As I lay in bed this morning I can hear the tell tale sounds of footsteps behind my back fence. My husband was up first and let Jessie out; she is doing her run around and the sound of her ID tag is obviously stirring some interest from behind. The dog who is behind my fence is one of the boxer girls that went after Luke about a year ago. Not friendly in the least. My protective Mother instinct is kicked into gear and I listen. The dogs have never cover over the fence, yet.
Protective instinct is strong in many of us and I for one am like a Mother Grizzly should you happen to cross one of my family members and that includes my dogs. When my guys were all young I was protective, always watching to see who was coming but now I'm on overdrive. One wrong bump could be all that it takes to break a leg or worse.
We have had several incidents over the years that sort of make you very cautious. A charging and or raging dog is no fun for anyone and we've had to deal with a few. The first was a dog that ran out of an open garage door as we walked by; it latched onto my Airedale and shook her like a rag doll. Another was a dog who continually charged us coming out of her garage door as we walked by; this dog was eventually euthanized due to biting several people. There was the dog that went after Tilley just a few weeks ago. A 4 month old puppy that went charged after Jessie; it was twice her size and grabbed hold of her neck and wouldn't let go. There have been others but these are the few that come to mind earlier this morning.
All it takes is one incident like any of these to pop you into protection mode. It is always good to be aware of your surroundings; including when you are out with your dog. You can much better deal with an issue when you know it's coming versus being startled by it. It's our job to protect our dogs; I take my job seriously so the sounds of our not friendly neighbor taking interest in Jessie's tags has me up and at it and out to check on the perimeter.
Sherri-How do you recommend dealing with these types of situations? I have been fortunate to never have to have dealt with an attack but my instinct would probably be to get in between a charging dog and my pups - probably not a smart thing so some helpful hints would be great!
ReplyDeleteI completely understand how you feel. If we dont protect our dogs who will? Certainly not the owner of the pointer that pounced on Bella (she was 4 months old) when we were walking down the street or the owner of the GSD that charges out of his yard after Tanzeer. I have to work doubly hard to get my dogs to accept other dogs coming near them because of incidents like these. It angers me that I am so careful that my dogs do not do anything to bother another dog or person yet we have been subjected to ignorant people and their dogs numerous times. I dont know how many times we have heard the words "he's friendly or he just wants to play" used by some fool of an owner while their unleashed dog is trying to accost one of mine. Then they wonder why my dogs start to growl, or bark when their dogs come charging up.
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