Ask Me Help Desk - Dog walking etiquette

And no, it's not about cleaning up after them! I know about that.

No, here's the situation. My Trinkett loves to graze when we walk. I sometimes feel like I'm walking a cow, she nibbles on grass so much. And it's only the grown, weedyy grass... never mowed grass. Which means generally it's grass growing in people's flower beds. She doesn't bother the flowers any. I didn't think anything of letting her nibble on other people's grass, but then this morning a woman pounded on her window when she was nibbling. Now, I'll grant that the woman may have thought that the dog was getting ready to poop. But should I be trying to keep Trink from eating other people's grass? Or do most people just not care?

Yeah, I have noticed dogs seem to prefer the tall weedy stuff. This is a people problem. I would keep her out of that lady's flower bed. Maybe others too. Some people don't appreciate help with the weeding. Can you interest her in the grass next to mailboxes or trees?

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Originally Posted by froggy7

And no, it's not about cleaning up after them! I know about that.

No, here's the situation. My Trinkett loves to graze when we walk. I sometimes feel like I'm walking a cow, she nibbles on grass so much. And it's only the grown, weedyy grass... never mowed grass. Which means generally it's grass growing in people's flower beds. She doesn't bother the flowers any. I didn't think anything of letting her nibble on other people's grass, but then this morning a woman pounded on her window when she was nibbling. Now, I'll grant that the woman may have thought that the dog was getting ready to poop. But should I be trying to keep Trink from eating other people's grass? Or do most people just not care?

Hi, I've worked at a petstore for close to five years and had a dog trainer/behaviorist as a roommate. Letting your dog even cross onto someone's front lawn property is generally frowned upon, let alone letting them eat someone else's grass. Most people probably wouldn't say anything, but in my opinion, having been around lots of dog owners and being a dog owner myself, many people would consider it rude even if they never express those feelings.

I agree with the above. I don't like dogs in or near my flower beds for ANY reason. Seems like every time I go to weed my flowers, all I can smell is dog pee.

I would keep my dog away from eating anyone else's grass or weeds or anything on their property. There are public places to walk a dog in where the dog can graze. I have a dog and would not appreciate someone on my lawn so I do my best effort not to annoy anyone else.

Froggy, aside from the good advice you have received from everyone here, is this an occasional "grazing" or does Trinkett do this all the time? A few of us have spoken about grass eating on other posts. Dogs will eat grass for various reasons. Some will go to town on it to cause themselves to vomit up whatever is irritating their stomachs. Some people believe it is because they are lacking something in their diet (I am not one of them). Some dogs do it just because they like it. When you are taking Trink for a walk, you should discourage all grazing. Your walks with her are not only her potty times, but training and exercising time. After she does her "business" and whatever else you are directing her to do during your walk to encourage her to focus on you, you can allow her to sniff and check things out. Always discourage any lingering on someone else's property, and don't let her set the rules of the walk by allowing her to "graze" to her heart's delight whenever she wants to. She needs to be paying attention to you. She is still adjusting to you and your household, and you need to make sure that she recognizes you are the alpha and the person that she needs to focus her attention on and looking for direction from.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RubyPitbull

froggy, aside from the good advice you have received from everyone here, is this an occasional "grazing" or does Trinkett do this all the time? A few of us have spoken about grass eating on other posts. Dogs will eat grass for various reasons. Some will go to town on it to cause themselves to vomit up whatever is irritating their stomachs. Some people believe it is because they are lacking something in their diet (I am not one of them). Some dogs do it just because they like it.

She doesn't do it all the time. But there's certain houses where she does it. It's largely at spots that have "natural" borders... native plants, bushes, etc. I'm thinking that there are probably scents of deer, armadillo, and other such critters attracting her to the area. Generally I have been letting her nibble a blade or two before asking her to move on, on the grounds that no one can tell the difference before and after.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RubyPitbull

When you are taking Trink for a walk, you should discourage all grazing. Your walks with her are not only her potty times, but training and exercising time. After she does her "business" and whatever else you are directing her to do during your walk to encourage her to focus on you, you can allow her to sniff and check things out. Always discourage any lingering on someone else's property, and don't let her set the rules of the walk by allowing her to "graze" to her heart's delight whenever she wants to. She needs to be paying attention to you. She is still adjusting to you and your household, and you need to make sure that she recognizes you are the alpha and the person that she needs to focus her attention on and looking for direction from.

