in 14 years of having my old girl i think i only ever had one or two rude encounters, probably because her walks were on the short side bc of her disabilities but man. in the 2.5 months i've had my current dog i've met some of the most insufferable dog owners and i'm here to bitch and rant about them

so my dog is very high energy but even tho i live in an apartment in a major city we make it work! we walk 10-15 km daily and i got lucky in that i have a very beautiful wooded area close to where i live. or would be if i didn't fucking hate like half the regulars holy fucking shit

this place is full of people walking their dogs. including off leash. which i'm fine with! i definitely want to be able to walk whiskey off leash eventually too which is what i'm working on with the trainer! but since i'm not a jackass i don't let him off leash yet because his recall isn't quite there yet and he does lunge at dogs (bc he wants to play with every dog™ even when they're visibly uncomfortable/aggressive)

so anyway quite a few of the regulars there try to make me feel bad about it???? wow i didn't know this city was suddenly full of dog training experts some of the absolutely delightful things i've been told include:

'if you keep him leashed he'll get attacked' (which happened and is my fault somehow i guess) 'he's unhappy leashed' 'the longer you keep him leashed the harder it'll be to train him' 'mine doesn't listen to me and i let her off-leash' 'if he runs away he'll come back eventually' 'you shouldn't take your dog here on a leash' (for the record this is literally a nature reserve not a dog park)

and wanna know what?? my dog actually has been attacked there

first time was a jack russell who bit down on his foot and held down. the wound swelled and had to go on antibiotics for it. the owner says her dog is 'only aggressive towards leashed dogs' which begs the question, fucking leash him??? train him???? cherry on top too this dumb bitch actually had a dog get killed in those same woods before so like. big yikes

second time was a setter but thankfully it was just a quick bite but still like.......... you could have leashed him ma'am like this dog was VERY clearly staring at mine and showing aggressive behaviour and the walker just shouted over at my behaviourist who had a long line in hand (since we were working with him in the woods) something like 'hit him with that' nobody is going to hit your dog what the fuck??? train him yourself??? leash him???

honestly i'm so fucking done i only walk him in the more secluded area in the morning since the regulars pop out in the evening. only person i've ran into multiple times with an aggressive dog leashes him when we walk by so it's nbd very early morning/late night isn't an option because of wild boars. haven't run into any yet but i don't wanna take any chances ; ____ ;

it's so frustrating because there are some lovely dogs and people there! and whiskey has friends! but his safety is my main concern and i'm not gonna walk him somewhere i can't be sure he'll be safe

at least i got lucky in that he LOVES public transit so taking him on busses/trains to other big parks is doable if a little inconvenient because man these woods are literally a 10 minute walk and so pretty orz

so anyway tell me about your shitty dog walking experiences let's laugh at assholes together

tl;dr irresponsible dog owners walk untrained/aggressive dogs off leash, their dogs attack mine but somehow i'm the one at fault. basically can't walk my dog in the nicest/nearest place to me anymore because of this and i'm very salty

Wow, that's awful!
I also walk my dog on a leash, originally because he loved to chase squirrels and would come back when he felt like it. Now, he's 13 years old, and getting cataracts, so I use the leash to guide him and make sure he doesn't walk into anything. He has been bitten by a pair of off-leash dogs, who were like half a mile ahead of their owners. I tried to keep my dog calm as he was suddenly surrounded by 2 much larger, intense dogs, and my dog was clearly uncomfortable but there was nothing I could do about it because the other dogs' owners were nowhere nearby. Fortunately the bite healed up, but since then, my dog has been even more touchy about other dogs. Meanwhile the people who weren't supervising their dogs just went on their way like nothing happened. Grr.

I'm very sorry that happened to you and your dog.. the fact that people don't learn well really scares me.

It's been a long time since I've owned a dog. Depending on how well trained the dog is, I'd say it's okay to keep them off of the leash. Every dog is different, so please keep them on a leash if you don't know what they could do. I've personally never had this problem before, but I'm scared it'll happen to me someday.

I'm a dog walker and I hear this shit so much it literally enrages me. People in my city think that leash laws also don't apply to them and their dogs can just run willy-nilly all over the friggin' place whenever they feel like it. Also the amount of people I've had get peeved with me because their dog wants to follow my pack at the park when we're all off leash is ridiculous. Like, it's not my fault your dog has no recall against distractions - you own a leash, use it.

Thankfully, I can count my really bad experiences on one hand and I've been a dog walker for almost 6 years, and most of the time the people I meet are really nice, and I've met some great people, dogs and clients that way.

