Puppy got sworn at and kicked by a jogger today...

[notimefortv]

she is only little and looks like a teddy bear - Bichon and toy poodle cross - can't even reach your knees if she jumps up.

Walking in woods with a friends and her lab x puppy and 5 children under 5 with us (2 in a buggy and 3 running around). Going a long a path and a jogger is running up - he shakes his head as he passes us as the pups have shown some interest in him - they come back to us but go back up to him when he is further away - he then stops and screams at mine to F Off but she sniffs a bit more so he boots her in the stomach. I couldn't believe it - most people at least give me the chance to say I'm sorry and am training her etc.

He was too far away to say antyhing although some other walkers shouted at him but then off he ran.

Please tell me that I will be more traumatised than the dog? Was in a wood with loads of dog walkers so can't believe it doesn't happen to him all the time.

Had just taken her off the trainng line but quickly put it back on - now need to re-gain my faith in mankind.

"how many bellas are there?"

is this going to be a joke - like how many men to change a lightbulb...

is it two ?
one to pick up the dog and one to kick the jogger....

I threatened to kick a very small dog once. A woman had it on an extendable lead and it was yapping at DS2 and scaring the crap out of him.
"ooh it won't hurt you!" she tutted at the child with no receptive language
"If you don't take that rat away from my son I will drop kick the little fucker over that cross bar" I hinted.

I wonder if she then came on to MN to complain about the dog hating cow

OK. I have thought about it.

Jogger was very unreasonable to kick dog. But OP was unreasonable to let dog off the lead and bother unknown passers by. You never know why passers by may be worried, anxious, aggressive. My DS2 is nearly as big as me and would be huge comapred to puppy but he may well kick out at puppy just because he is so very frightened.

I managed to train my dog without him bothering anyone. My dog - my responsibility.

My puppy weighs 18kg this week and everyone seems to realise he's a puppy.

This vitriol against dogs is pointless. I read the other day that there are more than 20 million pet dogs in Britain, so you might as well get used to them and try to get an eye for which ones are puppies etc, even if you don't much like them. You're going to see them around, and some of them are going to sniff you. Most owners who know their dogs are aggressive keep them on leads. Even dogs who do bite are pretty unlikely to do it without a reason such as fear or pain. So your likelihood of being bitten is much smaller than the likelihood of something else horrible happening, like getting botulism from a restaurant, or being run over by a moron who runs a red light, be in a plane crash or a train crash. There are some horrible dogs around and some stupid owners and shit happens, but in the grand scheme of things there's no special reason to loathe dogs so intensely or to be terrified of them.

But we're not talking about other dogs, we're talking about notimefortv's tiny little teddybear-esque puppy who doesn't even reach your knee when stood on her hind legs and is in no danger of mauling anyone, especially not a grown man.

This isn't a general thread about dogs who may or may not be viscious jumping up at people - the only people who have made it into that sort of thread are the anti-dog owner bashers who think kicking a small animal is acceptable and will use any thread to get their point across about how much dogs annoy them.

lol I can't type properly today (finger was bitten off by evil teddy bear). I meant vicious

but pag, why were you tempted to drop kick the dog? Why not drop-kick the owner? [sort of rhetorical question]

The dog is just behaving in a normal, dog like fashion, it's the owner who is at fault surely, for letting her yappy dog yap away at your frightened son?

If you have issues with how a dog is behaving why not take it up with the human owner who presumably has rather better receptive language and complex higher brain reasoning skills than their dog?

OP shouldnt have let an untrained dog off the lead, what if the jogger fell over your dog and broke a leg? nobody wants a dog running around your ankles when you are out jogging

However, there was no need for him to kick it, but your dog, your responsibility, dont let it wander off next time

Notimefortv, maybe the problem is that your dog is secretly evil and turns into this when approaching joggers

pmsl @ MrsL and ushers her out the door before she gets into trouble

"frequently killed" is just not true. kids getting killed by dogs make headlines - because it's unusual. there are no reliable stats because the incidence is so low they're not worth collating. the nearest thing I can find is an annual figure in the low 20s for the WHOLE of the US and a total figure of 5 in the UK which isn't dated. it's too many, of course it is, and it's utterly tragic and they should not happen. but to say that children are frequently killed by dogs is just nonsense

