To be fuming/upset about this (dog related)

[BB2000]

This morning I’m sat in our local park enjoying the sunshine and reading a book while my lovely 10 week old baby sleeps in the pram. Then a black labrador comes over to our bench. Now I don’t like this anyway as am scared of dogs but say nothing as I realise I am a minority in this. I wait for the owner to call it off – they don’t.

As it starts sniffing the pram I ask them to keep it away from the pram – they call it away ineffectually and the dog takes no notice. The dog sticks its head right in the pram (bottom bit of a phil and ted so very low to the ground). I grab the dog by the collar and pull it away. The owner mutters sorry and wonders off.

Now I know that no harm was done and probably the worst the dog would have done really is lick my baby and wake her up. Buy why can’t I just sit in the park and enjoy it without being harassed by a dog – it has made me much, much less keen to do this again as I feel I have to keep a watch out for dogs all the time. This happened several times with my first DD when she was little so it’s not just one owner – how can anyone think this is acceptable!

Of course many/most dog owners are very responsible but a there always seem to be one of two who just don’t care/have no control over their dog and ruin it for everyone else!

YANBU. I'm a dog owner and I hate owners who let their dogs do what they want unchecked as it gives us all a bad name.

Dogs are pack animals and they need controlling

Dogs should always be under control (which is not the same as "always on a lead", btw) but they are not pack animals, and following training or behavioural systems based on discredited and outdated pack theory isn't just misguided, it can be downright dangerous.

Dogs are not pack animals. They are social animals, who seek the company of other canines or humans, but they do not have a rigid hierarchy. Any submission or dominance shown by them is based on past experience of that particular situation and the importance of whatever it is the conflict has arisen over.

Whippy for example will fight for bed space. Food is not as important as comfort as she knows more food will be along soon. She is "pack leader" of who gets the best spot in the sun. Devil Dog is "leader" of who gets first dibs on illicit food stuffs. I have opposable thumbs and the ability to think forward and plan, so ultimately I am leader of all, without the need for silly, meaningless rules such as eating before they do or not letting them on the sofa.

Not much wrong with treating dogs like children imo. For most people that means good food, enough exercise and teaching them how to behave. In fact it's often crossed my mind that parenting a small child well is very similar to training a dog properly

YANBU, long term dog lover and keeper here and I firmly believe that if you can't control your dog it shouldn't be offlead in a public place. I also choose my walking places carefully and only allow my dogs offlead when appropriate - I wouldn't consider a park with small children and babies in prams/pushchairs appropriate. Our local park has quiet times and times, (like just before or after school/nursery) when it's busy with families/children. If I must take them out when it's full of children (extremely rare) they are kept on lead and we stay well away from the play areas etc.

Mine are both super soft, used to children and really friendly, but they are big and fast (Lurchers) and I do understand that not everyone likes or feels safe around dogs. They are well trained and I would say respond to my instruction 99.9% of the time, but they're not robots and I am well aware that the best way to avoid a problem is to make sure it can't happen in the first place, so if in doubt, they stay on-lead.

Fwiw, there are idiots and entitled twonks in every walk of life, it's not just dog owners and as usual it's those few that give the majority a bad name.

We had an experience with an unsupervised dog in a park harrassing my 5 year old dd this weekend, she is very dog aware and friendly and fortunately it was a friendly dog, but it's owner was sitting on a bench at the other end of the park and made no attempt to call it back or do anything in fact. (My two were offlead when it charged up to them without an owner in sight and mine returned immediately to my whistle, bringing the other dog with them.) He was so far away we could easily have taken his dog home with us and I doubt he could even have seen us put it in our car, yet he still didn't get off his backside.

Some people are just irresponsible and have an entitled attitude that means they think they can do whatever they want, regardless of who it inconveniences or upsets - I can't stand that type of dog owner.

Revised

Me too

I'm wondering how dog owners would feel if all dogs in city parks had to be on a lead aside from designated areas.

Is that too much to ask?

(When my son was bitten he was on the football pitch close to a gated play park).

YANBU. I have a dog, and love her dearly, but no way would i allow behaviour like this. But I think its part of all round awful behaviour by people who can't be arsed to train their animals (and in some cases their children)

It's heading that way already weegie. Each LA is now able to set it's own rules re dog-restricted areas and leashing etc, some towns already have dog-free zones and lead-only areas.

I wouldn't have a problem with either if they were well considered and sensibly managed ie, no dogs around children's play areas and only on lead in certain parks BUT I would like to think that if we do go that way, there would also be dog-parks, so people who don't like dogs can choose not to go there, but dogs can be off-lead without worrying about upsetting anyone.

I would hate it to become draconian and dogs to have to stay on leads in wide spaces like moors and country parks etc - that would be punishing the many because of the few - again.

