Yes, just imagine if that had been a small child.

Lucille, I agree completely with you. I haven't read the replies on Bob's thread, so don't know what folks were saying, but I do know a bit about dogs and training. Even people who train to the highest levels of competition keep their dogs on leash.

As Dirty Harry said, "Do ya feel lucky?"

There are trout stocked ponds where I "now" live. A German Shepherd, playing in the pond with two young children, off the leash, attacked a worker there doing his job. He was bitten on the ankle & on the butt. The dog had no tags & someone came forward to keep the dog at their house. The children ran off when the attack happened.

Two weeks later "I" found a wet German Shepherd standing in the middle of the street. I called to her, she came towards me, I kept saying "COME", with a gruff voice...she layed at my feet and exposed her belly. Then did a 5 mile run heeling next to my side. I didn't know where to return her when we were done. I brought her home with me. I later found out SHE was the dog who attacked the worker. I was shocked.

Speaking dog...is a BIG deal. She was such a sweet thang......her name is Pepper. There are sooooooo many factors when dealing with dogs.

I love the terms people give to their dogs to make themselves feel better about their lack of controlling and training their dog. Not only reactive and prey, but it's natural, being protective, or genetically normal. My favorite is separation anxiety. My son had a boxer with so called "separation anxiety " as the reason for the dog's bad behavior instead of training the dog who is alpha.
That was until the dog bit his 3 year old daughter in the face. Out the door that dog went. Personally I would of put the dog down.

So many view dogs as toys. They are not. They are a 12-15 year responsibility.

I am speaking as someone who never had a dog myself, but I have been around many in my family.

I’ve known and loved them.

The most impressive relationship between human and dog I’ve ever witnessed was my Aunt Albertine and her little black dog Mica. They lived on a small farm and my Aunt would need to go get the dairy cows in for milking.

Mica knew when it was time and would get so excited! (This was way out in the countryside. No leash). She would run at full speed ahead then turn around and look at us and bounce around as if to say “hurry up”. She would do this the entire time till we got to the field.

She NEVER would go round up those cows till my Aunt told her to. It was so amazing. Loved my Aunt and loved that dog

There is a flip side to this as well. Children need to be taught to respect and give dogs their space. They need to be taught how to be introduced to a dog, not to stand over the dog's head, not to run and scream when they see a dog. So many things kids do while being kids can trigger a dog's response. And I agree 100% about dogs being leashed in public.

I walk my niece's dog along a path that runs along a river and there are a lot of people walking their dogs. That same path is used by a day care to take the kids to a playground. These kids are young, not yet of school age and the care givers have taught the kids how to act when dogs are going by with their owners. They are taught to not yell and to keep their hands by their sides.

The dog I walk is always on leash but I shorten up the leash and have him walk by me. I've never seen an issue between the kids and dogs. A group of kids is usually about 6 or 7 in size and I would never stop to greet them with the dog.

Lucille, so true. I couldn't bear to read Bob's post when I realized what it was about.

A trainer once told me that even highly trained dogs can't be trusted. I think she compared dogs to toddlers. How much would you trust your toddler to do?

As an owner of a reactive dog, I don't sugar coat anything. We are very mindful, always.

I walk many dogs of many types. I have good command of them. Every dog I work with I spend a long time re-enforcing the basics; calling them to me, telling them to leave it etc and giving them praise when they do. However I don't let dogs off the leash except for in my yard! Training out there is unequal and it has led me to distrust for the below reasons.

My dog was bit by stranger dogs that were out of control. This was when my dog was on leash and not in dog parks, when he was very young, 6 months old. We had given him extensive training and he was eager-to-please us so listened to us. The other (two-year-old) dogs didn't seem to listen to their people. Their dogs were off leash in a place where they were supposed to be on leash and ran up and attacked my dog. Neither bite was life-threatening but drew blood! The people said oh my dog never has done that!

I say, Yeah right buddy

Luckily I have no compunction about stopping a dog like that and tearing into the owner for having her dog off-leash. It happened twice though. It took us a long while for him to be trained back to liking other dogs again.

I have encountered too many people who have uncontrollable dogs. I now yell down the trail in an on leash area which is the only place we go that my dog will bite an off-leash dog if it comes near them. It's not true but I want them to control their dog way before they get near me.

I do think however very few in the world will ever have 100% command over any other being to my mind. A dog on leash is safer in my books.

It is a rare dog, highly trained or otherwise, that can be totally trusted off-lead. I have known of one Cavalier King Charles Spaniel whose owner could walk him in NYC (lived on upper east side) off-lead and could trust him. He also was the first Cavalier to achieve the OTCH obedience title. He was a once-in-a-lifetime dog with a superb trainer/handler.

