When picking the perfect pet for your family, there are a few things to consider:

*are you and your family ready for a pet — do you have the time and resources to devote to a new pet in the home

*is your child old enough to handle a pet — keeping in mind that your child won’t be mature enough to help out with the pet until eight or so years old

*what kind of pet will fit in with your lifestyle — if you’re a traveler you’ll want a cat as they are more independent and can be left alone for several days.

If you’re a dog person and you’re absolutely sure your family needs a dog, it’s best to consider one between one and five years old. They are more mature than puppies and won’t rough house as much, and they’re still young and spry enough to play with your child.

Some breeds are better known for their family orientated personalities like retrievers and spaniels tend to be gentler and love being played with. Whereas small dogs such as terriers and toy breeds are easily hurt so they are more aggressive with nipping children out of fear. The only sure way to get one that is good with children is to measure the dog and not the breed.

Adoption is a good place to start with looking for a dog. The adoption counselors know the animals and their temperaments to tell if they’d be a good match with kids. A lot of shelters test out their dogs with children to verify if they’re good with them. They also foster dogs out to families with small children to accustom the dog to day to day life for permanent adoption.

Here’s a test to conduct for yourself when you find a dog you’re interested in:
1.) make loud noises and sudden movements and gauge reactions
2.) touch the dog in an intrusive way as a child would.
3.) play with the dogs ears, hold the paws, put your fingers in the mouth
4.) pat him, push him, roll him over
5.) run in a circle and jump up and down

You’re looking for a pet that can handle the rougher handling because until your child learns they won’t always be gentle. If the dog responds calmly to these annoyances you inflicted, chances are you’ve got a good family dog before you.

Next installment will be on how to choose a good family cat….

This entry was posted on Friday, July 25th, 2008 at 9:56 pm and is filed under Health, Healthy Living, Mental Health, Sleep, Sleep and Rest, Stress Management, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.