aibu to expect people to respect my nervous and shy rescue dog on her dog walk by recalling your dog from approaching us?

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Went on a lovely river walk today. DDog is very shy and nervous and doesnt really enjoy her street walks although we do these twice a day to help her get used to all the new noise.

Weekends we have time to walk along the river on her long lead, she gets to go in front and ahead. She is a major sniffer so I always catch her up quickly, she really enjoys the river walk and so do I.

Today, out of no where runs a dog straight towards us with no owner in view. I'll admit I panicked due to not seeing an owner and ended up picking my girl up (not a small breed) and putting my back to this dog. Not sure if that was the right thing to do but that's what I did. Owner eventually came along, failed to recall multi times and wasn't bothered at all.

We went our separate ways and enjoyed the rest of a walk only to encounter them again. And again the dog legged it to us. By now I'm thinking it's a friendly dog and my DDog is ok but doesn't like to be rushed in to meeting new friends. AIBU to think this is just rude and if you can't recall your dog they should be on a long lead at the least?

I spoke to the owner and told him to sort his re call out and get his dog on a long lead but he just said his dog is friendly and happy!

It really nerves me, did I do the right thing by picking my girl up. We live the river weekend walk but I can't cope with that every weekend, any tips?

Glad it's not just me Loup, my two are well behaved, well socialised, friendly dogs but they are bull breeds and I'm very aware other dogs could well come off worst should there be a fight.

Other dog owners can't fail to know that too with the amount of bad publicity they get which is why I'm so bemused by people who allow their dogs to bound up to mine (who I will have leaded the second I saw the other dog coming) and often display some quite confrontational behaviour towards dogs they have no idea about the temperament of.

My dogs are fortunately pretty bomb proof and have never been reactive as yet but I can't guarantee there won't be some doggy clash of personality which causes them to do something out of character one day. My dogs could do some serious damage if they wanted to and I do everything possible to ensure others safety but I can't mitigate for other people not controlling their dogs and I know mine would be blamed despite them being on leads and more under control than the loose dog whose owner has allowed it to approach mine.

I just don't get why they would take the risk, especially when bull breeds have been demonised to the extent they have, are they not concerned about their own dogs' safety and if not why do they even have a dog?

I don't care whether other dogs are on leads or not, only whether they are under control.

If your dog has reliable recall, or it will obey commands such as sit or stay from a distance - and if you are paying good attention to possible interactions (whether with other dogs, people or wildlife) then by all means let them have their run/sniff about or whatever.

I agree with a PP that if your dog was ahead of you on a long lead that would not have been obvious to the approaching dog (owner). We also encounter a nervous dog with shouty owner. Yesterday her dog was off lead as mine was. It gave me great pleasure to turn on heel and ask my dog to come too. She did.

No Hiding definitely not just you. My dog is very well trained, she was specially chosen for temperament and then professionally trained in personal protection and to be my assistance dog, and she was put through her paces extensively by police dog trainers in the country we used to live in to check she could do what I needed her to do before she came to us.
She's amazing, sweet, placid and gentle, extremely tolerant and generally completely bombproof, but if she felt another dog was threatening DS or I, she would react.
On the one occasion she has snarled at another dog (when the dog snarled and lunged at me), the other owners have been very abusive to me. She's a Doberman and she's unusually big for the breed, and some people see a dog of a certain type and judge

My Ddog wasn't ahead of me. I only let her do that when I can't see anyone around and she is a sniffer so never gets any real distance ahead.

We went back again today armed with all the great ideas in this thread and saw the same dog again. I wasn't fussed as at least this time I knew it was with an owner even if I couldn't see them yet. I put my girl on one side of me along the sea wall and carried on walking with the dog belting towards us. I did the chatty tinkery voice some one mentioned up thread and as soon as I spotted the owner I called out and asked them to recall their dog which they couldn't do but we just kept walking and I threw a few very mature dirty looks the owners way

I don't want to stop going just because of one owner, we had a lovely walk and she said hello to lots of people and pets today, she is making really good progress and much prefers this walk to a noisy road one which we do in the mornings.

I hate dogs running up to my dog, how do I know whether it is going to be friendly or not. My Sheltie is often leapt on by friendly dogs who apparently 'just want to play'.

Yes FiveShelties, its blinking annoying having that friendly just wants to play dog bouncing on my dogs knocking them flying apparently this is all ok as they 'just want to play' my dog has had operations on both his knees and he doesn't need an out of control flabrador flattening him grrr, I love dog but hate their owners.

Oh and to the poster that I can't remember your name complaint about someone having the audacity to walk her on lead nervous dog in a field, well how very dare she, I mean honestly, how incredibly selfish is she to disrupt your walk - oh and that was typed with a bucket load of sarcasm incase you missed it.

That's really great to hear OP, sounds like you're making good progress. Keep at it and try not to let the nasty fleabags of the non canine variety get you down

She really does love this walk, if I think back to 6 months ago we would walk on the road and she would spook, spin in circles, try to bolt and refuse to walk. Many times we only got to the end of our road in 20 minutes with her shaking and bolting now, after lots of patience she is trotting along, sniffing till her heart is content, so lovely to see.

We met a very bouncy puppy today, it jumped and bounced so much it kept falling over, my girl let the puppy have its excited time for 5 seconds, looked at me and trotted off

Awww bless her poor girl, she sounds really lovely. I used to have rescue dogs and seeing them grow and thrive and start enjoying even the most basic things was amazing. It sounds like you're doing a fantastic job

Thank you Loup I feel Ddog is doing a great job and I'm here to help her along.

Next step is to get her near enough to the waters edge to feel the water, she will happily watch others bounding around but gives me the WTF look when I try to coax her in

Bless her. Have you tried a paddling pool? Is it warm enough in the UK for one yet? I did that with one of my dogs who was wtf about water and after that there was no stopping him - not always a good thing!
My dog is very aloof about water but loves getting in the bath with DS when he invites her in - always when DH is supervising bath time, never on my watch!

We are known round here and tend to go at quiet times, so avoid most issues. When we had a friendly dog, we never thought to recall when we saw other dogs. It's only since we had a nervous dog that we are far more aware and wary.

Other owners might be lacking in empathy if they have never had a nervy/fear aggressive dog and can get very arsey about being asked to recall. I've heard the 'My dog is friendly' mantra so many times! Yes, mine, however, is bloody not!

Focus your dog with a strong recall/treats and head trouble off by walking away where possible. As mentioned, don't pick up your dog, you'll make her worse.

Next step is to get her near enough to the waters edge to feel the water, she will happily watch others bounding around but gives me the WTF look when I try to coax her in 

That's completely within the range of normal dog behaviour - lots of dogs are WTF about water. Mine will stoically cross streams when necessary but definitely prefers keeping his paws dry!