Good news! Since my last post – the off-leash dogs have been on-leash each time I’ve seen them. Even though I wish it had been unnecessary, seems my threat to call the cops worked.
Thank you to everyone who wrote about your experiences with off-leash dogs. Between practice, real life, and the petverse, I collected some great stories and resources.
Here are three stories/trends that especially stuck with me:
1. We visited friends for the holidays and they occasionally let their dog off-leash in the front yard. This slow-moving older dog was easy-going and seemed to have no desire to be more than 5 yards from the house.
Still, I’m a woman with a cause, right?
I felt like I should say something.
It was really hard to find a way to say they should do things differently without feeling confrontational or judgmental. It was especially hard because they are otherwise amazing pet owners, devoted to seeing this dog through several serious medical issues. I just couldn’t come up with an argument that would seem kind and reasonable. I wimped out.
It made me realize how difficult it can be to provide positive pet peer pressure.
It also helped me see why from a pet owner’s perspective having your pet off-leash may seem low-risk. After having a dog off-leash 100 times without a problem, it’s hard to believe something bad could happen.
2. A patient of mine is dog-aggressive. So, her owner makes sure to always keep her ON leash. The other day, someone from across the street let their well-behaved dog OFF leash. That dog approached my patient in a friendly way, but because she is aggressive – there was a huge dogfight.
This showed me that no matter how wonderful your dog is – the leash protects your dog from the world, just as much as it protects the world from your dog.
This incident could also get my patient branded a “dangerous dog”. If it happened a second time, a court could order her to be euthanized. Her owner was trying to keep her and everyone else safe, yet a perfectly friendly off-leash dog could have effectively killed her.
3. There was a curious pattern to the stories. Whenever I remembered to ask – the problem dog wasn’t the only off-leash dog in the neighborhood. This is true in my neighborhood. Another family only a couple of houses down lets their dog off leash too.
This made me wonder about the role of bad examples in off-leash behavior. Even if your pet is dependable off leash, not following leash laws may encourage your less pet-savvy neighbors to flout them too.
I’m working on bringing these and other stories together into the set of resources I promised on 1) promoting leashing and 2) what to do if you encounter an off-leash dog and 3) how to keep your dog from accidentally getting off leash.
Stay tuned!
I went hiking yesterday and met with 30 dogs on the trail. All but three were off-leash. Half of the people were kind enough to leash their dogs, or hold onto their collar, to pass us when they saw me step off the trail and body-block my dogs. Chester and Gretel are not aggressive per se but when they are leashed and are approached quickly by an off-leash dog, all bets are off. I feel for your client.
We were hiking in a new area so I thought that perhaps leashes were not required on this trail. It turns out they are though. People just choose to ignore it. I find it really frustrating but I have leash reactive dogs and am a rule-follower. I just think you’re right, keeping your dog keeps both dogs safe. I don’t know why that simple little thing is so hard for some people.
Well and I wonder how many people assume that dogs are allowed off leash after seeing 90% of the other dogs off leash on the trail. Just out of curiosity, once you found out dogs were supposed to be on-leash did you say anything to people who weren’t following the rules? Even I find it really hard to do and am trying to find ways and words for us to be able to encourage people to put their dogs on leash.
I’m curious what you would like your clients, and other dog owners, to do when they own medium to large dogs with large exercise needs that cannot be met in their own yards. Not all of them are good dog park candidates because they don’t suffer fools gladly, especially in smaller dog parks where moving away is hard to do. For example, many herding breeds have a larger personal space “bubble” than, say, sporting breeds and will react to what the sporting breed dog regards as a normal greeting. Throwing a ball or a frisbee in a dog park can also be an invitation to mayhem and/or fighting.
For example, I run my dogs off-lead in local parks. I go at times when there are fewer people and dogs in the parks. My dogs are trained from puppyhood to ignore other dogs and people who are not interfering with them, and I call them to me when we see dogs/people I don’t recognize as dogs/people we know to be friendly. My backyard is 50’x75′, so my dogs can barely get to full speed before they have to start slowing — frisbee or ball in the backyard is not an option. I cannot run anywhere near their maximum speed, and I surely cannot meet their ability to change direction at high speed. They are herding breeds and not fond of strange dogs running up to them at high speed or trying to wrestle with them, although they wrestle with each other and their friends. They are not good dog park dogs due to their larger personal space needs and preference for an orderly society.
Short of moving to “the country” with multiple fenced acres, a solution that would probably lead to other socialization issues for herding dogs who need to maintain awareness that other people and dogs exist and are a normal part of life, I don’t see a way to exercise my dogs safely outside of running them off-leash in parks. Getting smaller dogs with lower exercise needs would not meet my needs for a dog.
In short, I believe it’s possible to be a responsible rule-breaker when it comes to off-leash dogs. And, yeah, I have had my share of uncomfortable interactions with other off-leash dogs and their owners. I want people to be responsible, not legislated.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read and respond with such a well thought out comment.
