Pets left alone in RV at campground?

Lantley wrote:

I consider the unattended dog rules similar to the no alcohol rules at Most state parks in my area.
If your drinking and causing problems the authorities can quickly enforce the rules without debate. If your dog is barking or disturbing the peace the authorities can quickly enforce the rules if necessary without debate.
However if you and your dog are well behaved there is no harm done and consequently no foul.
Sometimes rules are put in place as a deterrent to ensure compliant behavior vs. solely for enforcement.

In theory yes. But in reality, it's a lot different. With alcohol, they can simply say "put it away or leave". With dogs left unattended, they get all the arguments here in this thread " but he doesn't bark", "he's small and just sleeps all day", "but we want to eat out tonight", "but we can't take her into the themepark", and on and on. The rangers get very tired of the arguments. And when it gets bad enough, they say "fine. No dogs for you!" and enact laws banning dogs from the campgrounds completely.

This happened with "dogs on trails". Once they were allowed with the usual "pick up their poop", "keep dogs on trails", and "keep dogs on leash" laws. But people decided those were inconveniences and just for other people with bad dogs, etc. When cited, the owners whined and argued about why THEIR dog shouldn't have to follow the rules. Rangers got tired of it. They enacted laws that now prevent dogs from going on trails, etc.
Look I'm not saying that anyone who leaves their dog unattended at their campsite is evil. And if it were limited to just one or two campsites with quiet dogs, etc, I wouldn't argue so much against it.

But the truth is, for every person who IS ACTUALLY only leaving well behaved quiet dogs who sleep the four hours max the owners are out, there are a dozen idiots out there who will happily leave their loud obnoxious dogs all day every day. And as with "but my dog is friendly", dog owners (and I say this as a dog owner) tend to have selective amnesia for all the times the dog has not been friendly/quiet/polite/etc, insisting that their dog never barks because they've asked the neighbors, etc.

Folks will do as they want. But I won't tell a stranger on the internet that it's OK for them to leave their dog(s) unattended against the rules. I may tell someone I know well and whose dog I know well "it's against the rules, but if it's just a couple hours here and there and knowing your dog, no one will likely even realize you left him. Just be prepared for the repercussions IF you do get called out for it. You may be asked to leave with no refund. You may not be able to enjoy the rest of your stay because your plan to leave the dog behind each day has been curtailed."

I'll add that one of the reasons for the rule is for safety of the dog. If you leave your dog in the RV while you spend the afternoon at the museum, there may be an emergency at the campground that makes it unsafe for your dog. Look at the thread with the RVs falling off the cliff.

1) they don't know a dog is in there because it's not allowed, so they don't try to get your dog out if there's a fire, etc. Your dog dies because it took you too long to get back when your monitoring alarms went off. And if you call the park for help, you put them at risk of injury/death to save your dog who shouldn't have been left alone in there.

2) If they need to get into your RV for some emergency reason, they unknowingly put themselves at risk confronting an unknown dog with no owners around.

3) if the dog gets out somehow, they now have a dog running loose who may be scared. And a scared dog could easily bite someone.