# Times you have been THAT owner



## gsdsar (May 21, 2002)

So I recently told a brief synopsis of s hike I took with one of my dogs. A hike in which I was that annoying owner we all like to complain about. 

It got me thinking, I know we all strive to be good dog owners and responsible owners. I actually take it very seriously. But we all slip up on occasion. None of us are perfect. I thought it would be good/fun to share those stories, so new owners coming to this board can learn from our mistakes. I will start with a few stories of my own: 

1- yesterday hiking with my lab, she was going crazy being off leash and running around like a total fool in the woods, having a great time. 2x during our hike, she got pretty far in front of me and ended up running smack into other hikers. One a woman with a GSD and the other 2 equestrians. Luckily my dog listened to her recall. But I felt terrible!! I would have been ticked off if I was one of those hikers. 

2- at my moms house with my previous male (RIP Ike) and she had left her door open, but screen door closed, or so we thought. We hear a boat load of barking, getting further away and I realize it's my dog. I go running upstairs and find my mom, chasing my dog around a little fox terrier screaming "Ike come here, don't worry he is a search dog" and hear the little dog screaming in fear and the owner totally wrapped up in the leash. I get out side, grab my dog by the scruff, throw him inside and head out to check on the little dog. Who was fine. Ike never even touched him. The owner was shaken up. I offered to pay for a vet exam. But the dog was fine. 

3- not dog, but medical. My cat Gabriel, aka Spawn of Satan, RIP, was acting weird one night. He had been acting up lately, attacking for no reason being a douche, but I was going to the bathroom and he came in and squatted to pee, RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME!! Right on the floor! I was ticked. I locked him in the bathroom (with food and a litter box and water) to obstensibly teach him a lesson. If that's even possible with cats. The next morning I checked on him. He was still acting like he was peeing on the floor. But no urine. I picked him up, and could feel his bladder, huge and hard as stone. My poor baby had a urinary obstruction!! I rushed him into my work( I am vet tech) and we got him unblocked, but I felt horrid. My poor cat could have died. I learned that I am terrible when my own pets have medical emergencies. 

4- last story, there are more, but someone may call AC if I share anymore. Years ago, hiking with Ike and Lena. We were all walking and see on the path in front of us a woman with her 3 dogs. I called my dogs and they came back, leashed them and moved off the path. My dogs went crazy(this is the exact reason I only take one dog at a time now) and Lena pulled out of my hands and charged the woman. I screamed the dreaded "she's friendly" and nearly punched myself as I was saying it. The woman hollered back, "my hound isn't! " I was THAT annoying owner. I then had to try to grab Lena, while hanging onto Ike( who was all hyped up) while this poor owner tried to handle her three large leashed dogs. Sooooooo embarrassing. Again luckily no fight or injury. But that woman was ticked. As she had every right to be. 


So what have I learned. Check doors, don't trust screen door locks, only take as many dogs as you can handle, pay attention to your pets odd behavior, apologize when you are in the wrong, take responsibility and don't make the same mistake twice. 


Anyone else find themselves dealing with the consequences of poor planning or inattention?


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## Thecowboysgirl (Nov 30, 2006)

Oh yeah. I have to think of the good ones, but thank you for being a responsible, respectable dog owner and SAR dog handler (right)? And being willing to put yourself out there and say you screwed up. I am certain we all have


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## holland (Jan 11, 2009)

This is one I can remember...and oh was I a bad dog owner-ugh. It was my golden Chelsea-my first dog as an adult. She was very active. My friend and co-worker were going home for the holidays with her brother and I drove them with Chelsea. When we got to the house she and her mother invited Chelsea and I in...Chelsea had been in the car for hours and had a lot of energy. She was playing with their mixed breed dog and they were running around the house ....we were eating lunch and Chelsea jumped up and grabbed the whole sandiwich from my friends brother...then I heard her mother say very calmly "oh Chelsea" and I went in the living room and Chelsea had pooped on the white carpet. I was horrified.... I apologized a million times and we left....


