Hello everyone!
I have a 9 month old standard poodle and I want to preface this by saying that I've always been kind of wary of dog parks in general, but my boy doesn't really get tired from walks and this dog park is pretty close by to where I live, so one day I decided to give it a shot. We actually had a lot of good experiences and I got into the habit of taking him to the park a couple times a week and he used to have the time of his life running around and playing with other dogs.
Today, however, there was a GSD (who we've met before and didn't know had any kind of behavioral issues) who was playing with a tennis ball, and when my puppy got close to her to play with it she snapped at him. The attack lasted maybe 5 seconds before her owner pulled her off of my dog — She just threw him onto the ground, growled and bit him a little, but she's not very young so her teeth didn't do any actual damage. However my puppy was absolutely terrified and ran away and hid in a corner, crying and shaking.
I checked him over and he didn't seem actually hurt, so as the GSD and her owner left I decided to stay for a little longer because I didn't want his last experience to be so negative. He eventually calmed down, but he was super wary of other dogs and only got close enough to sniff and get sniffed before taking a detour and coming back to where I was standing.
I'm honestly just so frustrated because I'm having a lot of problems with this puppy (we can't leave him alone without him barking and howling like a maniac, he swallows so many dangerous things) and I was just so happy he was, at least, very friendly with other dogs— He's always been so eager to play and just a happy-go-lucky puppy when it came to making new friends, and now I'm terrified this experience is going to make him scared of other dogs and it'll be yet another problem to deal with…
Does anyone have any advice on how to handle this? Should we go back to the park or stay away from it entirely? I sadly don't know anyone that owns a dog so I can't arrange any meetings or playdates that I'm certain would go well, so I'm feeling a little bit lost.
submitted by /u/_throwawaywastaken
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