As most of you know, I am working as a dog walker in Calgary. well, there is one set of dogs I walk every day, twice a day for 30mins each visit. All 3 are Irish Setters, and 2 are male so they are kinda big. Well, yesterday on our last walk, the 2 males saw a bird and pulled me so hard, I fell to my knees and they dragged me like 2 feet! I fell on top of the female! Poor girl! Well, I was obviously kinda upset, but overall, no damage done.
Well, this afternoon's walk started well, but at the end, a mom and her littrle boy were walking by us on a pathway that is closed in on two sides. The boy was on a scooter, and he just stopped and stared at the dogs. I had them in a sit, waiting for them to pass. Well, the dogs started barking at the boy when he decided to just sit there and stare at them! The woman started yelling at me!!! She said, "WOULD YOU JUST GO?!? YOU'RE TERRIFYING MY BOY!!!!!", and the boy is still just standing there SCREAMING and crying!!! I was soooo upset! I've never been yelled at like that before, and I had the dogs under control so they could pass!! Why didn't she tell her son to stop stareing at them, and just go by?? The dogs didn't even have enough room to get near them because I was holding their leashes so close to me!!!
These are 3 really good dogs, and it upsets me that people don't train their kids, but expect every dog to be perfectly well behaved!! I know the poor kid was scared, they are bigger dogs and sound scary when they bark, but I'll guarentee you that if they were chi's barking at him, she wouldn't have yelled like that!!! It just bothers me that if the dogs got away and went up to him, she'd probably sue the owners for trauma or something! They wouldn't have hurt him, but even if they just knocked him over, they'd have been put down for sure!!
Sorry for the long post, but I had to vent. That boy had his mom to speak for him and defend him, but who is gonna protect the dogs??
