02/09/2026
🐶 “Can my child stroke your dog?”
My answer?
No.
And before anyone gets their knickers in a twist… yes, I realise this may be slightly biased because, personally, children aren't really my thing. 😂
But actually, there's a serious point behind my answer.
This came up recently during one of my obedience classes, when I was asked what I'd advise someone to do if an unknown child approached their dog wanting to stroke them.
My advice was very simple:
Just say no.
Not “he's friendly.”
Not “she loves children.”
Not “he'll be fine.”
Not “you can stroke her, she's lovely.”
Just no.
Because the reality is that you don't know that child, and you don't know exactly how your dog is going to respond to an unfamiliar child suddenly approaching them.
You might think your dog is completely comfortable around children. You might genuinely believe they'd never do anything.
But dogs communicate constantly through tiny changes in body language and many people simply aren't good at recognising those subtle signs.
A dog may be saying:
“I'd rather you didn't come any closer.”
…and what we see is:
“He's just standing there. He's fine.”
Then perhaps the child reaches over the dog's head, hugs them, squeals, moves suddenly, falls against them or simply catches the dog on a bad day.
Maybe the dog jumps up.
Maybe they knock the child over.
Maybe they growl or snap because they've become uncomfortable.
Maybe absolutely nothing aggressive was intended whatsoever.
But suddenly you've got a frightened child, upset parents and a situation that could have been avoided completely by simply saying:
“Sorry, no. He's not available for interaction.”
And this is the bit people sometimes forget:
⚠️ Your responsibility is to manage the situation before something happens, not explain afterwards why you thought your dog would be fine.
Dogs don't have to be aggressive monsters for an interaction with a child to go wrong. They're animals, not machines, and behaviour can be affected by environment, stress, pain, fear, excitement, previous experiences and simply having had enough.
And once something does happen, saying “but he's never done that before” isn't going to undo it.
This isn't about saying children and dogs can never interact.
Of course they can.
If you have a family dog who lives with your children, you've got an established relationship and hopefully know both the dog and the children extremely well. That's very different from an unfamiliar child approaching your dog in public.
So if you're out walking and a child asks:
“Can I stroke your dog?”
You are absolutely allowed to say:
“No, sorry.”
You don't need to justify it.
You don't need to prove your dog is friendly.
You don't need to worry about offending the child.
And you certainly don't need to take a risk just to be polite.
Protect your dog. Protect the child. Don't put either of them in a situation they don't need to be in.
And if that makes me the miserable dog lady who says no to children…
I'll happily wear that badge. 😂🐾
