Does something need to be done about dogs?

[Mason-]

I take my boy to the park most days. It’s a play park, without a fence next to an open field/village green.

Most dog walkers walk with their dogs on the lead, but some just stroll into the park with them off lead. Winds me up, I always make sure I’m very close to my boy and never take my eyes off the dogs until they’re out. I’m truly paranoid about it. I wish it were the law that all dogs have to be on leads in public spaces.

 

[RedMogg]

I take my boy to the park most days. It’s a play park, without a fence next to an open field/village green.

Most dog walkers walk with their dogs on the lead, but some just stroll into the park with them off lead. Winds me up, I always make sure I’m very close to my boy and never take my eyes off the dogs until they’re out. I’m truly paranoid about it. I wish it were the law that all dogs have to be on leads in public spaces.

I empathise - our nearest park is similar, with a heavy influx of council estate muppets (I've posted about previously).

We don't use it anymore - much prefer driving to the nicer park with a fenced off kids' play area, playing fields and an enclosed dog-walking area, where I can let Poppy off-lead.

I disagree that all dogs should have to stay on lead in all public spaces - it's not safe for Poppy to be on a lead whilst walking alongside my wheelchair - high risk of getting caught in my rear wheels, or tangled in my castors.

Poppy is highly trained with complete recall; if I say "Hold", she stops in place and waits.
"Ignore" and "Away" she will break engagement and wait for next instruction.
If I say "Here", she returns immediately to my side and sits. "Show Me" to return her ball to my lap. "On", she stands in front of me, paws on my knees and has her harness attached, ready to ride on my lap.

..."Squirrel" sends her flying to the nearest tree like a complete lunatic; especially entertaining if she's still attached to me.

I understand not every owner takes training as seriously as some of us, but with a high energy, working dog, she shouldn't be restricted because others aren't responsible enough.

 

[Dis86]

I empathise - our nearest park is similar, with a heavy influx of council estate muppets (I've posted about previously).

We don't use it anymore - much prefer driving to the nicer park with a fenced off kids' play area, playing fields and an enclosed dog-walking area, where I can let Poppy off-lead.

I disagree that all dogs should have to stay on lead in all public spaces - it's not safe for Poppy to be on a lead whilst walking alongside my wheelchair - high risk of getting caught in my rear wheels, or tangled in my castors.

Poppy is highly trained with complete recall; if I say "Hold", she stops in place and waits.
"Ignore" and "Away" she will break engagement and wait for next instruction.
If I say "Here", she returns immediately to my side and sits. "Show Me" to return her ball to my lap. "On", she stands in front of me, paws on my knees and has her harness attached, ready to ride on my lap.

..."Squirrel" sends her flying to the nearest tree like a complete lunatic; especially entertaining if she's still attached to me.

I understand not every owner takes training as seriously as some of us, but with a high energy, working dog, she shouldn't be restricted because others aren't responsible enough.

And this is the pickle. People like yourself do everything right and yes, don't deserve punishment or restrictions. The problem is the increasing number of complete selfish pricks and those that are just inept.

I had a meeting with Natural England today about some of our land that I'm going to have to disrupt to carry out some works to. It's protected dunes and used to be home to seabird breeding colonies. They've all gone now because dog owners can't keep their pets on leads. Despite this I still have to act as if they're there.

 

[Tykey]

I can see both sides to having a dog must be on lead in a public place rule. I know dogs love being off the lead. I've no problem with it when the dog is obedient and the owners aren't muppets, but unfortunately like many things in life the idiotic few spoil it for the sensible majority. Maybe there should be fines for owners who can't control their dogs, who let their dogs run at other dogs, other people, cyclists etc. I expect it'd be very difficult to enforce though.

 

[Felon]

Maybe there should be fines for owners who can't control their dogs, who let their dogs run at other dogs, other people, cyclists etc. I expect it'd be very difficult to enforce though.

Yeah I mean there's just no muscle to enforce this, if you get your house turned over and burgled - you're lucky if the police even turn up at all, so getting them to even tackle poor dog ownership problems, is just going to be at the bottom of the pile.

I've said from the beginning;

• Bring back licensing
• Make pet insurance mandatory
• Background checks for the sale of larger breeds (where the responsibility lays the with the seller/breeder)
• A complete ban with serious consequences for hybrid breeding, (Breeding Pitbulls and other breeds to create new breeds)
• Real punishment for people who flout the law (massive fines and jail)

Until enforcement starts to bite properly, I don't think that much will change,

 

[InkZ]

This topic has been discussed a lot in this thread and while responsible ownership is key, it’s also important to acknowledge that some breeds have the potential to cause significantly more harm if something goes wrong.

A large, powerful dog like an XL bully can seriously injure or even kill an adult and intervening during an attack can be extremely difficult. The counter-argument is that breed bans don’t necessarily solve the problem. It’s a complicated situation with no easy answers.

These issues have been overlooked for a long time, so any meaningful improvement will take time. Unfortunately, there will always be people who ignore rules and regulations around ownership and realistically, the police don’t have the resources to enforce everything consistently.

