I will contribute, gladly, to your cause Mr. Bridges. My family own small dogs and not one of them is trained. They run around their houses, bite at ankles, bark obsessively, disobey, jump up to tables, beg for food, show dog agression, know only sit (if handler has a treat), etc etc.

Small dog owners have it so easy to train a little dog. They take very little effort to control. They don't need to know a million commands. I just never will get it. I have an open door with my family to let me help them train their dogs and they always say that "oh that's just too much," "its just a little dog," "I don't think I could do that training" blah blah blah.

Wow I have some real resentment towards my family not training their dogs. I need to work on this haha.

I don't have my pup yet but I do have a 2 and 3 year old daughters. My girls know not to go near any dogs no matter what to pet them, and they normally are pretty good with this. We live in an apartment building with about 6 other buildings. We are a dog friendly complex. There used to be breed restrictions and size restrictions,but those have basically gone out of the window due to management.

The part that scares me the most is when we are out walking and its mainly been the local chiauaus (spelling) that come sprinting after my kids yapping and snapping! I am not picking on thise breed but these dogs are spoiled and I get really dirty looks from their owners when I move to stand in front of my kids. I would rather have the dog nip at me then at them.

The worst is we have complained to management about this, he said he has never had any problems with these dogs. Go figure. Can anyone recomend what kind of mace to get that is ok with both large dogs and small dogs?

Here in India there is a breed called pomeranian (spelling?). They are little balls of fur, but mean as hell. I am a dog lover, and am not judgemental but I have a sense of resentment when I see these dogs and their owners. All of them I have seen so far are OUT OF CONTROL. They have no regard for the owners, bite first and ask questions later, dog aggressive and I saw today at the vet one owner actually stroking his pomeranian while it was barking aggressively at my dogs. They keep turning in circles and bark, growl, nip at the hand, feet etc.

Now the newest breed to that list is the Pug. There is aphone company called Vodafone and they use the pug as their mascot. The pug comes on TV every 5 minutes during cricket matches. So it is raining pugs now and some bad breeding has got some mean pugs. Today while walking my dogs, a pug which was chained lunged at my dogs from inside it's compound, threw itself in the air, did a 180 in the air as it was chained and just fell down like an egg to the ground.

The same guy has a black Lab, which is chained up and has chewed through the fence. I made my dobe sit facing me in front of this lab's house and my boy did what I asked him to. But it threw the black lab into a tizzy who was expecting us to run away. So the owner came out and gave me a dirty look as if to say "why are you teasing my dog?" .

One day I will upload a video of my daily walk and you will see what a mad house my neighbourhood is.

Ram

Edited by Ramachandran Subramanian (06/20/2010 10:25 AM)
Edit reason: spelling

For the charging Chihuahuas, I would use a spray citronella, they usually squirt about 10 feet.

For many many years I owned larger dogs. NEVER had a dog under 40#s. Then I found my animal talent covers saving extreme hypoglycemic toy pups....dogs the vets hospitalize and still lose sometimes. And I ended up with Widget...my brussels griffon.(the mom of the girl in my sig right now) I still....six years later, get teased about my toy breed dogs(yes, I have gotten others since). And I have to admit that a couple of them get away with much more than a bigger dog would. Well....they get away with stuff for longer than a large dog would. Eventually I do civilize them all. It is just easier to ignore some things and or realize that they can do no harm...literally.

I will note that NONE of my dogs are hostile or allowed to run roughshod through the world. All are leashed when appropriate and not demons with fur. Likewise several of them are therapy dogs and the little ones are especially great at visiting skilled nursing patients. Though I am gonna work on some of the basic obedience stuff.

I will also say......running a boarding kennel and grooming shop....I would rather deal with large dogs any day. I dread many of my small dog clients(and a couple of the big ones) . I have my thumb laid open right now...from a psychotic Shih Tzu of all things! Most large dogs are not the basket cases that small dogs are. And most of the small dogs are made that way by their owners who should have bought another stuffed bear instead. Biggest complaint with big dogs.....jumping up! I have been pounded by boxers and labs all week!

Like almost everything dog related, the human is at the root cause of this problem IMO.

Little dogs are just too easy to pick up and manhandle. It takes zero knowledge to just scoop up a little yapper rather than actually try to train it, so that's what most people do.

