Loose dog rant

There’s a 3-mile, out-and-back route that Lilly and I like to do. It takes us about an hour thanks to several hills, but it’s a good walk. Essentially, we walk from our house to the school bus turnaround on the rural county road up from us. We walk until we can see the Continential Divide, then we come home.

Unfortunately, we have to pass four properties, where dogs regularly behave badly. Here’s my whine — And, it’s just not fair. We should be able to walk without fear.

House #1 features two really mean spaniels of some sort. Several times, they’ve chased us well down the road, far from their driveway. They bark, snarl, and lunge at us. So far, I’ve been able to prevent a fight by keeping Lilly behind me and yelling at the dogs until someone at the house calls them back.

House #2 features a large brindle dog and a chow or keeshound-type dog. Once, the large dog charged down off the mountain and squared off with us on the road. We swung wide around him, only to have him circle front and square off again and again. The fluffier of the two sometimes rushes down the mountain to growl at us from a large overhang. Again, no fights so far.

House #3 features a wandering chow with a golden retriever sidekick. Our big dog Ginko and the chow nearly tangled once when the chow pursued us and began circling. Thankfully, that time, it’s owner was nearby, and I yelled for help. However, since then, several times this dog has purposefully pursued Lilly and I up the road, even when we turn back toward home rather than continue on. It’s not particularly mean on approach, but it’s relentless.

Once when I could not avoid contact, despite trying to return home, I just stayed as relaxed as I could as both dogs approached us at high speed. Lilly, bless her heart, tolerated being sandwiched between the dogs as they sniffed her thoroughly. She did not react, which is huge for a fearful dog like Lilly, so I called her off before things went south and turned again to walk home.

The dogs were relentless and would not let Lilly leave. That’s when she snapped. Lilly and the chow got into a pretty serious snarl and snap-fest. Thankfully, no one got hurt, but when it was over, I again turned and walked toward home.

The dogs still pursued us, but whatever Lilly did in the fight earned some respect because they kept their distance. Anytime they got within 6 feet of us, Lilly simply curled her lip, and the dogs backed off. They followed us almost all the way home before giving up.

House #4 features a pack of 4 or 5 new dogs (depending on the day), who begin barking and running toward us the minute we crest a hill. So far, I’ve just turned back toward home. The pack comes out to the road, but does not pursue us. I’m not sure what they’d do if we tried to walk past.

Now, comes the RANT. All of these dogs come from properties much larger than ours. Where we have just 3 acres, these homes probably have from 15 to 50. Follow my logic here … that means these properties are MUCH more expensive than ours. In other words, these darn people should be able to afford to fence their dogs properly.

In the last year, as I’ve mentioned, we indeed have replaced nearly all the fencing surrounding our land. Trust me, I know, it’s not cheap, and it’s a TON of work.

But, doing just a typical yard, wouldn’t be as big of a deal.

Many of these homes have fences of some sort, but not enough to contain a dog. Three strings of barbed wire may keep in horses or cattle, but not dogs. Really pretty privacy fences don’t do crap without gate to close the huge driveway gap.

These dogs, who I suspect spend most of their time outside unsupervised, have free run of the valley. That means, I believe, they consider everything they see and explore as theirs, which makes the public road a territorial hot spot.

I’ll say it again. It’s not fair for Lilly and I to worry on our walks. Why do people have dogs if they cannot properly contain them, like others do?

Even if I didn’t have a fearful dog, I think this would still bother me. It’s bad enough when gregarious dogs speed towards us in public. I know from the get-go these dogs mean no harm, but Lilly often interprets things differently.

It makes me wonder if her bad experiences with these loose dogs near our home hasn’t impacted her impression of all dogs. If that’s the case, then I really want to smack the owners upside the head.