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The doghouse

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Original poster

Was i wrong to out my foot out to a dog

16 replies

Arren12 · 18/12/2021 12:11

Hi

Had my dog a year. Shes about almost 2. Beautiful friendly soft thing.

9 times out if 10 she will ignore other dogs and recall is good. She had never been off lead or for long walks when we got her.

I'm working on the 1 time out of 10 so if I see dogs near she goes back on lead in to heal. We walk past etc

I have dogs approach her lots. Its annoying because it interferes with training and is confusing for her I suppose.

Anyway today I decided to take charge by blocking approaching dogs and walking past. I gently put my foot out and did not make contact with the dog and made a 'hish' sound. Owner was trying to catch their dog running around us. So I just kept blocking and walking. Owner was a bit taken aback and seemed rather annoyed. They were stood with other owners and their dogs were having an interaction but it was looking too boisterous anyway. One dog was yelping and I really didn't want my dog to get involved. She can get giddy.

As I walked off I did explain that she is friendly but is in training.

I feel like I'm doing something wrong by the reaction of other owners.
What do people think?

Cheers

OP posts:
Cyw2018 · 18/12/2021 12:19

It's great that you're putting such an effort into training your dog, but you seem to also be trying to stop your dog's normal doggy behaviour. They are social animals and if they find a like minded, playful and similar aged dog then being "giddy" and noisy play including playful "yelping" is normal behaviour for a 2 year old dog.

Original poster
Arren12 · 18/12/2021 12:22

@Cyw2018 we do walk with other similar age dogs about 3 or 4 times a week and they all get off lead play its great but I just don't want her approaching everyone

OP posts:
Original poster
Arren12 · 18/12/2021 12:25

If I allow her to approach other dogs and them to approach she has and will go up to on lead dogs at times which is really what I'm trying to stop. I got a trainer in who said dogs should ignore others unless owners allow interaction.

I don't want to be doing wrong by her though now you have said that.

OP posts:
NuffSaidSam · 18/12/2021 12:32

I think maybe talking to the people first would have been more polite? So, just calling out 'we're training at the moment so can't play today' or something, rather than foot out and hishing! The dog walking community are massively friendly in my experience and probably just haven't come across that quite unfriendly behaviour from an owner before.

You sound like a very responsible dog owner though, which is great!

Stressymum1 · 18/12/2021 12:33

You are absolutely doing the right thing! I have a reactive Westie who I keep on a lead around other dogs. I have taken him to a trainer who told me to block other dogs coming in contact with him.
I am absolutely fed up of selfish owners allowing ( or have no control) their dog to come up to him, saying "it's alright, he's friendly"

MacNTosh · 18/12/2021 12:34

No dog should approach yours especially if it’s on the lead. A shocking number of dog owners don’t know this so allow their dogs to come bounding up.

Cyw2018 · 18/12/2021 12:34

Can you try recalling to lead whenever you see another dog, then once she is under control of the other owner is happy to let them play then let her off to have some fun. That way she won't associate the lead with being the thing that ends all her fun.

My dog wouldn't recall within about 200m of our car as he associated it with the end of his walk, I had to break the association by doing a figure of 8 walk passing the car half way.

Cyw2018 · 18/12/2021 12:36

If the other owner" not of"

Original poster
Arren12 · 18/12/2021 12:45

@Cyw2018 I had recalled and put on lead. Then as I approached the group other dogs and already come over quite a distance from owners as they chatted.

They did not have hold of their dogs so couldn't wait for a time to let them off to play as they were already round us then owner came over.

I could have called out before and it probably did look rather strange but I too have been told to block. Thibg is even if I called out the other dogs had already started running over. Il try next time.

OP posts:
Alayalaya · 18/12/2021 12:50

A man shouted at me once for doing this and said I was kicking his dog. I had blocked it with my leg because it was jumping on my dog and then I kicked the air and said “go away”. He got very angry and I said of course I wouldn’t kick a dog on purpose but you shouldn’t be allowing him to attack me.

BoPeeple · 18/12/2021 12:53

@Cyw2018

It's great that you're putting such an effort into training your dog, but you seem to also be trying to stop your dog's normal doggy behaviour. They are social animals and if they find a like minded, playful and similar aged dog then being "giddy" and noisy play including playful "yelping" is normal behaviour for a 2 year old dog.
Hmm. This attitude causes a lot of problems for dogs unfortunately. Dogs should not be allowed to socialise with other dogs they don’t know unless expressly allowed to by their owners. Teaching them this will save you a load of bother and also give you a much lovelier dog. You did absolutely the right thing.

Unfortunately ‘dogs must be socialised’ has become a popular concept over the last few years. Why? They’re not children - they’re pack animals and you are their pack leader.

Floralnomad · 18/12/2021 13:50

You are doing absolutely the right thing , my dog is fine just saying hello and moving on , he never approaches a dog himself but he gets really aggravated if other dogs harass him . Twice in the last week I’ve had to step in to stop other dogs haranguing him and then wait while their owner tries to recover our ball from their errant hound . My dog doesn’t want ‘to play’ , he prefers to play with me .

icedcoffees · 18/12/2021 17:09

You're doing absolutely the right thing - I've had to do this three times this week as people seem to think it's acceptable to let their dogs run up to mine, even when mine is on a short lead, lunging and snarling Hmm

I had to firmly move one with my foot as it just wouldn't stop pestering - the final time (different day) I shouted for the owner to get his dog and he just ignored me and gave me the stink eye Grin

pigsDOfly · 18/12/2021 17:12

'Unfortunately 'dogs must be socialised' has become a popular concept over the last few years.'

I think a lot of the problem with this is what 'socialising' a dog means.

I always understood that socialising a dog meant training it behave well in general situations that it was likely to encounter during its life: how to meet people without jumping up, how to walk past other dogs without reacting, dealing with traffic and crowds, not lunging and so on and so forth.

Now it seems to mean getting your dog used to running around the park with, and meeting and greeting as many other dogs as possible.

pigsDOfly · 18/12/2021 17:14

First line of my pp should be bold, I was quoting BoPeeple

BoPeeple · 19/12/2021 14:38

@pigsDOfly

Exactly. Dogs need to learn good manners as you describe (not jumping up, begging for food etc); they don’t need to be allowed to approach and run around with other dogs. Where the hell did this idea come from?

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