A dog did little to hide her disappointed reaction to a toddler’s attempt at playing fetch in a clip that has proven popular on social media.
Train driver and mother-of-one Laura Silva regularly shares clips of her pet rottweiler Lola and 13-month-old son Olly to TikTok, under the handle ourgirllola.
However, it’s this latest video of the adorable pair that’s proving especially popular, with over 340,000 views. It captures Olly’s first attempt at a game of fetch with his four-legged friend, but it doesn’t exactly go to plan.
Dogs have an inbuilt disposition for chasing and retrieving, so it’s hardly a surprise that so many canines are drawn to activities like playing fetch.
As Debbie Jacobs, author of the book A Guide to Living with and Training a Fearful Dog explains, games like fetch “make the dog feel good.” She told the Huffington Post: “They don’t need to be rewarded for the behavior. If you like playing football, you play football even if you don’t get paid to do it. It just feels good to do it. Same is true for dogs.”
It’s therefore understandable that Lola would be eager to play a game of fetch with Olly. “She’s always loved chasing balls, head scratches, eating and hanging out as part of the family,” Silva told Newsweek. “She loves doing tricks and using her brain—mostly for the reward but she seems to genuinely love making people happy.”
Lola was just 8 weeks old when she joined the Silva family in late 2020. Part of a litter of seven pups, Silva and her partner were immediately drawn to the feisty canine. “She was nonstop chewing at our laces and trousers and even when food was brought out, she didn’t leave our side,” she recalled.
Lola has been around children from a young age, something Silva said has helped her develop a unique level of “patience” for her son. Not that she was all that interested when he first arrived though.
“She wasn’t bothered about my son AT ALL when we first brought him home, a screaming poop machine who was taking up loads of mom and dad’s time,” she said. “BUT even from the first day she was so calm and gentle and seemed to mature into her role as big sister immediately.”
That goes some way to explaining Lola’s reaction to Olly’s ineffective throw in the viral clip. With the canine clearly hoping for the young boy to launch the ball into the air, she instead has to make do with an understandably weak attempt.
As the onscreen caption puts it, Lola then “stares in disappointment” at the effort before picking up the ball and taking it over to Silva, evidently eager for someone else to have a go.
The hilarious nature of the dog’s reaction was not lost on those watching on social media. Taryn Ryan said: “Poor Lola was like forget Olly, she wants mom to play,” while Hell Belle offered some reassurance, writing: “It’s okay girl, he’ll be able to throw better soon.”
Calaheim Koraka, meanwhile, imagined Lola telling Silva: “Mom, this one’s defective, get a new one please.”
Silva is not entirely surprised people found Lola’s reaction amusing in the video.
“I think Lola was a human in a past life—she is SO expressive,” she said. “You can read her eyes and face like a book, and she sometimes gets quite vocal during sassy moments —as though she’s telling us off!”
Although this particular game of fetch may not have gone to plan, this is only the beginning of their blossoming friendship.
“Their relationship is really genuine—we didn’t ever lay him on her as a baby or force Lola to interact with him or anything like that,” Silva said. “Every interaction was done at Lola’s pace and was safely supervised.”
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