When your dog is approached by 'other' dogs

[JamiesGirl]

First let me say "thankfully it has never happened to me"   But I have a theory.........is the dog being attacked always on the lead, if it were free would it still happen.
Yes it is the owner of the attacking dog who is at fault.
I think the idea to carry some type of pepper spray in your pocket is a good one.

could we spray the pepper spray at the owner though 

[HBP]

Poor little Murph. I dread this sort of thing happening, Hudson knows no fear and will go up to any other dogs big or small! I usually put him back on his lead when I see other people with dogs approaching so at least he's by my side if anything should happen. Fingers crossed not had any bad experiences yet (apart from a 20 minute lecture from a woman with two enormous collies we'd never met before, for "not letting my dog socialise" ...  )

[Silver]

My Merlin was once attacked by another dog too A Jack Russel type that was on an extending lead *sigh* It went for his mouth, biting deep enough to draw blood. Since then he has acted strange around dogs - sometimes he is fine with them, othertimes he runs away squealing when some old lame dog approaches him!

[linda c]

  Sara it's a nice thought but don't think you could get away with that 

In reply to your question Julie I don't think it's always the dogs that are on the leads that are the only ones. I have to confess many years ago I was walking my 2 cockers with a friend and not watching them, they'd just gone round a corner and there was an almighty set to, it was a lady with a collie and she said her's was a devil for going for other dogs, but my dog was giving her a good telling off 
Another incident came to mind, my little black & tan was quietly sniffing when a jack Russell came flying up to her and grabbed her ear, that ended up as a visit to the vets but the owner was thoroughly apologetic and offered to pay for the vets fees

[vixen]

My girls are rarely on the lead.  When I see another dog approaching on the lead, I do call them to me and keep them close as we pass by.
Marley and Stevie are very good at reading other dogs' body language though and do avoid certain dogs.
Although I am wary of 'staffies' (sorry, I know that is breedist), I do give them the benefit of the doubt and try to act the same as I do with other breeds.
The dogs that give us the most grief are usually small terriers (usually on the lead) who can spot my dogs from a distance and start yapping and straining to get to them. 
There are four terriers who live at a property on a regular walk.  They never go for walks, I think their exercise is racing from vantage point to vantage point in their garden    When they spot my girls they start going ballistic  .
One day, the smallist terrier got out through a gap at the bottom of the fence and flew at my girls    What  was really comical though was when it realized it wasn't behind the fence and it wasn't being backed up by its 'pack'.
It didn't know what to do and just froze then casually went back under the fence, tail between its legs 

[Murphys Law]

This may sound like a stupid question but are some dogs more attackable than others?

Today Murphy was properly attacked by a springer. He was on his back screaming and the springer was having a right go. The woman owner sad that she has never done that before. And that is not the first time I have heard that.

There was blood on the springer's mouth and I was worried that Murphy had been badly bitten but the springer had just bit her own tongue. Apart from being a bit muddy, Murphy seems fine.

Being a sucker for punishment he wanted to go and play again 2 minutes later.

[HBP]

Poor Murphy! Perhaps it's a body language thing, he's not quite learnt proper doggy etiquette yet. Or maybe he's just been unfortunate to meet some not very nice dogs, not all like puppies for they. Hope he's okay x

[Murphys Law]

Thinking about it, whilst I was talking to the owner the springer was waiting for its ball to be thrown. Maybe she got impatient and took it out on Murphy who was no doubt right in the springers face.

He does seem to have a natural ability to wind up other dogs.

Murphy is fine though and it might teach him a lesson.

[HBP]

Maybe she was being protective over the ball then? I've been on walks before now where H has been growled at and the owner has said "oh he just thinks he's after his ball"

[*Marie*]

Bracken completely ignores friendly dogs that come up to him he does play with some dogs but mostly ignores some, but I have noticed if we come across a dog that's not friendly Bracken seems to be attracted to them and wants to go near them!

[piph]

Thinking about it, whilst I was talking to the owner the springer was waiting for its ball to be thrown. Maybe she got impatient and took it out on Murphy who was no doubt right in the springers face.

He does seem to have a natural ability to wind up other dogs.

Murphy is fine though and it might teach him a lesson.

I wouldn't bank on it teaching him a lesson!  Ozzy was attacked by 2 boxers in our local woods some time ago - not hurt badly but a couple of scratches, and he screeched like a banshee.  I was a bit shocked but I did hope it would teach him not to go bounding up to every dog he sees and leap all over them, but no - the very next day he was straight in there with a black lab he'd never met before!  I do try to put him on the lead if I see someone in the distance with a dog that we don't know, and his recall is fairly good most of the time, but if he spots another dog before I do, he's off and there's nothing I can do to stop him.  I wish I could train it out of him, but I've had no luck so far!  We are lucky that there are very few people in the woods when we go, and most of them are known to us and us to them.

[Jane57]

Double post.

[jasper_boy]

I was out walking Bee and Vixen with my housemate with 3 of her collies the other day and I came home still in a state of shock! Vixen and Bee are both person and dog reactive so are off lead but recall perfectly when I can see someone coming into the fields. I saw a medium white dog running quite fast, at least a field distance from its owner, but waiting at each gate. So all dogs recalled and put on lead, and I walked quite a distance off the path so I didn't need to get past the dog. The owner let her dog into the field and the dog, which turned out to be a female pointer just came running straight for us. My housemate recognised the dog straight away and let two of her collies off lead straight away to try and distract the pointer away from me. The dog was very friendly and did want to just say hello. However, the owner just stuck to walking on the path on the route she was taking and didn't look at us once or even attempt to call her dog. I was in absolute disbelief as you could see that my two girls were kicking off, that I was way off the path, dogs on lead, etc. I actually yelled out 'are you kidding me' and she just looked at me and smiled. It really gets my back up that I have my dogs in total control and then a 'its okay, they are friendly' dog comes running up and my girls both react 

[ruby n millies mum]

Dog walking used to be fun and enjoyable,
 i have two 15 month old cockers and both usually sniff and walk past other dogs.recently one of the has become very scared of bigger dogs and will not walk past them , not sure why but makes walking them difficult ,she has started to pull badly and keeps crossing in front of me , so i had to get a head collar to stop pulling , this worries me as if another dog attacks,she wouldnt be able to defend herself.
i now travel about 5 mile from home to a park with a tennis court which has a 10 foot fence, they have a mad run around inside and i guard the gate!!

[Walshies]

In my relatively short time as a dog owner (16 months) I have found that it is mostly the dog owners who are as thick as mince, not the dogs.  The amount of times I have heard "He/She has never done that before" - Fudge has been attacked several times in his very short life, the first time was when he was on his first walk after his jab. He does not trust other dogs no matter how friendly they appear - neither do I.  No amount of socialising, unfortunately can change this.

I have lost count of the times I have had the same conversation with another dog owner. You know the one - "if you cannot control your dog then why is it not on the lead?"