It finally happened

4X4Dodger wrote:

Dog Folks wrote:
You can flame me if you like. My flame suit composed of a lifetime of being around dogs, both personally and professionally, is on.

I do not let my dogs make "friends" with any other strange dog on a leash. They do not need any "friends" or exposure to any animal where the heath status and vaccinations are unknown.

Further, if you allow two dogs to meet, nose to nose, within a short period of time one of them will often start to assert dominance, which often will lead to a dog fight. I am walking my dogs to relax, not to break up dog fights.

So, no hard feelings, I'm sure your dogs are great, but we do not need a "meet and greet."

With all due respect DogFolks, I am not sure what professional world you come from with dogs or animals but I suspect it might be the show circuit, most true animal/dog experts agree that dogs, like many other mammals due indeed have and need friends. Or if you prefer a relationship that gives them happiness and or pleasure.

Many dogs make friends across species (and I dont mean man here). And really all you have to do to realize the depth of joy being with other dogs brings is to go to most local dog parks and watch. Most of the dogs are having a great time with each other. The odd ones or more aggresive are usually ignored.

I think dogs pick up easily on their owners fears and unease when they are on a leash and react accordingly. The reason so many dogs are unfriendly is the way they were improperly socialized as puppies by their owners.

But dogs also have their own communication and politics, likes and dislikes and I have found it is always best if humans generally speaking stay out of it and let them work it out. Millions of generations of dogs have the genetic ability to work out hierarchy and learn to get along with out us humans.

I don't need to parade my qualifications here, but just let's just say they are well established, in the behavioral side of the dog world. Your inference that I am not a "true" dog expert is laughable. You know not what you speak of. Sorry.

I agree that with what you are trying to say. Simply: Dogs are pack animals, and will include humans as their pack. Two dogs, three human adults are enough for our pack. They don't need to expand it is size by brief meeting with other dogs. It takes much more than that for a dog to accept another into the pack.

Again, the chance for dominance behaviors to occur, including fighting, is high with nose to nose meetings. Dog parks are known to be disease ridden.

If you wish to submit your animal to this, go for it. My pack gets their "pleasure" from the pack itself, where the hierarchy is well established. My pack is very happy without such encounters and the risks associated with such encounters.