Dog Park ALL to Ourselves

The Dog Park in Jefferson opened in 2016 near the municipal building there. It has 2 fences in areas-one for the smaller dogs, and one for the big dogs!

We ended up having the park all to ourselves on Saturday morning (probably due to the bleh weather), but we had a great time! There was SO much space for Brodie to run around, explore, sniff, and play, but not too much space where we would lose site of him like in other dog parks.

One other dog did show up…of course as we were getting into the car to leave after over an hour of play! But there’s always next time!

What we loved most about this park was the ground was gravel instead of grass! (Even though it looks like it’s all leaves, I swear there was gravel underneath!) It had rained the day before we went to the dog park-which usually means that Brodie would be covered in mud by the time we left, BUT because of the gravel, there was none!

There were two benches on either side of the yard for us humans to sit on…even though we tend to be up and running around with Brodie, it was still nice to have a place to put our things and Brodie’s water bowl. Both benches are placed in great places so you can always have eyes on your pup!

Because we had the park to ourselves, we were able to work on some training with Brodie without having too too many extra stimulants! There is a children’s playground across the parking lot, so there was plenty of distractions, but not too many for him to be able to work! He did a great job! Especially because we used his FAVORITE training “currency”-his frisbee!

Any time we get to spend together as a family is always special-especially those times when Brodie get’s to run free and be happy!

I’m personally always going back and forth with it. I like a nice a quiet dog park, where we either get the park to ourselves or there’s only a few other dogs there. He gets to enjoy himself and has WAY more room to run than in our yard at home, plus he loves meeting and playing with other dogs. He get’s some real life training experience and socialization-as long as we are paying attention and there…just in case.

There’s always the risk of an un-socialized dog or a dog selective dog being at the park and it not liking Brodie. You just never know. Many of our friends avoid the dog park if there are lots of people and dogs there because of those negative experiences. We’ve had a few off encounters, but have been lucky.