I love dogs and also believe strongly in the importance of training them. I had dogs before I was married but DH isn't fond of them and while I'd like to have another one day, at this point in my life I don't have the time or inclination to train a dog, so I won't get one until I do.

I used to work at a BnB that had an attached tea house (I cooked in the tea house). The owners had a boxer who was a friendly little female, but totally untrained. They also seemed to spend little time with her and she was constantly trying to come into the tea house and also stealing the house guests' shoes etc and chewing them up, which was an issue. Eventually they got rid of her for her bad behaviour, but I was so angry because it wasn't the dog's fault, it was the neglectful owner's fault for not training her and spending time with her..

I am so darned tired of being jumped on by the neighbors dogs. There must be 20 dogs on my street and the owners walk them past my house. If I am outside and they stop to say hello, the dog invariably jumps on me. I know they are being friendly but I dont like it. Most of the owners never stop them. Wish I knew a trick to make them stop.

Dedtired, don't blame the dogs, blame the owners, they need the training!

I do not dislike dogs but I dislike many owners. We always had German Shepherds that were trained by my father. We all had complete control of them, BUT we did not trust them around strangers and other dogs. We also did not take them to restaurants libraries, banks,grocery stores, etc.. My friends and I have been walking together for 29 years,. Naturally we come upon many dog-walkers, So often the owner does not have the dog under control, nor do they try to keep the dogs away from passers-by. In fact it seems that they want the dog to " get attention" and pets and sweet comments, We frequently hear " he/she is so sweet". It is so frustrating to be jumped upon, forced into bushes, etc, It is all so sad that people do not understand the responsibility of dog ownership, It is not the dog's fault.

I absolutely do not walk out of my house with my dog without her being on a leash. In our yard she is on a leash. It's just too dangerous because she is so tiny.

"Wish I knew a trick to make them stop."

Shriek and yell "NO" loudly and then say equally loudly "You must control your dog, I don't want it jumping on me"

Dedtired, here is the trick: a friend of mine who is a dog owner said that you should face the dog and raise your leg with your knee bent so that if the dog jumps on you your knee will contact its chest and that is uncomfortable to the dog. She said that is how she trained her dog and I’m going to try that from now on because I’m like you, I really dislike strange dogs jumping on me.

ccrunner, this was always the way to stop a dog from jumping. Then people began to think it was cruel so this way was deemed to be mean. Personally, I think it is a very good way to get them to stop jumping on you. Of course, you don't hurt the dog, just make it to where they don't want to jump on you.

It's all well and good to say that all dogs should be on a leash. But some owners still aren't able to control their animals. If you're a 110 lb woman and you're walking a 125 lb German Shepherd, you are not going to control that animal if he isn't well-trained. We've all seen dogs on leashes straining and pulling.

And don't get me started on retractable leashes. Just because your dog is on a leash, he's still 25 feet away from you. We see people at the park with the dog stretched clear across the path and the owner just shrugs. Because "well what am I supposed to do?" Your dog weighs 12 lb, you weigh 200 . PULL!

I knew someone would mention that sometimes people cannot control their leashed dog and that does happen.

But if everyone leashed their dog then even if one party was having difficulties, the other party could do damage prevention by pulling away her dog. Leashing is not an absolutely perfect guarantee of safety, but it beats trying to deal with a poorly trained, unleashed animal.

AOK, I agree. Same with dogs that are tied with rope! I was walking my dog and saw a dog in the yard tied with a rope. I breathed a sigh of relief as I thought the dog wasn't a threat.

Well, the dog starts running towards us and I realized that the rope was so long that the dog could come out halfway into the street! A car saw what was happening and luckily stopped.

I yelled for the dog owner who was watching the whole thing yet didn't realize that the rope was too long.

Patrice, I'm a Westie owner too. He's a good boy, as good as a terrier can be, but if he sees a squirrel, instinct takes over and he's gone. He's also very attracted to large dogs, so he pretty much forgets himself when he sees them and wants to take off. He's off leash in our yard or in a fenced area we can visit, otherwise he's leashed.

Dogs benefit humanity in so many ways. I do love them.

I love them too socks. Love my dogs, love pretty much all dogs. However I'm not very fond of some dog owners. Ha ha.

I think like pretty much all problems in life, it comes down to the fact some people just don't care how their laziness (or whatever you want to call it) is impacting other people. A responsible dog owner never allows their dog to be a problem for someone else. Period.

I try so hard not to let them jump on people. The puppy is still a work in progress. But to dedtired's point, we only approach people outside who want to interact with them, and I do my darndest to make sure the youngest won't jump.

