To most of the people I see walking their dog,
Stop running across the street with your dog as soon as you see me and my dogs. No wonder your dog is barking, pulling and squealing – you never let it meet anyone! I’d be pretty pissed too!
I own two of the nicest dogs you’ll ever meet, and I take a lot of pride in them and their behavior, but the dog owners in this city are really starting to piss me off with how they shelter their dogs from others. It’s actually starting to affect my dogs behavior because I try to socialize them and it’s nearly impossible.
If you don’t want to take on the responsibilities of owning a dog, then you shouldn’t have one. Period. —Two friendly dogs! Woof woof!
This article appears in Nov 11-17, 2010.
o.p., if your dogs are say, like a20 pounds, and someone’s dog is like 120, would you let it go to meet the bigger dog/s. i would think that you might be more inclined to stay away too. don’t get me wrong here, i had a couple dogs years ago, that might have went 5 pounds, but they would put the run to a fucking rottie or pit bull. yorkies are known for the braveness/small size. but in general, most folks will shy from the bigger, just to be safe. and no, just because your pups are well behaved for you, don’t mean that they won’t attack, and possibly kill, a small animal. it’s a thing called predatory instinct.
As a dog owner, how am I to know your dog is trained and socialable? For all I know your dog could be Brindi. I’d rather cross the street than have my dog attacked. Then again, attacking a German Sheppard wouldn’t be wise on your dog’s part.
There’s no way to predict how strange dogs will react to one another. It’s a real crapshoot so I can’t blame people for being protective of their pups.
My dog sometimes doesn’t get on well with dogs who are bigger than he is. He’s usually okay and he’s never violent, but it takes only a second for him to snap and bite someone’s dog for him to be taken away and for me to get sued. So I’m sorry if I’ve deprived your dog of a richer social life but I’d prefer to make absolutely sure that nothing happens to mine.
My other dog is fine around all other dogs so I let her socialize.
Socializing with strange dogs doesn’t seem to be worth the risk if things go wrong. Socializing a dog with dogs of people you know and have knowledge of their dog handling skills may be the best option for a responsible dog owner.
Maybe it’s you they don’t want to meet.
Op I agree, dogs do need to socialize, but many others have brought up good points about how you can never know if the other dog/owner is friendly.
Handling skills mentioned by ocean-biker-chick is also a really good point.
THen there’s the fact some dogs are so not used to ever coming into contact with other dogs & they view themselves as the protector of their pack (humans in their world)& might attack for no other reason than you got too close for its comfort !
So many err on the side of caution.
I had a Yorkie once, had the heart of a lion that dog. Absolutely fearless & surprisingly friendly to boot.
Yup, feel the same way OP. We have 2 very nice well behaved dog ourselves, and get the same reaction. Granted one of the dogs is a pitbull mix, he does have a large intimidating head and gets really excited to see other dogs. People will cross the street dragging their dogs behind them barking and whining to try and get away from us. I would wager a guess that those same people never have a smile or wave for anyone they don’t know either. Maybe thats why they need a dog, because they are too afraid to talk to other people.
To all the posters who say ” you don’t know how 2 strange dogs will react “, you are right, you don’t know how they will react. How will you know if you never let your dog meet any other dogs? In my experience how a dog will react is directly related to the reaction of the owner. If the owner reacts in a nervous or negative way, their dog will sense it and react in a nervous or negative way, it happens to us all the time at PPP. It annoys me when people grab their children and pull their dogs close to them, when all my poor dogs want to do is say hi. Do you really think that I would be irresponsible enough to take a child eating monster of a dog to a public park? But it’s always good to see people handing down their phobias to there dogs and or children. Way to go!!!
I had a sweet little poodle that was savaged and shaken to death by my cousin’s bigger mixed breed dog years ago when I lived on a farm outside Truro – it’s something I never want to experience again. No matter which way you slice it, some people with dogs are like some people with kids: ‘I can’t understand – he’s never this way with other (fill-in-the-blank).’ Others, like myself, would rather err on the side of caution, aside from having to ‘socialize’ with some random stranger when all I want to do is walk ma dawg.
My parents tiny lhasa apso is aggressive to most other dogs, new people, most animals, etc. I keep it from running up to other dogs because I’m responsible and don’t want my dog taking a nip at another dog, which it has tried to do in the past. GOOD for the dog owners taking responsibility for their dogs and preventing possible injuries to strangers dogs!
People like you are halarious, what if a person with a large dog didn’t cross the street and let their dog have a whiff of your dogs ass. What if their larger dog didn’t like the way your dogs ass smelled. What if the larger dog bit your dog, what would you say to the owner. Would you be mad? I own a large dog and he is very well trained but the fact of the matter is he doesn’t like every other dog in the world. I would love to let him loose and sniff every other dog out there but he is an alpha, I love my dog, I would never put him in a position where he could be in danger because of my foolishness. These people crossing the street are being good dog owners maybe you should open your eye’s and see that. By the way, PPP is a dogs of leash park and Long lake is another off leash park, i’m sure you could bring your dogs there to socialize them. Don’t get mad at people for being good dog owners.
This bitch is ridiculous.
If you want your dog to socialize with other dogs, pay for a dog socialization class and get your dog some quality social time.
Maybe people don’t want their dogs mingling with yours because their dogs have territory issues and might actually harm one of your precious, well behaved, socialized dogs??
I have made a point not to allow my dog to “meet” other dogs on the street. When he’s on his leash he’s to respect my rules and not drag me around whenever he sees a ‘friendly’ dog coming our way. My point is that I am a very responsible dog owner and your bitch pissed me off by saying that someone like me does not want the responsibility. If you want to socialize your dog – GO TO THE DOG PARK!
That’s a really good point, MHM.
There are plenty of reasons why someone wouldn’t want their dog to meet another dog on the street. Maybe they’re in the middle of training. Maybe their dog isn’t fixed. Maybe they wonder if your dog is fixed. Maybe their dog doesn’t play nicely with others. It doesn’t mean they don’t like the look of you or your dog.
There are plenty of socialization opportunities within HRM. Point Pleasant Park, Seaview Park, and Long Lake are all CRAWLING with dogs. I haven’t been but I’ve heard Shubie in Dartmouth is too. And apparently some of the local doggie daycares do “drop-in” nights during the fall and winter. Don’t rely on meeting dogs on the street to socialize your pup.
Meeting dog’s on the street is the worst possible place. Not only for the reason’s mentioned above, but dog’s feel threatened by other dogs when on a leash.
You take a dog that might not have any problems off-leash, and on leash go crazy.
It’s true that it’s unfortunate, although there are some good reasons for it. But you can socialize dogs at the park, or the ball fields where some dog owners and groups plan to get together at certain times. A walk is good but it’s not the only place if you dogs need some play dates.