There were a few different things that didn’t quite work in either the neighbours son or Bruna’s favour that day when he ran into the yard.

• The boy took off, throwing his gift of scraps for the chickens in the air as he ran back to his mum who was waiting for him in the front yard all the while listening to the sound of a screaming dog who’s 35lbs but sure does sound bigger than she actually is.
• Bruna didn’t understand why he was throwing things at her, yelling at her, and running away from her so she assumed this was someone she should be afraid of. She chased him out of the back yard, into the front yard, and nipped him in the ankle. No skin was broken, but there were visible marks on the boys leg where her teeth met his flesh.

Throughout the entire encounter, adults and other kids were hootin’ and hollerin’ because the boy sounded like he was in trouble and Bruna had gotten loose from the back yard, this was just adding to the commotion.

No adults knew what was going on until the boy and Bruna were in the front yard. I took her by the collar and led her back into the house so I could go check on the neighbour’s and their son. In my opinion, no amount of apologizing for this incident was good enough. I think I was as traumatized as the boy and the dog were, and at that moment I knew that I had to work harder and faster at getting Bruna on track with kids so that we never saw a repeat of the day’s dramatic turn.

At this point I felt that I had failed my dog, my family, and my neighbourhood. My husband and I had no idea there were kids next door, we had no idea they freely came into and out of the yard, we had no idea Bruna would do anything but run away to hide behind a tree or underneath a table. It was only our second day in the new place, we were still unpacking, still getting to know the community and the people that we lived next door to. So how do we help this unsuspecting child from developing a greater fear of dogs than he already had, and how do we get Bruna back on track because it was one thing when she felt kids were scary and would choose to run away, now we’ve found out that she will actually use her teeth on kids when fearful.

Stay tuned 🙂

XO