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## Jack's Dad (Jun 7, 2011)

WellI have many and type too slow so I'll just do one for now.

I was running at the local high school that my daughters attended. I had my Shepherd Husky mix with me to run on the track. If she stayed with me no problem. Well I start daydreaming and not paying any attention, then I look up to see her just finishing a nice big poop right next to the guys practicing football, the coach is walking towards me. He gets there and I realize that I have no poop bag. I got a nice lecture, apologized and got out of there. Worse even was I knew some of the kids on the team because of my daughters.

This could be the longest thread ever if we're honest.


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## Muskeg (Jun 15, 2012)

If we're honest, we've all probably been "that owner" at some point, I think.

Since I've made so many mistakes once I vowed never to make again, I have been doing pretty well for quite some time with my dogs, I can't think of anything recent... huh. I guess learning from mistakes does work, so there is hope for us all!


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## wolfy dog (Aug 1, 2012)

About 35-40 years ago with my first dog, a Bouvier X. He lunged on leash and off leash he would charge dogs and sometimes start a fight. I would holler then that he didn't cause injuries.
This is still embarrassing to this day. Because of him I started learning about dog behavior and eventually got smarter in it.


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## islanddog (Jun 27, 2016)

In the woods at the pond with my last two gsds, Dynamo (a young thing then) & Zandor, placidy middle aged.
The pond is where people congregate with their off-leash dogs. Dynamo was engaged in high energy play, so I watched hem like a hawk.
Then I heard yelling.
I looked over, and there was Zandor, helping himself to someone's bowl of soup. It had never occurred to me that people would be sitting down having lunch there.

Oops.

Never assume anything.


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## Casto (Jun 18, 2016)

Screen doors and windows. I remember when i had screens. lol JK may 2 of them RIP though. haha I put the kids to sleep. Let Jupiter out in the yard, fenced in. After about 5 minutes I hear the loudest noise. He caught the top corner of the screen and proceeded to slowly pull it apart. Stopped for a second as I yelled "off" lol Then yanked, succeeded tuned and ran with a "screen cape". Also, the other night somehow, he closed the valve that controls our Gas furnace, Gas Stove and Hot Water Heater. Seemed physically impossible. wife was cooking... the stove stopped burning. hmmm I had Just let Jupiter out and the city's equipment is in our fenced area, pretty contained but the valve was between the gas pipe and the house. No muzzle room... no paw room. I guess he used his Ninja Tongue to grab and pull that valve closed. Luckily I noticed the valve on off position, it stood out, because I've had to work pressure systems in the oil and gas industry at one point in my life. I'm 31. lol turned it on. Only thing I had to relight was the Water Heater, other other stuff has the electric ignition systems.


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## Thecowboysgirl (Nov 30, 2006)

Very early on in my relationship with my now husband, we were eating chinese takeout using the coffee table. He had a bowl of soup. My dog tried to sniff it and I said "dont worry, she won't touch it". Alone in my house I could leave a plate of food anywhere and she wouldnt eat it. Of course what did she do, she took a big slurp of his soup. He still teases me about this and she has never before or since touched food that didnt belong to her.

One day back on my farm I was out with the dogs and I see the animal control truck drive by. Because I am paranoid, I count my dogs and sure enough I am missing one. I frantically dall animal control thinking they have picked her up (my wandering lab mix). They said they had not picked up a dog on my road. So phew, kind of, but still couldnt find the dog. I go out on the road, long straight road, to see if I can see her. I did see her, inside the neighboring property's fence and coming home. She vanished into a pepper bush and popped out back on my side. I go investigate and find out when we had our new permiter fence built they failed to connect it to the existing front fence and there was a 2 ft gap between the two conveniently hidden by this pepper bush. My dogs had been using this as their personal highway. Thank god there werent livestock on that side or it would have been a whole different story


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## Daisy&Lucky's Mom (Apr 24, 2011)

I've been that owner multiple times. Charlie who can unlatch a gate if not secured just so is my latest. Neighbor is on speed dial as she heads straight for his house. anytime she can get out. We really watch our gates and have u rings on all but the vehicle gates as we cant on those. She can get the one vehicle gate lose usually on the day the gas company has been there. Its been a while but I know how close I got to watch her. She has made to his back door three times in the last year.


