Worried about this XL bully

[brookie26]

We often park our car the back of our house rather than the front as we live on a busy lane. This means our back door is basically our front and we leave through the back majority of the time.

Anyway, today I was leaving my house to pick DC up. There are 2 women walking with an XL bully off the lead. The dog wasn't displaying any aggressive behaviour but I was still really cautious and got in my car quickly.

It turns out the dog lives on the street behind us as it entered via a back gate a few doors down at the bottom of our backstreet.

What worries me is the fact I have a 4 year old who will often run off as soon as we leave the house. I'm forever telling him not to run off in case of cars coming etc but he doesn't listen. I would hate for us to be leaving the house and the dog be there again, off the lead.

Am I worrying about nothing here?

You shouldn’t have a child off lead if you can’t control it

@Fire9636 ok then 😂

This potential xl bully showed no aggression but also showed all the characteristics of an xl bully?

The dog should be on a lead. The kid should be prevented from running out the house for numerous reasons.

Sorry, OP, but I agree with others. Cars are a far bigger danger than a well-behaved, stocky dog.

Yes, the dog should have been on a lead but the child should also have been under control and kept safe.

Wrt kids running up to dogs, my large dog would also react to this, not with aggression but excitement. He has a handle on the back of his harness I can stop him from jumping with but a four-year-old is mouth height on him. Any four-year-old who runs up to him will be licked on the face. I cannot hold my dog and your child.

Are you sure its a bully? Theres a lot of similar looking dogs.
But in the same way that oerson should have their dog on a lead you should have control of your son, not least because of the actual risk of cars

Reins?

If you Google the Spanish rules on dogs it gives you all the information there.

Agreed

There's nothing to say he won't get hit by a bus either but its pretty unlikely if you don't let him run into its path.

Do you usually suffer from extreme anxiety as you seem determined to catastrophise with no actual evidence to support this fear? You aren't even sure its an XL Bully. It may well be a Boxer cross which, as a general rule, are great with children or a dozen other breeds. You have no concrete reason to fear it. It wasn't even misbehaving.

How many dogs have you walked past in your life and how many of those have hurt you? It's just a bloody dog ffs. Get a grip.

Put your child on reins if he refuses to do as he is told and not run off. This dog sounds quite well behaved compared with some.

If it won't be my child, it'll be somebody else's eventually

You're obviously just on the windup. There are thousands of these dogs, the odds of this one attacking someone is miniscule. If you're not on the windup, please seek help for your anxiety issues.

@Bananalanacake they are a fairly modern breed, thought to have been developed late 80's/90's in the US by crossbreeding Pit Bulls with other types of Bull terriers. They didn't really come to the UK until the early/mid 2010's. They are supposed to have been bred to have a better temperament and lower prey drive than Pit Bulls....apparently.

"I let my 4 year old run around but waaaaahhhh theres a big dog that lives near me and minds its own business"

Muscle mass is more of an indicator than weight. Heavily muscled dogs were bred to fight. I never had a problem holding back 25kg of wound up dog when he saw a rabbit. I doubt I could hold back a more muscled breed that was 5kg lighter. That’s why I’m frightened of XL Bullies and some other large bull breeds. I look at their owners and it’s obvious that the vast majority of them couldn’t physically stop their dog if decided to go after mine. On or off lead, it wouldn’t make a difference.

If you're worried then you need to find a way to stop your child running off. If he DID get attacked then you can blame the owners as much as you like, but it wouldn't change the fact that your son had been attacked because you failed to mitigate a risk you'd already identified. I didn't imagine being able to say "I told you so" will make you feel any better than 🤷‍♀️

Well I'd be cautious too. Not many people die of lightning strikes but I still wouldn't stand under a tree in a storm however unlikely it is ( or play golf).

All you can do is be cautious as dog isn't doing anything wrong. There was a xl bully at a pub last week and lots of people squeezing past it to get in. I just went in the side door. I don't really care who was offended because if it was to get stressed or someone stand on its paw, it wouldn't have been me. He looked quite docile but why raje a risk if there's no need?

Just be mindful each time you get in or out the car and keep a grip on your child. I have kids with autism who bolted. We had to get past that or he be under a car.

@Spanne Pardon?

People walking any dog off lead in a residential area / on roads or roadside pavements is a massive red flag to me. I’ve had dogs all my life and I believe in training polite animals, but having them off lead around cars is just stupid and it’s usually only problematic owners who do it. So yes, I’d be concerned - more so than I would be by a bully playing off lead, but under control, in a dog park.

That said, it’s your responsibility to keep your kid safe from running into traffic or up to strange dogs, so I’d focus on strategies to prevent him being far enough away from you that the dog is likely to be a risk to him.

@Spanne No idea what that's supposed to mean.

I would absolutely feel the same, unfortunately I'd take precautions when leaving the house. Ignore the people having a go about your child, having a child not holding your hand in a lane is not worse than having a dog breed, that the government are actively trying to ban, off the lead in a public place.

These people could be non steteotype decent owners who have trained it etc, but they're very powerful animals which sound impossible to get under control should anything go wrong. You're right to be cautious.

Unfortunately of the 3 xl bullies in my area I've seen one lunged at my toddler, the other was been walked by someone smoking a spliff, and the third attacked 2 dogs. I don't know i keep hearing about all these amazing owners that are being persecuted because of the crap ones, but it sounds to me like a combination of shit owners and a creation of a poor frankenstein beast breed.

Evidently. 🤣

@Nc4001 Wtf