There is just no reason to own these powerful dogs. They aren't from nature, they've literally been bred from fighting dogs. The dogs will never have a responsible owner because a responsible owner wouldn't buy one.

 

[Ayahuasca]

There is just no reason to own these powerful dogs. They aren't from nature, they've literally been bred from fighting dogs. The dogs will never have a responsible owner because a responsible owner wouldn't buy one.

It’s easy to point to pit bull–type dogs and trust me I get it, but people want to see real improvement, not just explanations of root causes.

There are still plenty of serious attacks involving breeds that aren’t banned and a lot of it comes down to the entitlement and complete lack of responsibility shown by what seems to be an ever increasing number of dog owners.

Only a couple of weeks ago, a friend-of-a-friend’s dog was savagely attacked by a guard dog that had escaped for the third time. The police were already aware of the dog because it had attacked before, yet it still hasn’t been seized. Unless a person is injured, the police usually leave it to the owners to resolve the issue privately.

In this case, they had their toddler with them. The child was knocked over in the chaos and could easily have been attacked if capable adults hadn’t intervened.

The whole system in this country, how these incidents are managed and policed, is an absolute mess.

 

[InkZ]

It’s easy to point to pit bull–type dogs and trust me I get it, but people want to see real improvement, not just explanations of root causes.

There are still plenty of serious attacks involving breeds that aren’t banned and a lot of it comes down to the entitlement and complete lack of responsibility shown by what seems to be an ever increasing number of dog owners.

Only a couple of weeks ago, a friend-of-a-friend’s dog was savagely attacked by a guard dog that had escaped for the third time. The police were already aware of the dog because it had attacked before, yet it still hasn’t been seized. Unless a person is injured, the police usually leave it to the owners to resolve the issue privately.

In this case, they had their toddler with them. The child was knocked over in the chaos and could easily have been attacked if capable adults hadn’t intervened.

The whole system in this country, how these incidents are managed and policed, is an absolute mess.

The only solution I can think of is licenses, but how the hell would that work / be enforced

 

[RedMogg]

It’s easy to point to pit bull–type dogs and trust me I get it, but people want to see real improvement, not just explanations of root causes.

There are still plenty of serious attacks involving breeds that aren’t banned and a lot of it comes down to the entitlement and complete lack of responsibility shown by what seems to be an ever increasing number of dog owners.

Only a couple of weeks ago, a friend-of-a-friend’s dog was savagely attacked by a guard dog that had escaped for the third time. The police were already aware of the dog because it had attacked before, yet it still hasn’t been seized. Unless a person is injured, the police usually leave it to the owners to resolve the issue privately.

In this case, they had their toddler with them. The child was knocked over in the chaos and could easily have been attacked if capable adults hadn’t intervened.

The whole system in this country, how these incidents are managed and policed, is an absolute mess.

My sister's Cockapoo "Olive" was attacked by her neighbour's escaped Cane Corso - when she tried to intervene, the Corso attacked her too. Thankfully she was coming back from judo, so her heavyweight gi fabric stopped the tearing, but not the extreme bruising to her calf and ankle, from the bite pressure.

Olive is my sister's seizure alert dog, who detects her epileptic fits, allowing my sister to use her VNS implant (clever device in her chest, activated by a wrist-worn magnet and reduces the severity of her fits), or if it's a *really* big seizure, Olive will alert my sister to lay on the floor, ready for her care companion to administer her anticonvulsants.

She's literally a life-saving part of my sister's ability to live independently.

The Corso attack traumatized Olive so much, it was months before she'd leave the house. My sister's injuries stopped her from training for 6 months.

The Corso's owners were investigated by the police, and despite admitting responsibility and offering to pay for Olive's vet bill at the time (about £3k for multiple lacerations to her back, ears and hips), when interviewed, they denied any involvement and played the "Prove It" game, with the police just throwing their hands up and saying "without more evidence, NFA".

The IOPC complaint resulted in nothing, but I did take the owners to civil court for the vet bill (lower bar for evidence: "More Likely Than Not", rather than "Beyond Reasonable Doubt") and they eventually paid when we instructed bailiffs, but the process took nearly two years.

They still have the Corso, it's still a menace, and the police have continued to do nothing, despite further incidents with other dogs in the street.

 

[dowie]

They still have the Corso, it's still a menace, and the police have continued to do nothing, despite further incidents with other dogs in the street.

I think that's where a small pocket knife or Leatherman tool might come in useful when dog walking, obvously useful to have in outdoor areas anyway and so long as it's a small folding blade then it's a tool, not a weapon to be used against humans etc. but could certainly be used against a dog like that or a Bully type if they're refusing to let go of your own dog/no owner to be seen.

 

[HoneyBadger]

This is a very interesting thread.

My wife and I have owned dogs for 20 odd years. Mostly GSD’s. All trained by us, and us paying for police dog trainers.

Current pack is a male GSD, and two female Weimaraner‘s.

I firmly believe that there’s no such thing as a bad dog, only a bad owner. But the landscape has changed over the years.