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## Nurse Bishop (Nov 20, 2016)

This is why I like to ride my horse in the California Point Reyes Natl. Seashore forests and mountains . No dogs are allowed on the trails- on leash or off.


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## SiegersMom (Apr 19, 2011)

We are perfect never had and issue......haha. Embarrassing story. Walking downtown one day with Sieger my gsd, we are in front of the court house practicing halt sit, stay and heel. My dog is very pretty and always got a lot of notice and people looking at him and stopping to admire him. So we are at the crosswalk light he is sitting nicely at my side and just being soooo good. Cars are driving by looking at us and I am thinking they are just checking out my dog because he is behaving so good and is just a good looking dog. The light changed and I tell him to heel and start to walk...I look down and realize he is humped up taking a monster dump right in the middle of the sidewalk! I left my poop bags in the car. We walked while my daughter was in dance class. I walked to my car and drove back to the scene of the crime and pickup the offending and very embarrassing package!!!


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## newlie (Feb 12, 2013)

One of the ones that popped into my head was returning home with Newlie after a visit to the vet. Because Newlie can be reactive, I am always hypervigilant when I take him out anyplace. That particular day, though, the vet visit had been fine, we had gotten home and I had him on my front porch getting ready to unlock the door, literally a step away from being inside. I heard a noise behind me and I looked around and saw the little neighbor girl cutting through the yard. That would have been fine as Newlie knows her and is good with all people anyway. But something about the look on her face must have alerted me and several seconds later, I saw she had her dog with her off-leash. I grabbed Newlie and pulled him in front of me while the neighbor girl grabbed her dog. Nothing happened, they never got near to each other, but what was embarrassing and funny, was that Newlie, having spotted the dog before I grabbed him, proceed to push his big head through my legs so in essence, it looked like I was riding a horse backwards. It is funny now but not so much then, I was too shaken up. A good lesson in that you can never afford to let your guard down.


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## Themusicmanswife (Jul 16, 2015)

I was fresh out of college and was working in a group home for developmentally disabled adults. My first GSD loved going to work with me and all of the clients adored him. He was such a gentle giant with them. I wasn't always able to bring the dog. One night, I agreed to take one of my clients to my house after work to see the dog. Not a big deal and I had done it before. After we got to my apartment, I had to pee quickly. While I was in the bathroom, my client left with my dog! It was dark and now night. My client was not very verbal and I doubted he knew how to get home. I searched and searched. Friends and coworkers searched. My client came back to the group home alone about an hour later. No dog! I searched and searched. All my client could tell me was that the dog was in a tree. My dog was waiting at the door later that night. Yikes. 

That's my worst story and we'll leave it at that!


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## cdwoodcox (Jul 4, 2015)

SiegersMom said:


> We are perfect never had and issue......haha. Embarrassing story. Walking downtown one day with Sieger my gsd, we are in front of the court house practicing halt sit, stay and heel. My dog is very pretty and always got a lot of notice and people looking at him and stopping to admire him. So we are at the crosswalk light he is sitting nicely at my side and just being soooo good. Cars are driving by looking at us and I am thinking they are just checking out my dog because he is behaving so good and is just a good looking dog. The light changed and I tell him to heel and start to walk...I look down and realize he is humped up taking a monster dump right in the middle of the sidewalk! I left my poop bags in the car. We walked while my daughter was in dance class. I walked to my car and drove back to the scene of the crime and pickup the offending and very embarrassing package!!!


