To Hershey's Dog-Mom

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

If you're taking your adorable chocolate lab out for a stroll on the bike-path on a lovely Sunday afternoon, please protect your dog and other people using the path and keep him on a leash.

I witnessed an almost-accident at close range as the dog ambled from one side of the path to another, forcing a bicyclist to slam on his brakes and stop hard to avoid hitting him.

He doesn't know any better, he's just a dog, doing what dogs do. You, on the other hand, should.

Comments

[tikva.livejournal.com]

Speaking as a guide dog handler, unleashed dogs are potentially dangerous for me, and I wish folks would be responsible about them. Sure, my dog is trained not to respond to distractions, but she's still a DOG, and a random loose dog coming up to her WILL get her attention. My dog is trying to keep me from getting dead, and loose dogs make that more difficult for her. Plus, your dog may be very well-behaved with people, but it may react differently to my dog, who is wearing strange equipment and has very "alpha" body language. There IS an off-leash dog area in Somerville; it's in Union Square, and we use it all the time - believe me, I'm not unsympathetic to the need to run an energetic dog, but there are places for that.

IOW, IAWTP.

[sparkgrrl658.livejournal.com]

exactly. i do not have a guide dog, rather i am my dog's guide ;)

so when dogs bound up to him and a lot of time they are puppies much larger than he is [a pug] and they bat him or try to play with him. luckily most times i can scoop him up in time but i have two dogs and if i'm carrying something else...well. he has snapped at a few dogs but had they been leashed and with an owner it wouldn't have happened.

it's why people to tell you to pay attention when you drive, it's not usually you they worry about, it's everyone else.