Well, see that's the thing. She does potty early in the walk (normally my yard or few houses away), so the rest of the walk is more to get some exercise (for both of us!), meet some of the neighbors and their dogs, admire the landscaping, wildlife, etc. And she walks well on the leash... the only issue we are working on there is that her brain needs to catch up to her nose, since she seems to walk past scents and then register them and want to go back and sniff them. But generally I don't mind her sniffing around, so I don't have a problem with doubling back. And she will stop sniffing and grazing when asked. It just never occurred to me that anyone would mind, because it doesn't do any harm that I can see. Unless you are really fond of weeds. The only real difficulties I am having are when other dogs go by in a direction that I do not want to go in, or when we start heading towards home. And that's just a case of two stubborn minds... she freezes in the direction she wants to go, I freeze in the direction I want to go until she gives in and goes my way. And the time that I have to wait it out is getting shorter. I'm not entirely sure that that's the best way of doing it, but I have found that if I try to force her to go my way (either by pulling on the leash or physically trying to move her), she seems to freeze up even more and it will take even longer to get her to go my way.

Actually... if I have a problem, it's that she is a very sweet, well-behaved dog generally. So it's never clear to me if I should be doing more to be dominant, because 98% of the time, she isn't doing anything that needs to be corrected. But it's not clear to me if that's because of anything that I am doing, or just because that's the kind of dog she is.

Another wrinkle... the neighborhood I live in is a mish mash of asphalt roads with concrete gutters, some of which have sidewalks (mainly only on one side of the road) and some of which don't. And some of which have one house with a sidewalk from one side of the yard to the other out of ten houses on the street. (I assume those houses got built after the code changed to require sidewalks.) Trink prefers to walk on the concrete, since the asphalt is both hot and rough. Which is great most of the time, since there's the gutter, and it keeps her nicely located at heel. The issue comes up when there are several cars parked along the street. Generally in those cases (with or without the dog) I will go up in the yard to get past the cars, rather than walking down the middle of the street. It just seems safer, it's what I did when growing up in a neighborhood without sidewalks, and I actually stay closer to the street than the sidewalks are. Technically the first 10 feet of the yards are easements, which is why the sidewalks go in them and the city can tear it up if they want to widen the street, etc. On the other hand, until that happens, people treat it like yard. So I always feel vaguely guilty when I do that, but at the same time I've seen people walking with dogs and kids down the middle of the street, which seems both unsafe and rude as well, since it inconveniences traffic, which can't go anywhere else. So, what's the best option there? (And don't get me started on people who let their landscaping crowd the sidewalks! The dog can't help getting on the grass if I am having to go to the very edge of the sidewalk to avoid the grasp of a rosebush that hasn't been trimmed back.)

This thread reminds me I have so spoiled Aster with quality of life enhancing walks (sniffs?), that a ''get somewhere'' heel doesn't work very well any more. What was once a well trained dog guide has become a spoiled old dog.

I hate to apply even the more gentle corrections to a Lab pushing 14. Perhaps, when I want to get somewhere, I should try the Gentle Leader.

Note, how does everybody feel about letting your dog swim in a housing development detention pond? Not my development. It is a new one without any houses yet. We walk by a couple of scummy old ones.

Froggy, that is a very tough call. I know exactly what you are talking about. I would say err on the side of caution since this is a safety issue and walk on the edge of the lawn rather than the street. But, if at all possible, keep her from lingering on those lawns. You are right about the easement but you know how people can be about what they consider their property. You don't need one of those people turning out to be a nutjob and throwing a fit at you in public or making a lame attempt to sue you over something like this.

Labman, I don't know about that situation. If there isn't anyone living there, I don't see it as a problem. But, your dog will get used to making that stop and there may come a day when the property management company forbids you from using it. It will be tough for you to retrain the dogs not to make a beeline for the water if it is an area you pass by every day. I guess this is one of those situations where you have to make a judgement call.