 This has happened twice to us. I think Rosko uses poop to aid in his marking repertoire. Whenever we're hiking he will have to stop and poop on the side of the trails. I never thought much of it. It's in the woods as long as it's off trail who cares. One day last June while on vacation Rosko and myself are walking downtown blue ridge waiting on my wife and the kids to get done from their train ride. All of a sudden the leash tightens and I look back to see Rosko pooping in the middle of the sidewalk while everyone is looking like really. Luckily a lady went into a store and got me a bag so I could clean it up. 
The other time happened a couple weeks ago during his first fly all practice. We were working on me going two or three jumps back and calling Rosko while someone held his collar. Once called she would release and he would run to me. I would then walk him back through the jumps to the holder. About our 4th time walking back I said come on Rosko and started walking. About half way back I noticed he wasn't beside me looked back to see him pooping on top of one of the jumps. (they were low for a little yapper dog.) of course he was the only dog out there so everyone was looking at him. He didn't care just pooping with a big old smile. I was like WTF Rosko. Lol.


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## CatChandler (Jul 25, 2016)

Lots of poop stories here, I'll add one to the pile. 

Scout and I were most of the way through our walk and I realized I'd left my poop bags at home. He started to squat and I said "No!" and tugged his leash. He was fine for another block, then started to squat. "No, we're almost home!", feeling guilty as heck for not letting this poor dog poop. At our cross street, he paused just to lift his leg on a fire hydrant - and poop shot out of him. When he finished pooping, he put his leg down like this was a normal thing, scratched the grass up, and trotted home.


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## Nurse Bishop (Nov 20, 2016)

10 month old Inga lives on a ranch and poops where she wants. At the moment she is in heat and leaves spritzes of her perfume everywhere for her suitors, the coyotes. At night, they come right up in the yard and howl. We refer to them as Owoo and the Backup Singers. No romance allowed here.

Anyway, she most recently embarrassed me with the Police K9 officer. He was coming out of the feed store to his police vehicle. I had pulled up next to it hoping to see his dog. Inga was in her kennel cage in the back of my truck. The officer said his dog was at home at the moment. I showed him Inga, and said she knows 26 commands at 10 months. He said his dog, a Malinois, was 18 months old and is a Drug Detection Dog, a Search and Rescue Dog and a Working Police Dog (I suppose that means Shutzhund ). I said wow that is so impressive and got Inga out to show off some of her obedience commands. All wiggly and happy, she broke her sit and jumped all over the police officer.


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## SiegersMom (Apr 19, 2011)

Nurse Bishop;8239242 He said his dog said:


> No on the Schutzhund. Schutzhund is sport. Police dogs learn in real life situations...they can't back off if the person they are chasing hits or kicks at them. Many sports dogs would not stand firm if they were being hit by a real criminal. Does not mean some sport dogs could not do both but the working police dog training is different. Those dogs have to go full out no matter what gets thrown at them.
> I'm sure he still loved your wiggly pup. Mine are have done that too. All the training goes out the window and they just want to bounce around!!!!


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

Well, this afternoon Oscar met me at the front door when I went to leave for work. As each pounding of snow half-melts and freezes, getting in and out of their kennel has been more interesting, so long as I can get the latch down... Well, with the kennel partly open, the latch only needed to be pushed a little to let the gate come the rest of the way open. Will attack it with a wrench tomorrow morning, and it will be tight. But for today, I pushed it into place, and then used a small dog collar that was right there, to keep it from opening any further. The scamp couldn't have been loose for more than 15 minutes, because that is how much time I had between finishing them, and being out the door for work. But still, I kind of pride myself at not letting my dogs get loose. 

Then there was that morning when the dogs were all in the sun room, in crates, waiting to go outside for the day, and they woke up and were being rather bitchy. It was early so I rolled over and went back to sleep. One of them continued to bitch. Finally I did get up and all ticked off, I went out there, and Bear had a marrow bone caught over the lower half of her muzzle. I don't know how she did it. She was not happy. I looked at her and said, "I'll take care of that." And then I went and let everyone else out for the day, came in, took a shower, and drove her to the vet, barging in on their morning meeting to have them do something with this bone. They laughed and said there was a trick to it. I thought they would have to cut it off, but they did not. I reported it here and got my clock cleaned for taking a shower before rushing her to the vet. But, she was maybe uncomfortable, not in danger. 

