# I saw this coming home



## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

Something I saw coming home that made me go hmm.....thoughts anyone? And it was a GSD so it is appropriate to the forum haha.


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## Pax8 (Apr 8, 2014)

Ugh, I hate seeing dogs on the back of trucks. The only time we let ours ride unsecured on the trucks at the ranch was when we were going pasture to pasture. But we never left them unsecured when on a road. It's just way too dangerous in case of an accident. And even past that, I can't imagine flying road debris and all the exhaust and fumes from the roadway is healthy for them.


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

Can't stand seeing that or kids..

This picture I took was on a highway. At a couple points the driver was zig zagging and going at least 80mph...the kid was about 10 yrs old or so.. I sped up to take this picture. I was going to call the pice but the driver was going so fast that I wouldn't have been able to give a location and jurisdiction changes on the highways.


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## car2ner (Apr 9, 2014)

I can remember the days when my friends and myself sat on deck chairs in the bed of a truck while it went through town. Yes, it was dangerous and I'd never do it now. So I see these things and thank God I survived the stupids. I hope they don't learn the hard way that this is a foolish way to transport their dogs. 

For the record, my current dog wears a seatbelt harness. My previous dogs slide around on the back seat of my car or in the back of my truck, that had a bed cover, too much when I had to stop or turn unexpectedly fast.


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## Arlene/Archer (Mar 7, 2013)

Nope, not for me. One sharp turn or brake and the dog goes flying.


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## Kayos and Havoc (Oct 17, 2002)

Sadly, it is against the law in my town to allow a dog to ride loose in a truck bed - but it is NOT against the law for a kid to ride back there. 

I like that we protect the dogs but why not the KIDS???


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## scarfish (Apr 9, 2013)

prolly some ******* laws out there. NJ has some strict booster seat 'till 12 law. that's like 6th grade. that must be embarrassing to get out of your mom's car from a booster seat in front of school. just getting to junior high and climbing out of a booster seat must be the worst. prolly why tenage suicide is up these days.


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## Jax08 (Feb 13, 2009)

Next time, instead of taking a picture, call 911 and report it.


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## scarfish (Apr 9, 2013)

i don't know, michelle. i doubt the 911 dispatcher is going to rally the posse over a dog in the back of a truck. you're prolly better off pulling next to him and calling him a scumbag.


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## onyx'girl (May 18, 2007)

Dogs are legally able to ride in open truck beds in MI. I saw a guy bring his Lab to the vet in an open bed.
There is also someone local that has his GSD in the back of his truck often(even in the frigid winter) The dog almost bailed as he turned sharply and hit a bump. I was so sad for that dog.


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## Magwart (Jul 8, 2012)

I've been rear-ended in heavy stop-and-go traffic by a young guy who had a loose lab in the back of his truck. He had noticed that his lab had spotted a squirrel and was about to jump out, so he was concentrating on the dog in his mirror and trying to talk to it through the back slider window--not on the stopped traffic ahead of him. Luckily, due to the congestion he wasn't going very fast so I wasn't injured.

It's dangerous for the dog AND for people.


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## Jax08 (Feb 13, 2009)

scarfish said:


> i don't know, michelle. i doubt the 911 dispatcher is going to rally the posse over a dog in the back of a truck. you're prolly better off pulling next to him and calling him a scumbag.


If it's illegal they will send the police.


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## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

llombardo said:


> Can't stand seeing that or kids..
> 
> This picture I took was on a highway. At a couple points the driver was zig zagging and going at least 80mph...the kid was about 10 yrs old or so.. I sped up to take this picture. I was going to call the pice but the driver was going so fast that I wouldn't have been able to give a location and jurisdiction changes on the highways.


Wow. This is unreal!!


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## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

scarfish said:


> prolly some ******* laws out there. NJ has some strict booster seat 'till 12 law. that's like 6th grade. that must be embarrassing to get out of your mom's car from a booster seat in front of school. just getting to junior high and climbing out of a booster seat must be the worst. prolly why tenage suicide is up these days.


This made me laugh. Haha


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## middleofnowhere (Dec 20, 2000)

In Oregon it is illegal to have a dog unsecured in your truck bed. That doesn't mean it doesn't happen. I've been tempted to copy the page from the driver's manual and leave it on windshields.


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## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

I'm new-ish to California so I don't really know the laws here but never thought to look Into the dog in the bed of a truck law because, I don't have a truck. Also, I would never put my dog in the bed of my truck IF I did. Now I am tempted to look out of curiousity.

Here is what is the most surprising part about what I saw though, was not just the dog in the truck, but the way the dog was hanging on the side of the truck, looking like it could almost fall out. And the owner jussst kept driving like, with not a care in the world.


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## maxtmill (Dec 28, 2010)

That is just horrible to see! I always see a number of dead dogs on the interstate on my 3 1/2 hr drive to my daughter's house here in Alabama. No doubt, many were thrown from trucks!


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## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

maxtmill said:


> That is just horrible to see! I always see a number of dead dogs on the interstate on my 3 1/2 hr drive to my daughter's house here in Alabama. No doubt, many were thrown from trucks!


So horrifying!


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## Springbrz (Aug 13, 2013)

We were behind a truck with a beautiful GSD tethered to a truck bed utility box. The dog got tangled in the tether and was hanging himself. We were just about to stop the driver of the truck when he fortunately noticed his dog in distress in the truck bed and pulled over. He untangled the dog but still left him in the bed of the truck. My heart sank and I worried about that poor dog all the way home from our trip.

