introducing-your-dog-to-a-new-baby

Have a read throgh this it may help