Originally Posted by MWF
Originally Posted by Redkop
I always walk my dog down the fields/woods at the end of our road. Most of the time, I never see anyone else down there walking their dogs. If I do - I always put my dog back on the lead immediately, it infuriates me when the other person doesn't and they let their dog run up to mine and 99 times out of a 100 they will say 'It's alright he/she is fine with other dogs' How the fuck would they know that my dog might not be 'fine with other dogs' and could attack theirs and that's the reason why I put mine on the lead
Luckily mine is fine with other dogs, as all she wants to do is play with them, but these sort of irresponsible owners don't know that. Half the time I bet their dogs haven't been trained to come back to the call.
You do sound a very responsible Redkop I wish more dog owners were like you. I personally love dogs to bits but my GF is really scared of bigger ones. When we are out walking in the fields we often cross paths with people who are out walking their dogs and quite a few of those will make sure they have control of their dogs as they pass, which I think is really considerate.
I firmly believe owners are to blame for how their dogs behave. We had 2 German Shepherds before, they were 'rescue dogs' both from totally different backgrounds and both approx 12 months old when we got them. We had the dog GSD first and although he loved all humans, he would have killed another dog given the chance..... at the time we got him, we had 2 small terrier bitches and we weren't aware of his hatred for other dogs, but for some reason he never even snarled at the 2 terriers, whether it was because he was the newbie and he sensed that the smallest Jack Russell was the Alpha dog.... just dunno.
It wasn't until we started to take him for walks we learned about his hatred for other dogs, once we did, he was always muzzled when we took him out, we had him for 11 years, we were able to control his aggression so he didn't need a muzzle, but we were never able to totally cure it.
When we got the 12 month old rescue GSD bitch about a year later, on their first meeting they flew at each other, seeing 2 GSDs fight like that was scary and pulling them apart, even scarier.... altho the bitch accepted the 2 terriers with no problem too. We decided to give it a couple more days to see if things would calm down and even had to keep them on their leads indoors. After 2 days it was no better, they only had to look at each and the growling would start, until we took all 4 dogs for a walk in an enclosed field and let all 4 dogs off the lead, the 2 GSDs actually started to play and chase each other. From that moment on they became best pals. The bitch was never sociable with people, she would never approach anyone at all if they visited the house and was always suspicious of everyone. Not having had these dogs from puppies and later finding out their history, we understood why they were like they were.
The GSD I have now, I got her at 8 weeks old and she is proof of what a GSD can be like, a happy-go-lucky, friendly dog, if trained properly by a responsible owner.