I would love to see it become law in North America that puppies and dogs cannot be sold in pet stores as in illegal to do so. Wouldn't that put a different spin on irresponsible breeders and puppymills?
As for Yorkies for families with small children, I know there are many on this forum that have small children or soon will and have a Yorkie.
I don't really care if anyone does but for my yorkies I do not ever sell to anyone with small children or anyone who will have children in the future. The minimum age I will sell to a family is a child no less than 10 years old, I have to meet the family and approve first reserving the right to refuse sale.
There has been two exceptions where there was one child about 7 years old and there were older brothers/sisters. I never regretted selling them that puppy as the family were excellent and have been wonderful parents to the kids and a good home for the dog.
However, as Willow posted the ages of her children, you may be an exception and are just fine with having a Yorkie. You must realize however, that from my point of view of looking for a proper home for my puppies, it is far too risky most of the time for my puppy to be in a home with such young children as I wouldn't know a prospective buyer is going to be clued in.
Most injuries to Yorkies and behaviour problems in Yorkies occur when small children are not properly supervised 24/7 with the Yorkie and the Yorkie is hurt or tormented.
I was at a dog show watching the Toy group and saw two little girls aged about 5 and 7 with their mother who had gotten a chihuahua and was trying to show it. The kids were torturing that dog no end at ringside waiting to go in the ring. I finally couldn't take it anymore and got up and talked to the girls with the mother standing right there who never said a word to correct those kids.
Unfortunately, this type of scenario is what I most often see with small dogs and families with small children. They think it is just a new inanimate doll and the parents don't give a hoot about the dog. |