It’s just too risky now, so we bought a property with some land. So we could run them privately on our own land. We have fields at the end of the drive way, and my wife will take each dog out individually, on a lead. She will walk at least a mile into the fields and carry out checks before considering taking them off the lead. The only check is that no one else is around. If they are, the dog stays on the lead.

As a treat, we hire a 5 acre field 10 mins away and take all 3, we drive in, secure the gate, do a perimeter check and only then release them. We sometimes visit the beach, in unseasonal times and unsocial hours and will keep them each on a 50 foot lead, anchored to us.

They respond to recall and won’t randomly run off, they will protect us if needs be.

Otherwise they don’t go out, we occasionally when they were younger took them around the village, and they socialise with other dogs, but only my other family’s.

Not worth the risk anymore, the public are stupid. Years ago I had my boy Murphy, a 50KG GSD who was police trained, but didn’t like other people. The amount of times I’d be walking him, with a coat on him which had stay away/anti-socisl/in training/go away and I’d have people attempting to come up and stroke him/parents with kids approaching whereby I’d cross/turn around whilst shouting stay back, he isn’t friendly. It became ridiculous. He was eventually okay after training, but ho hum.

 

[ttaskmaster]

I think that's where a small pocket knife or Leatherman tool might come in useful when dog walking, obvously useful to have in outdoor areas anyway and so long as it's a small folding blade then it's a tool, not a weapon to be used against humans etc. but could certainly be used against a dog like that or a Bully type if they're refusing to let go of your own dog/no owner to be seen.

Leathermans almost always have locking blades, which are an offense to carry without good reason.
Carrying anything with the intent of doing harm is also an offence, and harm is not limited to humans.

 

[413x]

Leathermans almost always have locking blades, which are an offense to carry without good reason.
Carrying anything with the intent of doing harm is also an offence, and harm is not limited to humans.

To be honest, I don't care. If a dog went for my dog and I couldn't physically remove it. I'd use a knife. And I wouldn't care about the consequences.


There really is no reason to have these dangerous dogs. But this thread goes round and round. Public opinion is changing though.

 

[bainbridge]

To be honest, I don't care. If a dog went for my dog and I couldn't physically remove it. I'd use a knife. And I wouldn't care about the consequences.


There really is no reason to have these dangerous dogs. But this thread goes round and round. Public opinion is changing though.

I get it, but you'd be the one on the hook for attacking another animal with a knife.

Plus fighting dogs can sustain a huge amount of damage and keep fighting.

I haven't got a solution, but carrying a weapon isn't one.

 

[413x]

I get it, but you'd be the one on the hook for attacking another animal with a knife.

Plus fighting dogs can sustain a huge amount of damage and keep fighting.

I haven't got a solution, but carrying a weapon isn't one.

Yeah I know. And I wouldn't care. It's better than having the guilt of maybe being able to do something but not being able to.

Its also never going to be a problem for me unless it's a problem. Ie, unless I have to use it.

My dog means everything to me. I'd do anything to save him.

 

[dowie]

If an XL Bully is off muzzle and off leash or a big dog is "dangerously out of control" and off the lead then it's the owner's fault, if they can't deal with it and remove it from your dog then that's when I think it would be quite reasonable.

And it's perfectly legal to carry a folding pocket knife (blade < 3") in the UK, especially when walking a dog in a semi-rural area, woods, open parkland etc.. you could probably justify a leatherman with a locking blade there too.

 

[ttaskmaster]

And it's perfectly legal to carry a folding pocket knife (blade < 3") in the UK, especially when walking a dog in a semi-rural area, woods, open parkland etc..

NOT with the intent of doing harm, which is precisely what you have stated as the reason you'd be carrying it.

It's also not a practical of implement for any kind of defence, so in addition to likely cutting your own fingers, you'd be looking at charges under several offences, including any harm you do to the dog.

 

[dowie]

NOT with the intent of doing harm, which is precisely what you have stated as the reason you'd be carrying it.

Not at all, my point was that it's a useful thing to carry in parkland, countryside and that if a dog attack happens to occur then you could use it for that secondary purpose, of course that wouldn't be the primary reason for carrying it!

 

[ttaskmaster]

Not at all, my point was that it's a useful thing to carry in parkland, countryside and that if a dog attack happens to occur then you could use it for that secondary purpose, of course that wouldn't be the primary reason for carrying it!

That'd be up to you to prove and for the Attending Officer to decide...

And with the time taken to fish it out of your pocket, fumble around opening up the correct blade, and manage to put it to use, all without closing the blade on your hand, most attacks would likely be over before your 'not-a-weapon' is brought to bear.
There are better things to have in a defence situation, and more legal things for which to advocate, than a pocket knife...!!

 

[RedMogg]

Leathermans almost always have locking blades, which are an offense to carry without good reason.
Carrying anything with the intent of doing harm is also an offence, and harm is not limited to humans.

I mean, he could always show the attacking dog a photo of his home theatre setup...

...the dog's shock, surprise and outright envy would be enough to escape to safety.

(Edit: Thought you were quoting Hornetstinger - my bad!)