Ded, if I were you I'd probably say, "no jumping!" to the dogs, and then smile at the owners. The knee trick works fine with little dogs but the problem is some bigger dogs can actually knock me down if I'm not firmly planted on the ground.

This is timely for me this morning. I was walking my 9lb. dog just a little while ago and when I was about two houses down from my house when I saw a woman coming up the street with 3 adult german shepherds!!! She is a slight woman. She is a police officer so I was hoping she could control all 3 but I took Carmelita up into the yards by the house and got her into my yard without incident. I have no idea how friendly those dogs are but I don't need to find out. Even friendly dogs can cause damage to the little dogs. One misplaced paw, even in play, can cripple or kill a small dog.

It is frustrating that people can be unaware of the power of their own dogs.

We’re very fortunate in that our dog doesn’t require a fenced yard and when we’re on our property we don’t use a collar or a leash. I know our dog would never hurt anyone but no one else knows that, which is the only reason we still leash her when we take her off the property. It’s the right thing to do for both the dog and anyone who is in the area. When walking the path, if someone is going to pass us, we stop and have her sit to the side of the path so the person going by knows she’s not going to hurt them. It’s obvious by their smiles and kind words about how good she is, that they appreciate the consideration.

I’ve had lots of dogs through the years and have worked at training all of them to some degree with varied success but it wasn’t until we got our lab that I discovered how socializing your dog can be just as important as training it is.

You wanna see a REALLY trained dog? Here's a video of a police K9 officer, closing his own door when told to kennel.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XIqvUzQDxn4

i don't have dogs, but since dog training is being discussed, I thought I'd mention the most AMAZING movie I saw recently about Hero Dogs. Dogs who are trained to do all kinds of different types of rescues, from Ski Patrol, Avalanche rescues to search and rescue in natural disasters and some other really interesting jobs dogs do. It's an IMAX film, exquisite photography, etc. So if it's playing near you be sure to go see it. Not one you want to wait to come to Netflix. Want to see it on a big screen for sure. I saw it at OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) in Portland Oregon, but it's playing around the country. Not sure about Canada, but I hope so. eta: I changed the link go to the youtube trailer for the film.
Superpower Dogs

Girlfriend and I took Gino to an off-leash dog park. We enjoyed it, he was a little intimidated because he was the only small dog. He stuck pretty close to us.

We went to a different one the following weekend and it was much better......larger, more people. They had separate areas......one for small dogs and one for big dogs. He was the only small dog, so we asked if he was allowed in with the big ones, and he was. Then all the dogs, big and small mingled in the same area.

Talking to the other dog owners, we found out that the first park we went to isn't desirable at all......a number of aggressive dogs AND the owners have a tendency to drop their dog off and then go across the road to Tim Horton's and sit and have a coffee. Unacceptable!!!

We have a beautiful county owned dog park that’s like that Jasdip. It’s separated according to dog size as well, has a lot of acreage and even a lake for the dogs to swim in during the summer. They’re especially ideal for people who don’t have yards and well worth the $30/yr license fee they charge. I think the person who came up with the idea was brilliant.

Jasdip, that just floored me. leaving the dog and going across the road!

Dedtired, here is another method to stop the jumping dogs. When they jump on you completely ignore them, don't even look at them. Then when the have all paws on the ground, acknowledge and pet them. Dogs hate to be ignored, this works best if all the people they come into contact with do this. I've used this technique with a neighbor that was walking dogs that were in training to be used medically. The trainer thanked me for ignoring the dogs.

We took Gino to the dog park again yesterday. We were talking with one another and all of a sudden a border collie came racing by us going like lightning. The owner caught up to us and the 3 of us walked together and talked. Her Border Collie is amazing, blazing fast, and will stop and lay down and just stare, fixated. She comes when whistled, and will go like a rocket when told.

There was also a whippet and it was wonderful seeing the speed of these beautiful creatures loving life and being off a leash.

We have a serial cat killer in our neighborhood. The dog is leashed and yet, he keeps attacking/killing cats. We are gaining momentum and will soon file vicious complaints with our city's animal control. What is the worst part of it all? Since it keeps happening, some wonder if the dog is being encouraged. When the dog is on leash and it happens, multiple times (cats are in their own yards, own porches, and not provoking the dog), we can draw no further conclusions.

ETA: I stand corrected. An attorney has been hired and they're already working on prosecuting. I'm glad to hear they're going to stop his killing. I wouldn't mind if they muzzled the dog and walked with a tight leash, but let's face it, he aint gonna do it. So I bet another life will be lost and that makes me sad.