A week gone to the dogs... (1 Viewer)

[Jay H]

What's with all these cat threads?? (If I'm not the Spiderman of the HTF or a fish geek, i'm a cat person myself)

This week, I've had two encounters with dogs, one of the larger variety and one of the itty bitty terrier sized variety, both of odd consequences. Most of the dog walkers I see do leash their dogs and even though it is a trail and not the road, they should be leashed because it is a multiuse trail (not an official railtrail, the state owns the property but it's been general consensus that everybody uses it, including the horse farm I go by all the time, who don't clean up after their stinkin' horses either..)

Tuesday postwork bike ride home... I'm zipping along on my railtrail on my bike, doing a good clip, almost to the end of the trail when along comes this dog walker. I see alot of them around in the warmer months, this guy I think I've seen before. Two larger blackish/brown dogs, nothing too agressive but they seem could be the curious/friendly type. One of them is leashed, the other is not. I continue on my 13-15mph trek, slow down to around 10/11mph and await the result. Well, the dog just takes off away from me, further down the trail in the direction I was headed at. I slow down, the owner sheepishly calls for the dog, dog doesn't care the slightest bit. It's not my problem it's not on a leash, I continue to bike. The dog continues to run further away from me and it's owner. Gets to a road, basically the end of the trail. Almost gets hit by a car, I continue to bike, dog continues to run. And since it's running faster than I am biking cause I continue to slowly bike trying not to scare the dog.

Eventually it's far off as I get to the road much faster than the owner behind me. I can see it has literally freaked out and ran a good 100ft further to another intersection/road. But I turn off before this and never found out what happened. Why the dog wasn't on a leash is beyond me but I can't be responsible for unleashed dog. Do you think if I stopped would the dog have stopped? He eventually just turned tail and ran, much farther than I was even intending to go. He was pacing me for a little bit but then just decided to take off.

Today, on this morning's brisk ride in, it's fall folks up here in the NE, almost pancaked a small terrier. Definitely seen this lady before who is sometimes walking her dog on the trail. This time the dog was unleashed though usually it is. Dog came up to my cranks while I was slowly biking by and had to lock the brakes to keep from making the dog into pancake. Fortunately, the dog did seem to stop once it realized it's impending doom and I continues on, while the owner was apologizing.

Leash your dogs!!! Dogs sometimes like to stick their little noses into shiny flashing things, like a bicycle spokes... Not a good result for fido!

Jay

 

[John Chow]

Well, I definitely agree with your main point of how dogs should be leashed. However, would it really have inconvenienced you that much to stop and let the owner regain control of his dog? I'm not absolutely sure from your post, but it appears the dog was initially chasing/following you, and then later just took off? Sure the owner was an idiot and didn't leash his dog, but as you mentioned the dog could have very easily been killed by a car. It's like watching a woman lose control of her baby stroller going down a hill and not even trying to give her a hand.

 

[Jay H]

No, it never chased me at all. It kind of looked at me and then immediate turned tail and slowing pace himself farther away. At this point, the dog was already a good 50/75 feet from it's owner. I stopped momentarily at one point but I wasn't going to sit there and wait for the owner to get the dog as he was already holding the other one. He initially didn't seem to concerned about it and I didn't have time to stand there waiting for him to go fetch his dog.
Usually, IME, most dogs who don't go to chase you wont seem to care that you're around, I haven't seen that many dogs that will actually run from you the way this guy did.
Jay

 

[Paul D Young]

This one could get complicated.

Although I think it would have been nice of you to help the person regain control of the dog, I don't think it was your responsibility. When I'm walking my (leashed) dog we are more likely to get followed by dogs that are curious about him. I like it and we'll usually stop to play. Two times in the last year, I had to return dogs back to their homes as they were loose.

One time the same thing happened to me but with a small boy. He just started following us asking about a million stupid questions. The last stupid question was "Am I going to get lost?" I told him, "I don't know" and he finally turned around and went back (presumably) toward home. Later on I found out that before he got home he stopped by my neighbors' house and walked INSIDE without permission. The owner had to chase him around the house in order to physically remove him from the property because he would not leave.

I guess even young children can lose their minds.

Anyway, if the subject is "leash your dogs" then I am off topic and I apologize. But if the topic is "being followed by unexpected people/animals and your responsibilities to them," then there you go.

 

[Steve Schaffer]

Legally you weren't responsible, the dog wasn't leashed as he should have been.

That being said, the dog was running away from you and you were between it and it's owner. It seems the dog may have been frightened by you or the bike and wasn't about to double back and pass you to get back to it's owner.

I know you take your riding very seriously having read other posts in other threads regarding it. And it is dogowner's responsibility to leash their animals. But not everyone is perfect all the time or as courteous and considerate as you are, so sometimes it might be a good idea to go ahead and slacken one's pace or even stop long enough for these people to regain control of their animals, perhaps mentionning to them that leashing their dogs would prevent future chances of them getting injured.

I know you'd be pretty upset if someone made little or no effort to avoid endangering one of your kittys if it were to somehow get into the street.

If I were you I'd be a lot more upset about all that slippery horse stuff!!

There is a leash law in my town, and I always have my smallish dog on a leash with a ziploc bag and some paper towels in a back pocket for cleaning up after her. Unfortunately on more than one occasion I've had to reel her in quickly and pick her up to protect her from loose pitbulls. Hope you never encounter one of those on your bike!