This is hard. The park itself is beautiful, huge, and has cute doggie pools. It is maintained every Tuesday from early - 1pm so its closed during that time. The park itself was very accommodating to allow us to use this park as visitors and with a puppy who is almost of age (5 1/2 months) when the age requirement is 6 months. She has all her shots and we have been socializing her and taking her to dog parks since she was 4 months old. She basically the most playful, non-aggressive pooch there is. We have had owners tell us that they have never seen their dog play so well with another dog until her and how big of a sweet heart she is. I gave the park two stars because the rules are not enforced. Being puppy owners we are very aware of creating positive socializing experiences for our pooch so she can be a well adjusted adult dog. We have been going to the park for almost 3 weeks now, almost everyday. Yes, the park has many rules, all which make even more sense to me now after our experiences. However, none of these rules seem to be enforced. We have seen the majority of the rules broken on a daily basis.
- some owners are on their phones, yapping away paying no attention to their dog, a no no
- others are just sitting in the shade while their dog roams 50 yards away, another no no
-some can't even see their dog, dogs are supposed to be under supervision the entire time.
The main rule and probably one of the most crucial:
***not pulling off dog when dog is engaging in aggressive behavior towards other dogs ****
Upon paying for a membership to this park we received a booklet. This booklet had a lot of informative stuff about dog personalities and making sure that the member's dog is appropriate for the park regarding aggressive behavior. It has a lot of stuff about what aggressive behavior looks like and when to separate dogs and stop "play". Things like dogs biting the back of other dogs necks, pinning, barking, showing teeth, not allowing a dog to run. It also states that if your dog engages in these behaviors that the park is not for you.
After reading this we started to see that almost half the dogs at this park engage in this behavior with our puppy. The worst part of it is the lackadaisical owners who don't seem to care that their dog is playing uncomfortably rough with our dog. Yes there is a small dog enclosure and a big dog enclosure. Unfortunately we also found aggressive dogs on the small dog side too. :(
Our pup thinks she is a big dog and gets a long really well with all dogs but really enjoys playing with large non aggressive dogs. We have had many positive experiences here at this park, but they are slowly being out numbered by the poor ones. Of course there is no such thing as a bad dog, just a bad owner. We have had aggressive dog's owners not say anything after we removed our dog from an aggressive situation by picking her up. The dog then continued to jump and nip at her while she was in my arms. This dog was also jumping on me covering me in dirt (bummer) although I do get dirty their but its mainly from picking up my dog from an aggressive dog. The owner said nothing, didn't even respond when we asked him to get his dog off of me and to stop his dog from nipping and jumping on me and the pooch. He walked slowly over to the situation and would reach for his jumping dog like he was stuck in slow motion, while I'm shouting at his dog "NO!"
Half of the aggressive dog owners give you attitude if you mention that their dog is being aggressive or ask them to do something about it. We have heard so many excuses like "thats just how he plays" or "he is normally really nice", we have also heard things like "maybe she should go to the small dog side" which sucks to hear when she was playing fine with other big dogs until YOUR DOG CAME. Some woman the other day said that "oh she is just playing submissive play" while she bites the back of our dogs neck not letting her get up. Our dog is smart and knows to go under tables or chairs or in the doggie pools to get away from these dogs. We have had another experience where a dog jumped in the pool with her and pinned her under water! The owner made a comment, not really showing any concern!
Why do we keep going back you ask? Well, the park itself is unbeatable, plus our dog loves it and can't get enough play. Its sad to see us working hard to have a well adjusted dog and have so many shitty owners who can't seem to control their dog or think they even have to. Your dog is teaching ours poor behaviors!
Our dog is almost 25 pounds which is the limit for her to be in the small dog enclosure, but we run into biting dogs, excessive humpers another no no. One woman came up to us and asked how old our dog was, being not yet of age and we answered honestly and said that she has been approved. The woman defiantly said approved by who? I said "the park itself", she said she was going to call them. Her dog was an excessive humper, so gross! read more