The problem is a lot of dog legislation is created as a knee-jerk reaction to negative media/publicity. It's then rushed through without proper consideration and there are always those that suffer as a result. The problem is, no matter how you try, you can't legislate against bad/irresponsible dog owners, all that happens is that the good ones comply and the bad ones carry on as they always have, as these laws are very hard to police on a day-to-day basis.

As it is, lots of people use current - and new legislation to victimise decent dog owners, while the ones with out of control dogs and those that just don't give a damn often go unpunished.

Think, banning all cars because of those that drive around at stupid speeds with no MOT/Insurance/License. Or if you want to compare to breed specific legislation, banning all drivers of a certain background, because of the few that flaut the law or all those of a certain, specific age. Blanket legislation isn't the way forward, but I'm afraid I don't know what the answer is to all the 'problem' dog owners out there - and I do believe the dogs with problems are created by their owners - it's the humans that are the problems, not the dogs.

Apologies for my terrible grammar and punctuation in that post - trying to do two/three things at once here.

weegiemum I wouldn't oppose that in principle, so long as the designated areas were big enough to allow people to walk their dogs off-lead without having to get right up in another dog's space, and to allow dogs that need it to have a good run. Some sensory stimulation for the dogs - different surfaces, trees/bushes etc would be quite nice too. Not everyone who lives in a city with a dog chose to get their dog while living in that city, IYSWIM - people have to move because of work, family commitments etc and the breed that was perfectly suited to the original countryside home can need a lot more management in a city, e.g. planning the timing / length / route of walks to avoid crowded areas, school chucking-out time, that badly-behaved dog that goes for every other dog in sight etc etc.

The evidence that Dogs are not pack animals is disputed by many experts and it's a contentious theory that they are not.

Dogs still need a hierarchy and still need to know their place.

Treating them like Children is wrong.

No it's not caruthers, don't be silly. The researcher who came up with pack theory, has himself admitted he was talking bollocks.

Dogs, like almost all sentient beings, need boundaries, to prevent chaos (like criminal law for example). Just like children need boundaries. More people would do well to treat their children like responsibly owned dogs and teach them to wait at doors, walk to heal and sit nicely. Clicker training works on children and dogs. What dogs and children do not need is dominating or given a set of nonsensical rules in the expectation that it will somehow, magically, teach them right from wrong.

David Mech - who studied wolves and came up with the idea of hierarchical wolf packs - has himself done a great deal more research and proven that his inital theories were incorrect. Even wolves don't live in a strict hierarchical pack structure in the way we were taught as part of dog-training years ago, they live in family groups, the females raise the pups together 'co-operatively' and the males are rarely actively involved in this process. At around two years old/maturity the offspring leave the family group and either live as lone wolves or if they're lucky enough, find a mate and start their own family.

As in any family group, the parents set the boundaries and teach their offspring to respect their elders and live by the family rules (which are basically for the good of/safety of the whole family as well as themselves) that's not a pack, it's a family. It's also done in a non-violent way, with wolves only resorting to physical control as a last resort. They do not spend their days/lives trying to dominate each other and plotting how to take over 'the pack' and neither do domestic dogs.

Domestic dogs that end up living feral, as in Romania, South America, The Cook Islands etc, form only transitory groups where there is a clear reward for doing so (eg team hunting or readily available food resource). They also hunt less and scavenge more than wild wolves. This has been observed and reported many times over. There is no structure to these groups, they work by mutual benefit and co-operation and the groups tend to be very short-lived, as once the benefit of working as a group ceases, they go their own ways.

The problem with pack theory, is that not only is it scientifically wrong, it inevitably leads to the use of strength as a means of domination, thus creating more problems via subjugated dogs, rather than those that live happily with their people and live within the rules because it's rewarding to do so and they are happy and well cared for. There simply is no need to dominate dogs, they are willing partners and family members, dominating and forcing them to submit serves only to break that bond and create fearful dogs that are more, not less likely to cause problems in the future.

Yanbu. My children are a little nervous of strange dogs. Yesterday as we were in the car park at an outdoor pool a couple of wet spaniels came charging up to us. "Oh, they're ok" say the owners and I think "actually they're not. It's a car park, they are off the lead and approaching people who may not be comfortable with it." I got the kids in the car and I wish I had said something

Tiktok - Good dog training doesn't necessarily teach your dog not to approach someone, but it should understand leave it and have a good recall so if it does start to approach, you can call it away easily.

Like D0oin, it drives me batshit crazy when strangers call my dogs over. Not only are my dogs VERY exuberant big collies, but they can get over excited at people giving them a fuss which causes them to jump up and behave like fools. If someone wants to pet my dogs, I prefer to have them sat at my feet and be under control. then I'll call the dogs over for them to fuss

I love dogs and don't mind a friendly one at all but when I've given myself a migraine teaching my DC's and mindees to ask the owner before touching a strange dog I do get a bit tetchy when a roaming dog sticks it's head in DD's buggy.
YANBU. I would have moved the dog away by the collar too.