Your responsibility

Socialising our puppies is vital, and your commitment to this will help to ensure that your puppy grows up confident and friendly. The effects of socialisation are a bit like compound interest on your savings. The more you put in, the more you get out. The more experiences your puppy learns to accept, the more easily he accepts each new experience. The object is to end up with a dog that is able to cope happily with almost any eventuality. I say almost because there are always exceptions. We need to be aware of our dog’s limitations and protect him from being put in situations where he may feel very threatened.


Any dog, no matter how well socialised, is likely to become afraid when he is injured, for example, or when faced with an experience he simply cannot match against any of his experiences so far. If your dog is hurt, you need to assume he may bite. If your dog is exposed to human behaviour he does not understand, and is not allowed to move away, you need to be willing to entertain the possibility that he may react with aggression. Even if he has been well socialised with children, you cannot guarantee that your dog has been exposed to all the sorts of noises that children sometimes make, especially a child that is very scared, or upset. We cannot prepare a dog for every possibility. Toddlers, for example, with their lack of empathy, may sometimes hit dogs, or simply cuddle them too tightly. For this reason, it is vital that dogs are always supervised around small children.