There is another gentleman I know from our local dog park that has a senior GSD with severe cataracts and is nearly blind. He tethers her in the bed of his truck. It makes me sick every time I see it. Oddly, this guy really loves his dog, but just doesn't get how dangerous it is. I just don't know what people are thinking.


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## scarfish (Apr 9, 2013)

to be honest i'm guilty of having a dog fall out of the back window of a car on the street. right in the middle of a busy intersection.


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## newlie (Feb 12, 2013)

It's funny this subject came up today because I was stopped at an intersection this morning and heard a dog barking and it sounded really loud. I started looking all around and finally saw another car with a German Shepherd in the back seat. The back window was almost all the way down and the dog had his head and upper body out the window. It gave me the creeps because I don't know anything that was keeping that dog in the car, it looked like he could fall or jump out any second. I roll the back window part the way down for Newlie so he caan stick his nose out but that's as far as I go.


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

I've jumped into the bed of a truck a few times when I was a kid. And when Cujo was dying, we loaded him into half a crate and lifted it into my dad's truck -- he could not walk or get up. So I rode back there with him the few village blocks to the vet.

But when I was in my late teens or early twenties, a lady was driving a pick up here in town, with seven children in the back, and got into an accident, and several of the kids died. I never forgot that. And riding in the bed of a pick up is generally something I would never do, for people or dogs -- the Cujo thing was really the only way my dad could get the dog there with the least amount of pain, etc. We couldn't fit the crate into the cab, and there was no way to get him in there without hurting him more. Best for me to travel back in the back with him. 

My parents had a van for their TV business when I was small. That was our family vehicle. When we went somewhere, dad put a spindly kitchen chair in the passenger side for my mother, and the four of us kids fought over the wheel wells. We also sat on my dad's lap and steered while he was driving. And my mom used to not only drink in the car, but she would pour her beer into a beer mug in front of God and everyone. And leave it there between the driver and passenger seat while she shopped. Ah, the good ole days. It's amazing we someone made it to adulthood.


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## BARBIElovesSAILOR (Aug 11, 2014)

newlie said:


> It's funny this subject came up today because I was stopped at an intersection this morning and heard a dog barking and it sounded really loud. I started looking all around and finally saw another car with a German Shepherd in the back seat. The back window was almost all the way down and the dog had his head and upper body out the window. It gave me the creeps because I don't know anything that was keeping that dog in the car, it looked like he could fall or jump out any second. I roll the back window part the way down for Newlie so he caan stick his nose out but that's as far as I go.


I do the same thing for Captain, just enough to stick out his nose and nothing more haha.

@Selzer, I don't blame your dad for Cujo. I'm not opposed to riding in the back of the truck (dog or human) if it is an emergency situation, someone is dying, and there is no other vehicle. But that is pretty much the only time. I have had to ride in the back of a truck before but it's because like I said, nothing else was available. 
I also sometimes wonder how we made it this far. My mom used to put me in the front seat next to her without a seatbelt at 3 yrs old. I think things were just different back then. :-/


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## DixieGSD (Aug 22, 2012)

Personally i think if you train your dog to ride properly in the back of anything, it'll be ok. Bad to admit but Dixie has rode in the back of trucks, she is not to stick her body out like that dog, or stick her head out to far. If she does i yell get back and she usually just lays down. The reasoning she rode in the back of an uncovered truck was because i was driving my father in law's truck and that was the only way I could take her someplace to walk and swim (she could not ride in the cab). Other than that she rode in the back of a covered truck with a window she could look out of. And now we just have a car so she sit's in the backseat. I do not agree with how that dog is sticking his whole body out.. And the kid! oh my gosh, I hope nothing bad happens to ANY kid/dog.


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## jjk454ss (Mar 26, 2013)

Used to be something we did, never thought twice about it. Us and the dogs both.


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

No one leaves home in a car thinking, today I am going to get in an accident. But dogs or children in the back of pick up trucks don't stand a chance. Just slamming on the brakes to avoid an accident can cause a canine to be flung against the truck or even out of the bed of the truck where he could be run over or lost or just killed on impact. 

If you must put a dog in the bed of your pick up, for heaven's sake put it in a crate and tie the crate down properly.


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## Nikitta (Nov 10, 2011)

My dogs are tethered riding in a car; and I NEVER let them stick their heads out the windows. Nose to a little crack is the best they get.


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## Gwenhwyfair (Jul 27, 2010)

There's a guy around here with a gorgeous black sable. The dog rides in the bed of the fancy lifted diesel truck of his. (Lifted heavy diesels are so stupid sorry the stupid thing will sink due to weight...). 

It's all about status and showing off in that case, truck and dog.

Sometimes, where I used to train I'd see dogs in a crate that is strapped down to the bed of a truck. That's better but I still would worry because they are exposed to more external forces should an accident happen.


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## selzer (May 7, 2005)

Ya gotta do what you gotta do. In a crate that is properly tied down, at least the dog will not be flung out of the vehicle and smooshed in a non-accident situation. There is another thing too. Stones get chucked up from wheels. How easy is it for a dog to lose and eye or be disfigured when his head is hanging out the window. Some things simply aren't smart but we never consider them because that is just what people do, and we never thought about before. Someone might read this thread and enjoy an illumination. Telling people who are currently practicing a potentially dangerous situation never seems to end well, no matter how well-intended and properly delivered.


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