Gold Lifetime
- Messages
- 27,260
- Reactions
- 72,491
I've had dogs dart right out in front of me in the city. One of them I didn't even see and it hit the undercarriage of the car. The impact lifted the car a bit. Not pretty.Nowhere in the article does it say that Madden himself was threatened by the dog, or did I miss it? Off-leash dogs can be unpredictable, ask city mail carriers. I don't trust them no matter how they appear. The last couple of years I've noticed a lot more dog walking going on along the road in front of my place. People who no longer have to work, I guess. Most are on leash. A few are off leash. I have maintenance work to do out there every so often, and take the garbage carts out and back once a week. I have an alder pole I can take along with me to keep dogs back. There is one that will run up, get his muddy paws in my crotch, which I don't appreciate but I wouldn't shoot him for it. The last time he attempted it, I had the leaf blower going and that kept him away.
There is one issue of dog walking safety that I think about when I'm driving. In my area, we don't have many sidewalks and curbs, it's mostly just road, then dirt/gravel shoulder. So dog walkers are close to traffic. Lots of them use the leash that allows them to reel out a lot of line for the animal. Letting the dog have a lot of leash is fine so long as he's going straight ahead. But it's notion to do this isn't guaranteed. Should the dog decide to suddenly veer into the road could result in death on a long leash. When I can, I give them a wide berth.