Stastically I would hazard a guess that parents kill more children than dogs

ooh Edwardian - did I mistakenly give the impression that I did not want to drop kick the owner

I did want to kick her - I really did. Poor old DS2. I had worked for ages to build up his confidence around dog and this incident scared him so much that we were put back about two years.
But she had dog on long extendable lead and I needed to get her to react at that second - which the threat achieved as she reeled him in like a prize salmon

But i should add that whilst it was not the dogs fault that she was the owner, she had managed to bring this little yapping fucker up to be incredibly hostile and aggressive and whilst I can regret that his treatement and her neglect had done that to him, it was like a mouthy teenager - you can blame the parents but the urge to slap remains however your better self knows that you can't and won't. Violence is never the answer but the frisson of imagining him sailing over the post was strangely enjoyable

As someone who is completely petrified of dogs, I have read this thread with interest. I would not advocate kicking a dog (nor any other animal, although I can't say I'm an animal-lover), however if I had been the person approached by the OP's dog, I can honestly say I don't know how I would have reacted.

I am completely nervous of being approached by any dog not on a lead. I know a lot of people have commented that the dog in question was very small, and unlikely to be able to jump up far or cause much damage. But for me, any dog is completely scary - for one thing even a small dog can bite your ankles (and if you don't know much about different breeds you wouldn't know which ones were likely to bite) and for another thing, I find even having a dog snuffling round me freaks me out (even if I knew it wouldn't bite/jump up). So I really don't know how I would have reacted. I would like to think I would have tried to ignore it, but in reality I'm not sure whether I wouldn't have kicked out at it in my panic.

I really think that dogs should not be allowed off the lead in public places unless they are 100% reliable at coming back when called. Obviously with the OP's experience, we don't know whether the jogger was frightened of dogs, or had previously had bad experiences with them. If not, then it was obviously unreasonable of him to kick it. But if he was really scared (and yes, even big blokes can be scared of something small) then I do have some sympathy for him.

I get grown men running up to me everywhere I go.

A simple 'get over it' usually suffices - I do try not to kick them

but in the grand scheme of things there's no special reason to loathe dogs so intensely or to be terrified of them.

Try telling that to my dc who have been chased by 2 dogs on separate occasions.

My ds is terrified of all dogs because of it, puppy or not. If a dog came anywhere near my ds or dd because of past experiences my dh would without doubt give it a kick, he often tells ds he will in order to calm him down when he sees dogs running amok off leads.

So shoot us now.

" "If you don't take that rat away from my son I will drop kick the little fucker over that cross bar" I hinted."

Quote of the week!!!! pagwatch

FimBOW - don't be ridiculous.

We're talking drop kicks, not bullets fgs

Bella you are too funny by half.

I think that many dog-owners underestimate how scared some people can be of dogs. I would not willingly hurt a dog, but if one came close to me (especially if not on a lead) then I would really be in a blind panic.

Now, bella, don't brag!

Grown men never run up to me unless it's to tell me I've dropped something

Goodness me, well I had NO IDEA that there were so many dog hating posters on mn.

I'm still sure there is a sensible middle ground to be found somewhere. Somewhere where people can go out with their children and not expect them to be run after and jumped all over (= dog owners being more responsible and training their dogs properly) but also co-existing in a place where dogs can be let off lead without fear of being kicked if they approach a human.

SoMuchToBits Actually I think people in general don't understand phobias - as in that they are irrational fears, so you can't reason people into not having a phobia - I have a fear of flying and I have lost count at the number of people that tell me I am more likely to die in a car crash - helpful - I think a phobia of dogs is not the same as not liking them though.... some people that have posted on this thread clearly hate dogs - but are not nescessarily phobic... not sure where am going with this tho!

It's true.

Have lost count of the number of times I have tripped over a young, fit chap on my way to the shops.

Blardy nightmare.

A few no dog zones in public areas would be nice, so I could have a peaceful walk with the dc for once.

bella I wanna live where you live