B****y dogs

That's a very reasoned post Nfk

Help! - the dog lovers are taking over the world!

I start a thread called b****y dogs outlining the horrific experience my DGD had, and everyone starts chatting about their dogs - please no!

You ought to have called it 'b****y dog OWNERS '

still not shouting

Not a dog lover Luckygirl. I have worked in A&E.

What I think we're trying to say Lucky, by giving examples, is that it's not entirely the fault of the dog. Too many people get a specific breed of dog because they like the look of it without thinking through the characteristics of the breed. My parents should never have had a Staffie knowing full well (and why) we wouldn't home her when they died and the dogs home were barmy giving a springer to an elderly couple. Too many people take on energetic dogs, dogs bred as working dogs, dogs which should only really be kept on farms. Any dog can be affectionate and loving - but it will still have the underlying characteristics it was bred with. Be it defending, hunting, scenting, etc. It's time for more pretty, soft mouthed, flop dog breeds!

Dogs have a valued place in society as do cats - and horses, guinea pigs and rabbits! if a pet - any pet - is well integrated and looked after it goes unnoticed. But when it turns vicious or noisy and becomes a problem then all pets become tarred with the same brush. All dogs should be muzzled and kept on leads. All cats should be kept indoors. Horses should only be ridden in their own fields.

I feel for you Lucky. What happened was really REALLY scary. A similar thing happened to me with our eldest DD when she was little - only it was a pony who sucked her entire face into it's mouth! She was luckily unscathed, but it was really scary. It didn't stop her being horse mad though so hopefully there'll be no lasting effects on your DGD. The dog obviously was 'just playing' - but it shouldn't have been loose and should have be introduced and taught how to behave around children as part of it's training. (My mum's dog was afraid of children so she knew to avoid them, leave them alone. Those of us who walked her were always alert to this and made sure she never felt cornered).

It sounds to me like an example of the wrong breed of dog in the wrong hands.

Dogs do a variety of amazing jobs in our society. As already mentioned there are Pets as Therapy dogs, who visit the old and lonely, and help children overcome their fears. There are dogs who act as guide dogs and companions, hearing dogs, sniffer dogs in customs and disaster situations, police dogs, dogs trained to sniff out cancers, and so on.

So all we are doing Lucky is showing the responsible side of dog ownership.

I hope your little GD has had the support she needs to move on from her fright?

We only allowed them to live with us because we found that we both benefitted from it in different ways. I read that, when they realised that whippets weren't as good at hunting as they'd been bred to do, they were used to sleep with the children to keep them warm [because whippets crave any sort of warmth and don't wriggle in bed; they're far too blissfully happy there]. Which is another reason why they were bred for temperament. But I am biased of course. And they can't really be let off lead when there are children around; not that they'd deliberately hurt them but they run so fast they can't stop suddenly and have a habit of running into people [as my knees know only too well].

Aw. Whippets are lovely but I don't know why I like them so much. I once knew a very fat lady who had whippets. Our theory was that she wasn't actually fat it was that she looked huge compared to the wee dogs. Now if she'd had a Newfoundland she'd have looked like Twiggy

She was probably fat because instead of taking them for long walks she just sat on the sofa watching television with them #whichiswotido. They're quite happy doing absolutely nothing#mykindofdog

So a whippet cross dachund - the perfect family pet!

Luckygirl: I used to be a dog-lover, but now feel like you do about them.
What happened to your GD was really awful, but is the sort of thing that is just so common now. I do hope that she eventually overcomes the fear that the incident caused.

My own 2-year-old GC will not walk down our front path now because she is terrified of the neighbours' dogs. They have three of them, and they go crazy ever time anyone or anything moves out there.

Even though I'm not afraid of dogs, they have given me quite a shock on many occasions - I can be mowing the lawn when all of a sudden, seemingly from nowhere, one will shoot across the gravel and throw itself at the chainlink fence inches from me, barking furiously.
Even for me, this is scary, so I can well imagine the fear felt by DG.
The owners' response whenever the dogs do this is to come to the door and shout at the dogs to shut up, for all the good that does. Though when they reacted like this to a friend of ours as she walked up our path, the neighbour blamed her, saying that she was making them nervous!

Then there is the smell of their muck! It's rarely, if ever, cleared up, so the smell in warm weather is awful. Even if the dogs were well behaved, we couldn't sit or play with the GC in our garden because of that.

Things are no better when I'm out and about. Almost without fail, if a dog comes within reach of me, it will jump up on me with its muddy feet and try to lick my face, or worse, while the owner either ignores it or utters those infuriating words about it 'just being friendly'.

Grrrr!

