An open letter.

[theweaselking]

Dear owner of the snausage-with-legs that attacked Piper:

Your pug has been returned in one piece because my dog, unlike yours, responds to voice control and knows that I am allowed to take food away from her.

By "food", of course, I mean "your dog, after it bit her".

Piper now gives me this look because I took her squeaky wriggling meat toy away:



Obedience and socialisation training: Just because I *can* grab your dog and chuck it like a football does not mean I should have to.

No love,
Me.

(For the record: No harm done, to either participant. Defective fuzzy rat-creature returned to apologetic owner. Piper now distracted by The Mystery Of Is There A Squirrel and once again all is right in her mayonnaise-witted little doggy world.)

Comments

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

I hate it when owners of ratty type dogs believe their little balls of toothy fluff don't need training. Just because I can punt said fluff over the wall doesn't mean I want to have a little buzzing ball of teeth nipping at my ankles

There's a theme that bigger dogs are gentler, but I wonder if that's just because their owners are more careful about training them

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Big dogs really do tend to be gentler, because they are smarter, and because an aggressive large dog does not get allowed to breed - but mostly it's training.

[senorcameltoe.livejournal.com]

This article seems like it fits right in here (the study isn't your typical list of dobies, rotts, etc.):
http://www.k9magazine.org/most-aggressive-dog-breeds/

Unsurprisingly, when looking at aggression, the small breeds are taking over. My sense is that it is a combination of zero training plus these "purse dogs" get put into a lot of situations where they are uncomfortable. Several incidents of defensive biting or snapping, followed by the owner reinforcing that behavior instead of correcting it create a pattern. Of course, I'm also not surprised by breed ambassadors or breeders saying, "I've never seen anything like this!" Right, you haven't because you're a responsible dog owner and you properly train your dog. The people you're selling puppies to don't!

On the flip side, however, ill-trained big dogs are downright dangerous. Two weeks back I was walking my 60lb shepherd mix who is a sweet, submissive dog. A 120lb mastiff pushed an unlatched gate open, raced across the street, and tackled my dog. She was just mouthing and showing dominance behavior so no damage was done, but it scared the living shit out of me. I tried and was unable to pull her off my dog as the owner came running over. He is probably a 200lb guy and could barely control his dog. He was very apologetic, offered to pay for a vet visit to make sure everything was ok, and promised to keep better tabs on his gate. He didn't, however, offer to send his dog to obedience training.

The lesson here is that some people are lazy and irresponsible - some of them own big dogs, but I'm guessing more of them own small dogs because they think they require less work.