Annoying Beagle encounter

[mimitabby]

Good Work Lisa, that dog will think twice the next time he sees a bicyclist!

[Chile Pepper]

Too funny! I hate dog encounters--there are so many dogs running loose here. I've been known to get off and walk past them, rather than risk an attack on the bike.

Last week on an ascent there was a German shepherd on the right and a pit bull on the left. Neither made a move as I slowly passed them, until a cocker spaniel came flying out of nowhere, yapping at my heels. Then the pit bull decided it had better watch the cocker's back. My scary bellowing didn't do a thing for the dogs, but it did get the owner out of the house.

[pooks]

Hysterical, Lisa! (You ride in hiking boots?)

I've had close encounters with a pit bull, a mastiff and a chihuahua. The only one that decided to attack me was the chihuahua. (Which was scary because he was darting at me too close and I thought I was going to run over him.)

[SouthernBelle]

Lisa, you backing down that beagle is such a funny picture.

A couple of weeks ago I had an encounter with a couple of big dogs. It was the first time I have ever stopped the bike, gotten off and put it between myself and the dog. Since then I got a can of Halt, just for that one dog. Normally I use a milder citrus spray.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Hysterical, Lisa! (You ride in hiking boots?)

Yep, when it's 36 degrees out and snowing i do!

I would not have gone storming back after a german shepard or pitbull hollering like I did, that's for sure....but beagles, labs and goldens seem to respond well to reprimands, at least for me.

[pooks]

Oh yeah, my lab would scare the britches off anybody who only heard him bark, but as soon as they saw he was just a big old goofball lab? They'd know him for the pushover he is.

I've often wondered if he'd defend me. He only seems to be territorial about other dogs and even when I asked a friend who was coming over to bang on the front door and make a lot of racket, and I cowered and acted afraid, Jake just kind of stared at me with his tongue hanging out, tail gently wagging, trying to figure out if there was a game afoot and where was the ball?

[teigyr]

Beagles are so cute but also so difficult to train! Hopefully your intervention worked. Poor dog, it really is bad for owners to not keep the dog fenced, especially if the dog is a runner.

Pooks, you never know. I always would go walk my parents dogs (my favorite activity in the world but unfortunately, I am never in the position to have one of my own!). One of them was a big goofy samoyed. He was impossible to train and acted completely scattered.

One day on a walk, we hiked up a canyon. A man in a truck (wide canyon with off-road potential) drove near me to ask me something. The german shepherd who was well trained sat when I stopped walking. The samoyed actually started walking circles around me. When the guy got closer, the samoyed started doing the circles faster and he started growling. Goofy dog but he was obviously trying to protect me Dogs are pretty intuitive so maybe your dog knew it was a test.

[Mr. Bloom]

'cause she can talk to animals, it's incredible, to chatter with a chimp or chimpanzee!

[divingbiker]

Good Work Lisa, that dog will think twice the next time he sees a bicyclist!

As the owner of two cocker spaniels who HATE bicycles, I doubt that this is true. I have tried for 10 years to sensitize my dogs to bikes, they see me riding mine every day, and still every time we encounter one while out for a walk they freak out. It's quite embarrassing, but I've resigned myself to their bad behavior and I just control them as best I can. Of course, they're never off leash so they're literally "all bark, no bite."

[li10up]

It's quite embarrassing, but I've resigned myself to their bad behavior and I just control them as best I can. Of course, they're never off leash so they're literally "all bark, no bite."

As dog owners we should never resign ourselves to their bad behavior. ALL dogs can be trained...but usually it is the owner that needs the training first in how to train the dog. If I may offer a bit of advice...you must correct the dog's behavior BEFORE the outburst happens. You can see when a dog becomes fixated on something. That's when the correction is needed. A pull of the leash and a verbal correction at that point, done on a CONSISTANT basis, will correct the dog's behavior. Please don't give up. The people they are "attacking" don't know the dogs are "all bark, no bite." I think all dog owners should watch the TV show "Dog Whisper." Cesar Millan is amazing! He really KNOWS dogs! You'll learn a lot from that show. I'm in the process of rehabilitating my dog's fear of thunder. It was a lot easier to just lock him in his crate...but instead this last time I worked with him and he actually eventually went to his crate and laid down on his own...nice and calm. It was amazing. I lost some sleep that night but it will be better for him and me in the long run.

[DebW]

While a dog chasing a lone cyclist will tend to stay behind or to the side of the bike, generally allowing you to keep pedaling and outrun the dog, I once had a different situation. I was pedaling with a group and the dog went for the bike ahead of me. I couldn't avoid it, hit the dog, and went down. My bike and I weren't hurt, but my wool Stil-long long underwear pants (worn under my shorts) were torn at the knee. Given that these were expensive wool long underwear and I was a poor student at the time, I actually went to the home that the dog came from and knocked on the door. My attempts to get the owner of the dog to pay for a new pair of Stil-longs were unsuccessful, and I later was able to patch them. Just a note that dog encounters don't always end as positively as Lisa's.

Then there are the country dogs that will wait for you 1/2 way up a hill...

[mimitabby]

Then there are the country dogs that will wait for you 1/2 way up a hill...

Yup, that's the kind I get off the bike for and start purposefully walking towards and tell them to GO HOME.

[Jo-n-NY]

Lisa, you dog encounter made me laugh. If I wasn't afraid I could see myself doing the same thing.

The rides you take sound so lovely to me also. It doesn't matter the pace, the main thing is you are enjoying yourself and becoming fitter at the same time. I think it is wonderful!!!

~ JoAnn

[liberty]

Once I was flying down a hill and saw two huge dogs at the bottom, lying in the middle of the road. They got up and began to act all aggressive towards me, and I knew I wouldn't be able to stop by the time I reached them. So I began to scream and shriek at the top of my lungs. Freaked the poor things out. They jumped out from in front of me. Makes for a nice story, but there's no way I'll go down that hill that fast again. Dogs are awfully unpredictable. Good thing they don't drive cars.

[divingbiker]

As dog owners we should never resign ourselves to their bad behavior. ALL dogs can be trained...but usually it is the owner that needs the training first in how to train the dog.

Thanks for the advice, but I've been through obedience training with both dogs, had a specialist come out to work with us, and one dog got Canine Good Citizen certification and was a therapy dog in a nursing home till his arthritis got too bad.

It might be easy to yank on the leash and train one dog when a bike comes by, but when two (or three, before one of them died) go berserk at once, I'm happy to just be able to keep them under control. People who have walked multiple dogs understand this...it's a whole different ball game than walking one dog.

We hide behind parked cars when I see a bike coming, and I manage the situation. As I said, they're always leashed so the situation Lisa encountered can't happen with my dogs.

(I am hesitant to post this because I don't intend to get into a war of words about dog training, but I don't care for the insinuation that I haven't trained my dogs.)