And then, I have been known to go up to perfect strangers in PetsMart and demand how old that puppy is, and then tell them, "Get it up!!! Off the floor!" and lecture them about neonatal puppies and disease. -- Yep, those people probably went back and reported to their dog-sites about the crazy woman at PetsMart. 

I've been known to brake for German Shepherd Dogs, tell their owners how nice they are and ask where they got them. 

And once or twice I have been guilty of petting a dog (usually in class) without asking permission first.


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## Hineni7 (Nov 8, 2014)

Ugh... Well, I train for SAR alot (alot alot).. When doing urban trails, I try to make sure my dogs have done their 'duty' before starting the trail, but inevitably one or both will have to take a dump mid trail... On the good days I look like a weirdo jogging behind my dog (SAR vest and harness on so of course level of expectation of dog manners is higher.. Not) with a baggie full of poor hoping I come across a trash can.. On the bad days... The days when the dog dumps on a lawn or in front of a business and I have to mock search my pockets for a baggie while my dog is trying to drag me down the trail.. I feel horrible! I do try to get back and pick up anything left... But it is just embarrassing in every way imaginable to have your SAR dog dump in full view... Ugh... I'm also the one, trying to be polite telling people the dog is working and please don't pet/step in front of/get in the way on purpose /no she isn't dragging me due to ill manners/no this is practice not a real search/etc while trying to read my dog, avoid traffic, handle comms if necessary (I RARELY have a flanker) /and suck air (my girl is an extremely fast mover slowed to a good jog for her and a fast jog for me and pulls like a freaking freight train) and look semi dignified while I hold a poop bag full of, well, poo,...... Yup.. One of those owners


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## car2ner (Apr 9, 2014)

We took our dogs for a walk through D.C. the other day. Both dogs handled the crowds, sounds and ever changing scenes quite nicely. But eventually my she-pup got tired and I was too and I let my guard down. My youngster turned to a small child in a stroller and barked at him loudly. It scared the poor child and made him cry. I felt terrible. I apologized to the parents, who were visiting America on holiday by the looks of it, and would have done anything to sooth the little boy if I could have. Needless to say I put my dog into a down right away. I also put her prong collar on and had her stay near me for the rest of the walk. 

But to be fair to my dog, I also made sure she had the space she needed between people and us, especially when we stopped. Folks loved to stop and talk dog or ask to pat them. I also made sure my she-pup had a few moments of quiet time to rest.


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## labX (Dec 7, 2016)

Let see 
Gigi was a bully by birth ,the 3 month old puppy that bullies 6 month old bigger puppy. Thanks to the supervising trainer that knocked that out her.
Diving into a lake at 4 months after mama ducks and her dozen ducking while my kids are screaming to save them and other kids and parents looked at my monster.
She would look scary with her mohawk and barring all her teeth ...We code named it stink face. 
Dog reactive when young till we corrected it .
I hate when kids scream that the dog bit them when I tell them she is teething and stay away at campground.
Escaping from our camper and entering the public shower to check on dad.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

Well, I forgot my dog the other day. 

This is the first time. 

It was Milla. 

I bring her in when I feed and water the others, and clean kennels so I can use her area for keeping critters safe when I let others out. 

I forgot to let her out at the end of the procedure. I left her in the crate while I got ready for work, left, and when I got home, I took care of my sister's parakeet and guinea pig before coming down to let Babs in. Then I saw Milla there in the crate. 11 hours easy. 

She was fine, but still, I hate leaving a critter in a crate. 

Now when I leave, I have to see her at her gate.


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## Jenny720 (Nov 21, 2014)

Inadequate fencing. Awhile back Max was able to fly over our fence which was four feet most of it was blocked with hydrangea bushes and such but he found a small spot where was clear. What fueled his escape were our kids in front yard. After that he just jumping over the fence because he could. We would watch him from the house as headed in the direction to escape he would stop and turn around to check if we were watching or not. My husband had to attach deer fence on top of the existing fence all around the perimeter of the yard as if we were in the front he would try to find a new spot if we were out front. It is over six feet now and he is safely contained in his yard.


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