Gold Ribbon Rescue no longer adopts dogs to families with children under the age of 8 years old (repeat adopters will be considered on a case by case basis).
We know many families want to have great memories of their kids growing up with a dog, like they did.
Golden retrievers have changed since many of us were kids. Greed often causes indiscriminate breeding. Puppy mills that mass produce dogs do so for profit and not for betterment of the breed.
As a result of changing times, 71% of the dogs we have taken into care since January 2015 are from shelters. These dogs come with an unknown history of their compatibility with children.
Very few of our foster homes have young children to provide us with insight on how the dog will interact with children.
Therefore, we cannot gauge how a dog will react when a child:
- Removes toys or food from the dog’s mouth, bowl, or play area
- Runs and yells through the house or around the yard; crawls over or tugs at the dog; gives a hug
- Carries food in their hands
- Is left alone with the new dog without adult supervision
Small children, many at a dog’s eye level, see a Golden as a play partner or stuffed toy. The quick movements of young children and their loud noises can become too much for a dog, which has led to injury to the children and euthanasia for the dog.
Based on this, we feel it is no long appropriate for us to accept applications from families with children under 8, knowing the chances of placing a dog would be slim, and the wait for a suitable dog, extremely long.