Monthly Off-Leash Dog Rant Megathread

[lpwillia]

@cobondservant I have 1.5yo mini dachshund who is shy and fearful. He started to be dog selective - i would exactly because of the amount of off leash dogs running to him... i am trying to teach him to ignore other dogs . we meet / greet other dogs only when I talk to the owner and see how reliable the owner is etc... when I see an off leash dog in front of us I stop and see if the owner will get the dog to heel or put it on leash then we continue . or I ask them to hold the dog while we pass.

I have real problems to stay calm when there is an off leash dog running to us and i dont have time to react. I keep pulling my dog on a leash trying to get him away from the off leash dog - kicking my leg to get the dog away and yelling like a mad person I know it makes the whole situation worse but sometimes I just panic

so it happened today and the owner finally got to us and said maybe your dog should have bitten mine so that it will stop running to other dogs... lots of owners said that to me when I try ti explain mine is not friendly. But it can end so badly for mine because most of the other dogs are way bigger and stronger

I always feel so bad when I react like this and want to cry. I feel like i am the one ruining the training for him...

 

[ladyghosthunter]

@cobondservant Neighbor REFUSES to acknowledge that it's a problem that her dog is constantly getting out. It's literally a weekly occurrence where her dog gets out and comes at mine while we're on a walk. And I'm just supposed to be chill and let her dog jump all over mine. Lady, I'm trying to teach my dog that other dogs do not equal play time. I don't give a fuck that you think your dog is friendly and is only a puppy, my dog is on leash and yours is all over mine. Fix your effing gate.

 

[sarnmere]

@ladyghosthunter This was happening with my pit and Jack Russell for many weeks. We didn’t know because the neighbor would take them in their house let them play with their dogs and bring them back before we got home. One day she leaves a note saying she would be out town the next week and couldn’t watch the dogs if they got out. I was upset because we actually never knew as everytime we came they were there and happy. Worries me so much and so happy nothing terrible ever happened. Our Pitty was a big baby the Jack was the one of concern. We fixed the issue by keeping them in the house when we weren’t home. Looking back I still can’t believe I used to let my dogs be outside all day I would never do that now.

 

[janimelody]

@cobondservant Off leash chihuahua charged my 2 German shepherds last night (my dogs were both leashed and harnessed). One of my dogs was able to get a bite in before we could react and the little devil ran away screaming. The owner then came out of their house (yes the dog was outside untethered and unsupervised) to yell that we need to control our dogs and we yelled that they needed to keep their dog leashed.

Fortunately we’ve call animal control on this particular dog 3 times in the past month so we called the police who assured us that it isn’t our fault and that if they press charges the paper trail backs us up

 

[vel]

@cobondservant There's currently public meetings that have been going on in my municipality about whether they should start enforcing leash laws in a particular park that is not supposed to be an off-leash park but where everyone lets their dogs off leash. I watched the televised meeting and it was filled with SO MANY of these "free the dogs! let the dog roam free! all our dogs are friendly!" people. All I could think was, YOUR dog is friendly, the concern is your friendly dog thinking OTHER dogs are friendly. I don't bring my dog to this park, but surely at least some other people with reactive dogs do, thinking "my dog is on a leash, and we're in a town with a leash law, awesome." If your friendly dog runs up to a leashed reactive dog to say hello, this could be dangerous! It's my own greatest fear any time I go anywhere.

At a minimum I hope they add some "warning: off leash dog" signs or something, if they're going to keep not enforcing the law, so that people with reactive dogs don't accidentally stumble into the park.

(And this is not like, a typical dog park. It's a park with hiking trails and stuff where you wouldn't enter and immediately see the off leash dogs. You could be happily walking along by yourself and then be surprised when they suddenly came around the corner.)