We take calculated risks every day as pet owners, don’t we? I have to acknowledge that every day as a veterinarian. Giving a dog steak from the table might give them pancreatitis which is astoundingly painful and can be deadly. Is that going to happen all or even most of the time? No. As pet owners we get to decide whether we want to take those kinds of risks when it comes to our dog’s health and safety. So I get where you’re coming from – this seems like another educated risk.
However, I get concerned when the risks we choose to take effect the health and safety of others. Laws exist for people’s protection, especially the protection of our individual rights. Having dogs is a privilege, *not* a right, and I don’t believe it’s fair for our dogs to interfere with the health, safety, and mental well-being of others. That includes not leaving our dogs poop on the ground and not forcing the fear and worries associated with encountering an off-leash dog onto people unexpectedly. As you were saying, you’ve encountered uncomfortable interactions with other off-leash dogs and owners, so you know how that can feel.
Getting exercise for large and high energy dogs can be a struggle and all pet owners should consider how they are going to provide for a pet’s physical and mental exercise prior to getting any kind of pet.
My main concern is that I think it is unreasonable for us to expect people to responsibly gauge their own pet’s level of safety off-leash. People will inevitably overestimate how much control they have over their dogs and in what situations they have control over their dogs. I don’t imagine when you had uncomfortable interactions with other off-leash dogs that those owners thought they were being irresponsible.
A good friend of mine told me about their leash laws in Fort Collins, Colorado, which I thought struck a fair balance. There there was an independent group that provided off-leash licenses for dogs based on completing certain training tests. Being licensed gave dogs the right to be off leash in city parks. This 1) let people know in what situations dogs might be allowed off leash and how to avoid off-leash dogs if they so desired (avoid the city parks) and 2) made sure that dogs that were allowed off-leash were truly adequately trained. If this sounds like a good option to you, I encourage you to work with other dog owners to lobby for this in your hometown.
Dog parks are also not always full of dogs, some dog owners will go to dog parks at hours when there are not other dogs (middle of the day) and give their dog the kind of free running/roaming you are looking for. Dog parks often also have formal or informal groups that force out poorly behaved dogs. Peer pressure can be a powerful force.
While I don’t know of any that exist, I don’t see why it wouldn’t or couldn’t be a good business model to create a “solo” dog park where people could rent a large fenced in or indoor space specifically for their dog for a period of time. Million dollar idea?
Fortunately, there are also lots of other ways for us to get sufficient physical and mental exercise for our dogs. The options are endless – there are dog walkers who specifically offer dog running services (and maybe run faster than we can), dogs can be trained to run on treadmills (allowing faster speeds than people can run), running in a field or park on a long lead, doing stair exercises inside, going swimming (many dog boarding facilities now offer dog swimming pools), renting a fenced-in baseball or soccer field, etc.
There are also tons of dog activities that attract other well behaved dogs to allow our dogs to stay socialized but not “to suffer fools”. While the training classes for many events like agility, frisbee, etc. may have other dogs in them, the “performance” of agility or frisbee is done solo. Working with these groups may give us access to their rental spaces to allow our pet some off lead exercise.
When I work on weight loss plans with my clients I am consistently amazed by the ideas they come up with to exercise their dogs, we are limited only by the power of our own creativity.
Just because we feel like our dogs deserve to run free doesn’t mean that we don’t have reasonable alternatives. We are not entitled to the easier, cheap, illegal alternative of just letting them run free where and when *we* feel it is okay. We don’t have the right to make that decision for the people around us.
You bring up some really valid points and I think we *should* work to create more alternatives for dogs with high energy needs who don’t get along with other dogs. Instead of breaking the law though, let’s focus on creating common sense alternatives and changes to the law that can fill our pets’ needs. Would you be willing to work with me on exploring and potentially compiling a list of alternatives for pet owners and making those kind of options more popular?
I feel for your client with the dog aggressive fur kid. One of my fur kids is also dog aggressive so I have to be super careful where we walk. However, assuming the area where your client was walking has a leash law I fail to see how her dog could be deemed as a “dangerous dog” when she was the only one in that situation following the law. I’m thinking a good attorney could make that go away rather quickly.
That being said it cost money to retain counsel and that is only an after the fact solution anyway. Personally I carry not only a walking stick but pepper spray. I hope I never have to use either but I will do whatever is required to keep your off leash dog away from my on leash dog in order to head off the problem before it starts. Thus far putting my head on a constant swivel and walking at off peak hours have worked for me. I can only hope that I continue to be so lucky.
Exactly, one would hope the legal system would deal with that in the right way, but sometimes thing don’t turn out the way we think we should. Like you said there’s always the $$$ factor.
I hate to say it but I’m sure it’s hard to completely eliminate the stereotypes of breed and big dog/small dog from those kind of determinations : / too.