I'm sorry you've had garbage experiences though, but there will always be entitled owners who think that they and their dog are above the law. I'm not sure what your pet/off leash laws/rules are where you live but here if an on leash dog gets attacked by an off leash dog 9/10 it's automatically the fault of the off leash dog for being out of control. But yeah, how dare you want to have your dog trained before letting him off leash, god lol

"mine doesn't listen to me and i let her off-leash' -MOST irresponsible comment i could read! I hear what you say 100% and i'm a cat person with currently 3 cats. Back in '14 we had a puppy for only 9 months, because she was high energy. Taking her out on a walk was nice though, as i would get to work out a bit (more than i usually do, which is not at all, lol).

i don't recall any encounter with irresponsible dog owners, if anything, i was one of them for not trying harder to train her :( i remember this one time, she grabbed the marking outlining the bike lane and she wanted to continue walking with it in her mouth! It was hilarious XDD Said marking was some type of canvas? glued to the sidewalk. it time, it came undone here and there, and if you tried hard enough, you could peel it off. it was a piece of cake for our puppy to do that. XDD

Our oldest cat, now 11 years old, is named Whiskey XDD i hope yours gets to live a long and happy life!

oh my god what assholes!! that really sucks ;; it's so sad when experiences like that negatively affect dogs, i'm so thankful mine didn't become reactive/develop fears

absolutely agree tbh! i used to leave my old girl off leash in parks but she was old and had trouble walking (hip dysplasia + arthritis) and was also happy to just lie in the grass and chill so i felt pretty safe my current dog's training is coming along super well but we're not at the point where he'll come when i recall if he sees a dog so no off-leash walks for him yet lmao

hhh don't even talk to me about leash laws nobody gives a shit about them here orz

but also lmao what?? why tf would someone get angry at you because their own dogs get distracted.......... but i'm glad you haven't had many bad experiences!! mad respect for being a dog walker tho omg i get exhausted just walking one lmao

omg that sounds really cute tho even if kinda chaotic asdfghjkl

i love puppies but i absolutely don't have the energy for one lmao that's why i wanted an adult dog, even if training is harder (also bc he had 0 training prior and also i have no idea what his life was like before being abandoned) though he was already house trained? which was a nice surprise haha

hell yeah another whiskey!! i hope your cat also gets many more happy years c:

She was chaotic indeed! One time, we asked my MIL if she could take the puppy for a few days, so we could go on a short vacation. She agreed as she had a dog before and she likes dogs.

When wee go take the puppy back, MIL informs us the puppy just walked or ran through the house, and without even stopping what she was doing, just took a bite off of this monstera plant XDD TT__TT At a different time, we came home, and i found she chewed on this cream i was using for my back pain along with a pair of my undies -however she found them i have no idea. I think she liked both and she was completely fine too. She was unstoppable.

Even MIL said the puppy was TOO much! MIL's previous dog was not trained (in any shape or form) but was also not this high energy, despite being a hunting type of dog. And as she grew older, she calmed down even more, as you can imagine. MIL was not prepared for the hyper active puppy i found on the street.

in the end, we found her a family with a yard, so with plenty of space to run and burn all that energy. The family also had a couple more dogs, as play mates for the puppy. we were informed that the puppy completely annihilated their garden with eggplants and whatever else they planted... in just 1 night.... u.u

Thank you for the good wishes! <3

Yeeeahhhh I'd be that bitch who retorts back to their comments is a passive aggressive way. That or call the part that watches for leash violations to go visit that area and issue tickets 🤷‍♀️ Like NONE of this is called for unless YOUR dog hurt theirs. And as for the jack Russell incident I'd have demanded that ladies info to charge her the vet fees. Jack Russell's are known for biting in a never let go manner, thats why they make great dogs for hunting or retrieving small game and DON'T really belong in a city without activities that fulfill that breeds instinct. Which is why they get reported higher for bites. Those who say it'll be harder to get him trained off leash if you keep him on it can shove it. You can train any animal to do a variety of things at any age. My cat for example when he was 5 years old I was told "You can't teach him anything, he's too old and won't understand". So I started using the phrase PIG PIG for when I wanted to share a bite of ham or bacon with him. It took a few months and it worked! So now I can say ham or bacon and he just walks around uninterested. But the MOMENT I say PIG PIG, zoom he's right there waiting for his bite. And he's 15 almost 16 now. If a cat can be trained so can a dog.