What is running protocol for dogs?

When we start applying the same rights to animals that we do to humans, the whole world is going nuts. Seriously. Bat-*kitten* crazy.

I believe the whole point of this thread, and the majority of the comments if you bothered to read them, were finding another way around it. Kicking any animal would obviously not be the first choice for most people.

And yes, pets are a very important part of the family. I did not say otherwise. I respect peoples' love for their animals and have had many in my life, including dogs. I also have a child. No matter how you look at it, they are not the same thing.

What I take exception to is the comments such as "should I kick your kid"? That is an unintelligent and absolutely ridiculous comment, and totally irrelevant to this thread. It implies that the consequences for defending onseself against a dog which is approaching in a perceived threatening manner is comparable to kicking a child who is misbehaving. Before lobbing personal attacks against one's character, try seeing both sides of the argument with intelligence rather than emotion. This was a relatively respectful debate before you came along.

I have 8 dogs.... that I absolutely adore and I would never allow them to harass a person. I may know that my dogs are harmless to me but they are animals and you never know what they will do to someone or something that they don't know. If my dogs got out of our fence (we have a double fence) and harassed a jogger and got kicked, that would be MY FAULT for not securing my dog.

That having been said. I do carry a big stick when I go walking up the road, not only to protect myself but also protect my on leash dog. Pepper spray also works as well and honestly I would have no qualms about using it. I have no tolerance for badly behaved out of control dogs - ZERO

Like I said I have eight dogs that we show and complete with in obedience and other venues and my attitude is that it is dogs that are running lose and their owners who don't contain them or clean up after them that cause problems for the rest of us.

Not exactly jogging related, but I did have these friends with several "free range" dogs on their property. Once I went over to visit and the pit bull mix cornered me against my car and was nipping, almost biting me. I just screamed until someone heard me. They didn't think it was a big deal and recommended that I "learn how to act" 'around their dogs. I never went over their again.


On my usual jogging route, there's a schnauzer who always barks at me and starts to follow behind. All I have to do is LOOK at him and he yips and runs from me as fast as possible. So now I just ignore him and let him think that he's 'chasing' the big, bad human away. Schnauzers are some of the worst, by the way.


Also, it's generally a good rule of thumb that a dog that's barking at you is not going to bite you.

I live in the country (no leash law) and walk with my husky who wouldn't hurt a fly BUT he is on a leash at all times. I don't want someone else getting scared by him! There is a dog on our street that I was worried about at first it will run out of its hard and follow us for a bit then pee on the other side of the road and go home- luckily I can tell my dog "no" and "leave it" and we are on our way. As a kid riding bikes we always grabbed some rocks up so we could throw towards any aggressive dogs that came out.

I walk my dog every day and have had large loose dogs approach me. The dog will usually retreat if I confront it. I will usually stand my ground and tell it to go away. That usually does the trick. However, I'm not afraid of dogs, so this may not work for you…

Mace or a stick would do the trick. Don't try to kick or punch the dog like other people here have mentioned because it will prompt the dog to bite your hand or leg. You could hold out the stick in front of you if the dog is being aggressive. That would probably tell it that you're not a submissive "dog" and it won't bother fighting you. If it's always the same dog approaching you and is acting aggressive, call the bylaw officer and see if there is something they can do. You shouldn't have to put up with that.

You can also adjust your route.

By the logic of some posters in this thread, you should have just assumed the dog was nice, because that's what its owner thought.

It's more a question of recognising the indicators and what they're telling you, that informs the response. That said, recognising that some people have a rational (as the originator), or irrational, fear of dogs that precludes making a decision based on the dogs behaviours, and in that sense it is incumbent on the owner or handler to reduce the risk to the animal by keeping it under control.

If it's demonstrating friendly or playful indicators, then just keep clear of it. If it's demonstrating defensive or protective indicators, then again act in a way that reduces their feelings of fear or defensiveness. In the first instance that's about making sure there is adequate space, and taking charge of the situation with verbal commands and body language..

If that fails, then there are more effective ways to subdue a dog than kicking it, as I described upthread.

Using some fairly straightforward techniques it's entirely possible to take down a properly trained attack or pursuit dog, although none of the scenarios posited in this thread suggest trained dogs.

If a dog is behaving in an actively hostile way, and doesn't appear to be defending boundaries or similar, then generally I'd suggest using some form of tool to maintain distance. Whether that is a stick or something similar. Kicking or hitting is just stupid, because that puts parts of the body that could fit in the mouth within reach of the dog, unless it's the only option available, in which case, as described above it's safest to go for the side of the head, or the top between the eyes. A dog big enough to be a credible threat will generally have a thicker skull than a human so mostly that's just doing to daze them, rather than kill them. Dazing them is enough as it gives the opportunity to get clear.

All that said, and mainly because it's already come up in the thread, the most effective way to deal with a properly trained attack or pursuit dog is a 9mm pacifier. Not nice to have to do it, but while most dogs will back off from a dominant position, or if physically defended against, a trained dog won't back down.

Of course it's again different if one is dealing with fighting dogs, personally I'd quite happily kneecap people who train their dogs for fighting as some of the techniques to encourage aggression in them are horrible. Some can be rehabilitated, some can't. Dogs that have been used as bait training frequently have an excessive fear of other dogs that can affect their behaviour around others, particularly yappy ones.

fwiw my Bengal will do more damage, more quickly, than dogs three times her size.