Well, this morning I decided to take a few broken-up milk bones with me, to see if random treating during the walk would help her focus on me and distract her a bit from sniffing. It seems to work, although I need to find something else to treat with. She has to stop to eat the milk bone, so it makes it slightly hard to reward her for walking well. :)

One of the things I have learned about greyhounds is that they only have two walking gaits: a slow amble and very brisk walk. The amble is their more normal pace, and is really well suited for... well... ambling. Admiring the scenery, window shopping, chatting with friends, etc. The brisk walk is an almost-jog for me, but they only do it for brief bursts. A normal dog pace falls in-between the two, and is very hard for a greyhound. We've paced some of the other dog-walkers in the neighborhood, and eventually we have to drop back, because she just can't maintain that pace for too long. But ambling leads to stopping to sniff the flowers, and watch the bees, and let the neighborhood kids pet you...

Quote:

Originally Posted by froggy7

And no, it's not about cleaning up after them! I know about that.

No, here's the situation. My Trinkett loves to graze when we walk. I sometimes feel like I'm walking a cow, she nibbles on grass so much. And it's only the grown, weedyy grass... never mowed grass. Which means generally it's grass growing in people's flower beds. She doesn't bother the flowers any. I didn't think anything of letting her nibble on other people's grass, but then this morning a woman pounded on her window when she was nibbling. Now, I'll grant that the woman may have thought that the dog was getting ready to poop. But should I be trying to keep Trink from eating other people's grass? Or do most people just not care?

No let the dog eat the grass, it is healthy because of al the antioxidents in it. I have a shih tzu and she loves eating grass it helps their stomach functions.

Froggy be careful about Trink eating grass from peoples lawns. Wouldn't it poison her if it had recently been treated ? Labman how could you resist letting that girl go for a swim, I say go for it.

Hah! Half the time, I swear I have a lab instead of a greyhound. If there is a puddle around big enough to lie in, Trink will find it. The muddier the better! Went for a hike this morning, that normally follows an old road along a stream/creek. But with all the recent rains, we got to a twenty-foot stretch where the water was up over the road about to mid-shin. Trink was ecstatic... nice cool water to lie down in, and she was game for wading through it when I finally decided that I was willing to get soaked.

LOL froggy. Sounds like Trink is settling in very comfortably with you! She must be a very happy girl. BTW, Bushg brings up another good point. At this time of year, you never know what chemicals people are putting on their lawns. I am not aware of any studies that confirm lawn grass holds any nutritional value whatsoever, and it can be a problem when they poop if they have eaten too much of it. It can cause difficulty pooping or the grass will hang out of the anus and, guess who has to help pull it out? ;)

If you haven't already, watch a little bit of the TV program The Dog Whisperer. You can learn a lot about how to keep dogs obedient, and a great portion of the show is how to walk dogs properly.

Forget the Dog Whisperer. His harsh, abusive methods are the opposite of the current trend toward more positive methods.

Quote:

Originally Posted by labman

Forget the Dog Whisperer. His harsh, abusive methods are the opposite of the current trend toward more positive methods.

It does depend on what he's dealing with. Quite often, he doesn't really do much with the dog, it's training the owner to realize that they are the ones in charge. I still remember one show where a couple had a problem with a Great Dane that took over the couch, and they asked how in the world they were supposed to keep him from doing that. And Cesar did exactly what I would have... walked over, took the collar, and used it to lead the dog off the sofa to the floor. Quite often the dogs are just looking for someone who is willing to be in charge, and happily decide to follow along when presented with a leader. Most often he just uses "ah ah" and lots of exercise to tire the dog out and get it to listen and follow along.

The ones where I have seen him being harsh are dogs that, to be honest, I'm not sure I'd be willing to keep. The vicious ones that have attacked other dogs, or are biting family members... totally out of control and dangerous dogs. At which point, I'm not sure that the positive reinforcement methods would work, and what he does seems to.

The Dog Whisperer is a Hollywood production and no more trustworthy than some of the other material coming from there. Yes you see amazing results, but it is Hollywood. It is true, some of his techniques do work. Much of his work is the same thing trainers have done for years. Go back to 2003, when I joined, and look at some of my posts where I talk about leadership. You will also see some of my advice has changed since then, reflecting what I have learned. Real experts are continually learning and quick to adopt new, better methods. I am part of the trend to more positive methods. Just as an old jalopy will get you some where, his methods work. Many people are having good results with them, but in the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king. Wouldn't you rather be driving a new luxury car? Check some of the books on the list at https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/dogs/i...tml#post251804

I wouldn't exactly call touching a dog harsh.