Oh dear Mamacaz, where do you live? Around here the vast majority of dogs are well behaved. They get used to being pretty much ignored when out on a lead and just sit or stand waiting patiently for their owner to stop chatting. I can't remember the last time a dog jumped up at me. Perhaps it's a country /city thing.

Mamacaz I think anyone would find that situation awful. Your neighbours sound a nightmare. The worst people seem to have the worst dogs. As usual the thread running through this seems to be inconsiderate (stupid?) people!

Perhaps it's time an animal organisation such as the RSPCA did an advertising campaign to make more people aware of dog training. And there hasn't been a dog training series on TV for ages. Too many cooking /gardening programmes. I thought it was common knowledge nowadays that by shouting at dogs for barking only makes them worse. In their minds you're barking with them! Your neighbours sound awful - and as for not clearing up the mess - yuk! Perhaps a quiet anonymous word to environmental health? Their other neighbours must be suffering too.

B****y irresponsible owners again. Dogs can't pick up their own droppings and I'm betting they never get taken out on good, long walks regularly.

Have you tried contacting Environmental Health over the smell?

We are the only neighbours who share a boundary with their property, Dumpling (they are in an end terrace), so I don't know if the other neighbours are affected by the smell, though they can't fail to be aware of the noise problem.
In fact, these neighbours have been told on several occasions to clean up their act, so to speak, but they are experts in sob stories and knowing how to do the minimum that will get the powers that be off their backs again and normal disorder resumed.

For reasons that I won't go in to here - we could write a book on it - we are on very poor terms with them, barely acknowledging each other unless absolutely necessary. Despite that, DH plucked up the courage a few weeks ago to ask them, very nicely, if they would mind clearing up the mess in the back garden, explaining that now the weather was warmer, it was starting to smell a bit. To our surprise, within an hour one of them had cleared some of it. Trouble is, "some" was where it ended, so the problem didn't go away and the 'some' was soon replaced by a lot more. We've lived here long enough now to know that nothing is ever going to improve where they are concerned.

It's not just our neighbours' dogs that are a problem, though. On three or four occasions over the last year, we've been on a beach, and loose dogs have come racing over and relieved themselves on our belongings or tried to get at sandwiches in our bags, while their owners have either tried in vain (from the distance) to call their dogs back, or simply turned a blind eye.
Yes, it's the owners who are really to blame, not the dogs, but knowing that really doesn't make the end result the slightest bit less unpleasant.

Right, rant over - I'll go and have another cuppa and keep my head down now

You are perfectly entitled to a rant. What a rotten situation!

As a dog-hater, even I do not blame the dogs. They are not naturally adapted to living in a human civilisation, and it is entirely the fault of humans that there is this obsession with trying to make them do it.

It is just a power trip. I watched a woman in the street yesterday - her dog was leaping about and she eventually succeeded in making him sit. The look of satisfaction on her face and the look of total dejection in the dog's body language said it all - she had enjoyed wielding the power and he had suffered though his natural instincts being thwarted.

Without human intervention this dog would probably not even have existed - it was one of those inbred artefacts that bore some resemblance to a dog.

Al the dog owners who emphasis the need for training are missing the point - the dog is in the wrong place to start with. Dogs are not meant to live in houses.

"through"

Well they have had millenia to domestic them as have cats luckygirl - and we've mostly stopped living in caves.

I saw a little girl yesterday (aged about 11) taking one of those huge mastiff type dogs for a walk. I worried for the child. The dog had big powerful jaws and if it decided to 'turn' the child, and anyone else around would have had no chance.

Are cats domesticated? They just grab food where it is on offer - and even if it isn't they hunt, which is what they were meant to do.

We'll have to agree to disagree, Luckygirl. Tens of thousands of years ago, a variant of the grey wolf developed/evolved that learned to scavenge around humans and become sociable, helping humans and receiving food and shelter in return. They now bear no resemblance to wild animals, nor to wolves, and are domestic dogs in their own right, with great variation. Training has to be done in a way that allows a dog to be itself and fit in with humans, in the same way that we have to be socialised in order to comply with society. More is being understood about dog behaviour and regarding them as pack animals that have a pecking order like wolves does not apply to domestic dogs. Dog-lovers who study and understand canine behaviour are not misguided people who are trying to fit a round peg into a square hole - most sensible, responsible dog-lovers appreciate the dogginess of their companions, as do their dogs appreciate the humanity of the people they live with. A truly wild dog would disappear at the first opportunity as soon as it was let off the lead, not wait patiently on the doorstep till the human got back home. Animals evolve - we don't bear any resemblance to the first humans and dogs aren't wolves.

Try telling my dogs they're not meant to live in the house