Squirrels and dogs

[trish321]

Hi everyone,

I have a Portuguese Water Dog puppy and she is barking at and trying to catch the squirrels in our backyard. Should I be concerned? Can a squirrel attack our dog? What do I do if she actually catches one?

Great forum here and I look forward to becoming an active member!!

Trish

[Longblades]

In the highly unlikely event your pup catches a squirrel you can bet it will fight back. I doubt a squirrel will go out of it's way to attack a dog. It would be sick or the dog was close to it's baby.

However squirrel chasing is something I discourage for fear one will lead my dog to dart across the street. Plus, the neighbours will love your dog barking at the squirrels, NOT. I'm thankful my dog has had excellent recall since wee tiny puppyhood and has learned on his own to not chase things he has faint hope of catching.

The little hound next door is not so smart and I'm thankful his nitwit owners finally put a bark collar on him. He was driving us nuts. But I'm not kidding, despite all the play on words.

[Marty11]

Yes I would discourage chasing squirrels because high prey drive leads to problems. Escaping from the yard, barking etc..... One problem I had was toy guarding. And in the event you introduce a cat someday would go a lot smoother. I have never seen a squirrel bother a dog.

[marko]

I've never seen a dog actually catch and harm a squirrel, but I'm sure it happens. I agree with everyone else though, best to discourage this behaviour....as a high prey drive can get dogs into big trouble when it comes to potential accidents.

[hazelrunpack]

In the past 20 years our dogs have only caught squirrels twice, both times in our yard. And, both times, the squirrel reached back from the dogs' mouth and bit the dog on the snout and/or jowls. The vets were surprised both times that there wasn't more damage to the dogs--often the dog will need stitches, but ours didn't either time.

So a squirrel can do some damage but they aren't really likely to bite unless the dog catches them first...at least in our experience. And our dogs, at least, really aren't that likely to catch a squirrel--but running into traffic would be a tragic possibility if the yard weren't fenced. We've noticed that as our dogs aged, they outgrew their interest in squirrels--they still watch them, but rarely chase any more.

[trish321]

lets hope she does not catch one... I will update as the summer progresses... thanks for the great responses. I love this place.