Do the springer spaniels live happily with children. we recently brought one into our home from a Rescue centre. He is beautiful, he is faithful, loyal and very well mannered. The only fault he has is that he does not tolerate our children well. He grumbles and growls when they try to touch him. We love him, but have had to take him back, as we fear for our children's safety. However, we would have him back tomorrow if we could understand and help him.
We know nothing about his background - perhaps that's his problem, we wonder if he has had a bad experience with children - he's around 18 months to 2 years old. If we can't have him, we have definately fallen for the springer spaniel, but we are desperate to know if they generally love children.

Hi,
I think you answered one of your own questions by saying you had him from a rescue centre and knew nothing about his back ground.
He may have had a bad experience with children or simply never been around children before.
I had my Spaniel when she was 6 months old, she is such a little darling,very good natured and very good with children.
You don't say how old your children are.
if they were very young I deffeintly would not have trusted the dog but if they were older and could understand the situation with the dog and knew the lines that shouldn't be crossed with the dog perhaps you may have had a chance.
How long did you have him for, was he given enough time to settle in ( again this would have depended on the age of the children, how safe was it to leave him with them).
The only down side ( if you can call it a down side ) is that they are bags of energy , and need a lot of excercise ( the reason I had Lucy from someone else is that they could not give her the time she needed ).They are generally working dogs but I think they make very good familly pets.