I admit to doing that myself with our mini-dachshund who thinks he's a dang Rottie. He'd be dead by now unless I physically nabbed him before he became breakfast for a larger dog. Over time, he has not benefitted from experience or training much - his little walnut brain just sends him into 100% defense. Oy vay. You add in his "special needs" (two crushed disks, surgery, permanent loss of about 50% use of his hind legs), and his age (13+), and we have even more incentive to just pick him up rather than deal with situational training.

So, I'm one of the guilty ones of undertraining a small mutt. Now, you WILL NOT see mine loose, or abusing other dogs, etc.. Rather, if we're there together, he'll be happily under my arm.

I'm another one who has gone from having large breed dogs to my first toy breed (a Toy Fox Terrier). Gracie went to puppy classes given by a local obedience club and earned her AKC S.T.A.R. Puppy title. I have plans for her to earn her CGC and at least two obedience titles (one each in AKC and UKC).

That said, I'll admit to spoiling her more than I ever did the larger ones but she has never been permitted to run wild or run up to strange dogs or act like a general public nuissance (sp). People that permit their dogs to act that way, whatever the dog's size may be, really irritate me.

My only real problem with Gracie is that she tends to be a whiner. I'm working on it but, living with other people and working nights (sleeping days), it's not always easy. Plus, she's just so darned cute, it's not always easy to correct her. LOL

I always had big dogs, thought little dogs were "queer", yappy, awful. Then my kids bought me an IG, 11 years ago. It was an awakening. Raised as a farm dog, she did everything the big dogs did, chasing the tractor, eating cow pies, all of it (in SUMMER!). It was an awakening for us.
Our pup now, the ACD cross, completely fills our "dog" needs -- except when I see those cool indian sighthound pups!- Then I think, well maybe someday I could have an afghan.....or saluki.....

 Quote: ramachandran subramanian

Here in India there is a breed called pomeranian (spelling?). They are little balls of fur, but mean as hell.

I can't help but snicker at this - my family's first and only "family" dog was a Pom (you spelled it just right ). We had no idea what we were doing - my dad's boss's dog had pups and for some reason they were just irresistible... even though my parents aren't really "dog" people in the slightest. Eddie was actually quite a good little dog, in regards to other dogs - we didn't socialize him AT all, so he just thought he was a human! Completely ignored other dogs... the trouble was that, by human standards, he had absolutely no manners, and just like Rob mentioned, it was far too easy to just tuck him under an arm or physically hold his snarling face away from our hands if we needed to do something he didn't like (most notably, groom him in any way). He growled if you picked him up, growled if you put him back down... My 95lb Oscar has NEVER been a bite risk at the vet, but 7lb Eddie... he always wore a muzzle.

100% blame for Eddie's behavior lands smack on his uneducated owners (for shame...), but he was a great, tough as nails little dude (he summited many a VT mountain with us) that made it to 17 y/o... miss him to this day. I think it took getting a large, assertive breed dog to really motivate me to learn how to read behavior and train a dog (that and my own maturity), and if I ever get another small breed, I certainly won't let it end up like Ed, but I know it will take a different bag of tricks, due largely to physical scale. Every one's a challenge...

~Natalya

 Quote: Lauren Jeffery

 Quote: Chip Bridges

And then they go out into the world.

On those mega long flexi leashes no less!

I think that the flexi leads & harnesses that people have dogs out on, all size dogs, are the worse things that have ever been invented for the average owner.

I find it hard to find ANY good things to say about felxi leads. Most of the time, they don't work properly or the owner doesn't know how to or they extend when & where the owner doesn't want to or expect it to. I almost ran over a yorkie that ran out in front of my pick up TRUCK whose owner was standing on the sidewalk talking & not paying attention. At least if you have a regular leash you know how far your dog can move away from you..there is no QUESTION about the distance at any time.

As for the harnesses.....they serve a purposs for WORKING dogs in many venues from tacking, agitation work, etc to guide dogs. But to put one on a pet for walking is idiotic. The owner has absolutly NO control over a dog on these. Dogs have been blessed with 4-wheel drive & there is no way that an owner is going to be able to hold back a dog digging in to get away & run off in one of these. Sorry, not bashing any particular breed, but bully breeds seem to be one of the breeds that I often see on these things.

At the very least if owners can't train their dogs put a collar & a regular leash on your animal so the rest of us at least has a fighting chance dealing with your uncontroled dog.