Hi, Third day in a row down at the beach with being off leash. She does not run far and always comes back within about 15seconds. She gets a treat everytime which helps. Plus most of the time she gives me a present, seaweed etc. The times we have been down there usually only about half a dozen dogs but scattered, so we only really encounter 2 at the same time. No issues with any interaction and when she has had enough comes back. I am normally only a couple of meters away to make sure. Today however was different. Other dog present had increased, but only to maybe a dozen, but more people. Again let her off the lead and she played with a dog pretty much straight away. The lady had no issues as that her dog was off lead too. She was maybe about 10m away. There was a couple with a child and a toy dog on leash walking same direction as I was heading. Vanilla as a young 18week old does wanted to say hello. She went over and unfortunately jumped up on the little kid. She was straight back down and I startwed to run towards them. She started to interact with the dog on leash. That unfortunately looked scared so I ran faster but just as I got there the gentleman decided to kick the little one in the stomach. I heard the thump as I got there, but no yelp or anything. I was going to apologies, but due to the action that changed. This of course resulted in an argument, him saying I should have full control of my dog, which I explained she is a puppy and learning, but still does not give him the right to kick her. Luckely the lady of the other dog from earlier intercepted. She had seen what had happened. My question is has anybody ever come across this while allowing their puppy off leash and if so what did you do differently next time. Given that they have to learn... And I am learning too being our first puppy.... Thanks for any help
I'm so sorry you and Vanilla had this awful experience. Dreadful. You must've been livid. Why didn't they just pick up their little dog?
What a horrible thing for him to do -I'd have been fuming! An 18 week old is obviously a puppy! If the beach is very busy, one option is to use a trailing long line.
That is absolutely unacceptable behaviour, obviously. However, it sounds like you might be setting yourself up for problems in the future by letting her run up to other dogs and people. I wouldn't be doing that, because you're going to end up with a full-grown dog that does the same, and that's not OK. I also think it's never a good idea to have an off-lead dog interacting with an on-lead dog, and it's your responsibility as an owner to keep your dog away from any other dog that is on lead. You don't know why it's on lead - it may be aggressive, it may be scared, it may be injured... in these cases, as the owner of the on-lead dog, I'd do what I deemed necessary to protect my dog from another. I'm NOT saying I'd kick a young puppy, clearly, but there may be a reason why the other dog couldn't be picked up. If I felt it necessary, I would certainly stand between the dogs and try to intimidate the incoming one - it's something I've done in the past and would have no qualms about doing in the future. So, for your benefit as she gets older, my focus would be on having her never run over to other dogs, and to get her focus completely and utterly on you. She only gets to play with another dog if you say she can, once you know that it's suitable to do so. You may need to keep her on lead around other dogs to start with, since she already has a history of running over to them which has to be untrained. Good luck and I hope you have more positive walks from now on.
There are some vile people out there just because they have a dog doesn't mean they are nice. Use a long line if its too busy and train as much as you can so sorry you had to learn that the world can be hard. Hope you are both ok
Yeah, do agree with Snowbunny about the best policy being 'if there's a lead, then no interaction is allowed'. That's our approach. I think it's safest for all parties.
I 110% agree with what @snowbunny has said. This is something we failed with Ella and I still regret it. If I could wind back the clock I'd spend a lot more time focussing on being the most exciting thing for my puppy and keeping her from running off to socialise with every dog in the neighbourhood
Thanks we are OK. No issue with anybody standing between to protect their dog. I would be doing the same. What annoyed me more was that she was actually moving away at the time of the kick plus I was nearly there. Maybe 2 seconds away. Plus his wife saw me coming. Will start to make sure that she does not interact with dogs on leads, unless it is OK. More training required for both of us.
Like @snowbunny said, get a long line. An 18 week old lab could still cause a frail/elderly/small child to fall over and hurt themselves. I was at the pet shop this weekend and a Bernese Mountain Dog (size of a small pony) came bouncing into the shop, ran straight at me and body slammed me. Now I'm a fit young woman, but what if I'd had my kid with me, or if I'd been heavily pregnant? I (or kid) would have been pushed over and potentially been severely injured. I now have Xena (14 weeks) on a long line after a couple of close calls. She's desperate to get to THE PEOPLE, so until she has greater self-control there's no more off leash for her unless there's not a person in sight. My experience with the Berner this weekend has just reinforced my decision.
Have a long line so will use that. Current one is 30ft is that enough as it does not feel that long? Hindsight is a wonderfull thing...no more of leash unless it is clear...until fully trained.
Hi , I had a similar incident a few months ago , there's a thread on it somewhere! I use the long line on the beach still , even when it's empty , as people just seem to appear from nowhere . Just some horrible people around that think it's acceptable to kick dogs . On a positive note , the long line has made my life a lot less stressful . Good luck x
I've just had to go go the police about an encounter I had and they may get charged with public order offensives and common assault. The officer told me that there some nasty people out there it'd just we are lucky and don't see it very often he says nothing surprises him anymore
Awk that's shocking . Hope you and the dogs are ok xx life's hard enough without having to deal with complete tossers as well ! In the end I didn't go to the gards and thankfully we've never met the man again or had any further interactions with numpties !
30 feet is heaps long enough. Longer than that would be pretty hard to manage I think. You may even find you want to go shorter. Give it a try though.
I'm new to the forms, only have responded on my introduction thread. Where I live there are many dogs, some aggressive and some that weren't. Until I moved in to this place I never once had my dog on a lead because I had a large size property but I learned from that mistake pretty early. A little backstory here.. I lived on 10 acres in Oregon in the middle of an area that had nothing but farm style animals and logging trucks driving around constantly. One day I got a knock on the door informing me that my dog has been going over to another mans property and chasing the live stock. The man was polite enough to inform me that if this situation that apparently my lab had grown custom to, did not change that he would shoot my dog. I thanked the farmer for not shooting first and for the warning. A few days later, my dog ran over to his property and attacked one of the animals on his farm. The man had then brought my dog home, who had a hole in the side of him. This man informed me of what had happened and I did not get angry because instead of using a "real" gun he used an air rifle. My dog survived but that was my last warning to keep my dog off his property. Things could of escalated quickly. I was not angry at the man as it was my mistake and I was warned which the farmer did not have to do. I know this story does not directly relate to the kicking of your dog but where I am from a man has a right to defend his property regardless if it's an animal or a human. The guy with the lead dog felt scared I'm sure. A charging dog is a scary situation to be in because you don't know what or how the charging dog could react.
Maybe you running up to them made them think she was capable of hurting them. Sent a panic ? This happened to me once. I was fine with a dog charging up to me and my little dog until the owner came running yelling his dogs name. Then I panicked and picked up my Pomeranian who was in fact in danger so I'm glad I picked him up. My husband stood between us and the dog and kept him away from us and the owner ran up and put his dog on a leash. Granted, where I was it was not an off leash area. But sounds like you were in an off leash area. If I didn't want my dog interacting with other dogs I wouldn't walk in an off leash area. So they could have also helped prevent the situation it sounds like. But I don't know the area so I could be wrong. Strongly work on recall like others suggested! This past week at our cabin we had a dog with no owner in sight come on to our property, a chocolate lab, and we were outside with Axel. Axel got excited and wanted to play with him and the dog had no interest what so ever and Axel kept trying with the play bow and the dog warned him off but Axel kept trying so we called Axel and he came running to us and nothing escalated but maybe it could have. I practiced recall like crazy in off leash areas when ever he would see a new dog I would call him to me with lots of praise and treats
