My dogs will not be anyway as well trained as Johns, in particular my terrier does largely as she pleases but I still don't think society could ever justify demanded that I muzzle them and I would say the vast majory of the dogs I know well, although many are quiet badly trained in a lot of ways, would never be regarded as a danger to anyone. I think therefore to force all dogs to wear a muzzle would be using a sledge hammer to crack a nut.
I think like you say the dogs could get used to wearing one but I don't think I could get used to washing of all the disgusting things they like sniffing at that will inevitably get attached to the muzzle. Yuk

My two have been trained from the day they came home, twice a day at least, and we go to training classes. They are terriers, and Morris is extremely independent. If I were to keep him on a lead whenever we went out he would go mad through sheer frustration and build up of energy. No matyter how far we walk, up to three or four miles sometimes, if he's on a lead, he behaves as though he hasn't been out at all. For the basic reason that he needs a lot of excercise, he is allowed off the lead in open spaces (never on the road or near children's play areas) and yes, he does run over to other dogs, but stops about a meter away and says hello gently, then runs away again, if they don't want to play, or will play for a while if the dog's up for it! he generally leaves 'on-lead' dogs alone, because they're not much fun:). He has only ever shown any aggression towards dogs twice, both times while on a lead over a year ago, growling (both times at staffs, because he's been attacked by four, and is affraid of them). I do not like the idea of having him muzzled, as this would prevent him from playing with toys, taking a drink if he needed it, and may restrict his head movement while swimming. I do beleive that aggressive or dangerous dogs shouldbe muzzled, but feel that muzzling all dogs is a little drastic.

my dog likes the muzzle

In the past, dogs, by and large were never even shut in. When I came home from school there was a Labrador “Peter” always lying in his gateway sunning himself and watching the world go by. Other dogs wandered around unrestrained in any way. Trouble is times change and places change. I lived in the country with fields all around and could walk my dogs and literally never see another dog. Now, I’ve not moved but the town has! It’s sprawled all over my house and I’m submerged in the middle of three housing estates. The only place to walk my dogs without getting in my car is the local park.
We see pictures of animals in captivity, pacing their cages because they are so bored with life and yet you want to deny the dog what little freedom it has? I can’t seriously believe that is your desire. I can take my dogs to private places to train and work so they can get their exercise. Some people I know through the working side of dogs have vast estates where their dog can run all day without seeing another. By the same token I have friends (And a relative) who live in flats without a blade of grass to their name. What of them? Are they to spend their entire lives without knowing the pleasure of so much as a five minutes of free running in their entire life! I can't believe this is what you want.
As I said, I have private fields I can use although I need a car to get to them because they are over ten miles from where I live, so for that reason I sometimes use the local park. I also have a halfway decent garden but we all know the pocket handkerchief of a garden you get with a house these days!
When I say about people who cant be bothered to train their dogs I am not talking about gundog work, obedience work of any other specialise form of training. Just good old fashioned pet training. Learning how to interrogate with society. Sorry but I will never be able to agree with you that restricting a dog to the lead for its entire life just because of the mindless few is the way to go. As you so rightly say, I am not in anyway special, hundreds of people do what I do and do it far better. But that does not affect my feelings about the moronic minority who don’t bother to do even the most rudimentary training. And I still come back to the original statement:-

I could never agree to the muzzling of my dog because some other damn fool cannot be bothered to train theirs! EVER! Or for that matter restricting them to the lead for the rest of their lives. That is victimisation of the responsible people!

John

Hi John
I know we don't agree, but I hope you realise I don't want to see muzzling compulsory either, but it is the original topic of this thread and I was giving my feelings about it.

What amazes me is to think that here we are, all us people who love our dogs and just want to keep them safe and happy are arguing the toss, when the idiots that cause the very problems we are discussing, probably wouldn't give it another thought.
Dawn.

Don’t worry Dawn, as I've said before, I only growl, never bite! :) I know people on this board care about dogs and that there more than one way of looking at everything. I'm not getting at you but just feel that education is the way to go, not compulsion.

Regards, John

You might not think you're special John, but we do :)

Fiona
x x x

You got that right Fiona , totally agree. John you are special Lol Mari

No! you two mean the other bloke!

I totally agree with you John
Why should the responsible owners dogs suffer for the sake of those who cannot be bothered to train their dogs and keep them under control. The people who 'Cant be bothered' should not own a dog in the first place.
My dogs love to free run and a walk on the lead is just not the same, where is the quality of life in a dog that has to be kept on the lead all the time AND muzzled. All my dogs are extremely well behaved when we are out walking so why should they be treated as though they are likely to be nasty. I trust my dogs 110% never mind 100%
Maybe we should muzzle some of these foul mouthed teenagers who hang around the parks and street corners and make thier parents keep them on a lead!! (now theres a thought!)

Longdog
Quite agree with the teenager bit!
Dawn.

Me to, I agree with the teenager bit...

I find it much easier to train my dogs than my teenager and pre teen. society seems intent on underminining parental authority, and as yet no one interferes with my training/discipline measures re the dogs! :D

I've just seen this thread ressurected from the depths and realised - I miss John's posts!!  :-(

This is the first time I have had a puppy of my own and i have been disgusted at the way owners let their dogs do what they like. Being a GSD at 16 weeks I cant take her on long walks so we drive to the park to have a 10 minute wander now and then. The amount of owners that have let their boisterous dogs come pounding over to my puppy is ridiculus. Especially when it is obvious she needs a few minutes to have a sniff and make sure everything is ok. She has on numerous occasions ended up jumping behind me and hiding as she is scared and the owner of the other dogs leave their dog to carry on intimidating her! This cant do much for her confidence. She is fine at puppy classes, everything is calm and relaxed and she turns into the nutter jumping in and out of the pond, the minute it looks like she may be intimidating another puppy i hold her collar and let her calm down.

The thing i was most annoyed about was a 'friend' of mine. As my pup cant be walked too far i drive to school and let her walk 2 minutes to the gates of the school, part of socialisation. She is well behaved, i dont let her go up to other children unless their parents ask if they can stroke her. The other day me and pup and kids are walking back to the car. My 'friend' goes to her car, gets out her 6 month dog to introduce her to my pup. My pup is obviously scared, backing away and trying to free herself of her collar to run away. The friend does absolutly nothing telling me bitches dont usually get on but these two are! They so wasnt. My baby was completly distressed. I started walking back to the car and my friend lets her son who has adhd hold the lead of their dog. Of course he cant hold her back and doesnt attempt to so their dog runs up to my pup and pins her to the floor. They both thought it was hilarious. I really cant see this kind of behaviour helping my pup become a confident well behaved dog. Thankfully she will still walk to the gates without being scared of bumping into their dog again but i really shouldnt have to put up with this. Their dog is also a gsd cross yet they walk her for an hour or more each time. Ok I may have read TOO much info on bringing up a dog but to be honest im bloody glad i have after witnessing the stupidity of many dog owners. It would be a good idea if there was some kind of law that meant you could only own a dog if it had been to training classes to at least learn the basic's ie.. sit come heel etc. We are not allowed to hit our children but its ok to witness people hitting their dogs? This so called friend said nothing as her son walloped their dog for basically pulling on the lead in another direction. If they had of trained her then maybe they wouldnt feel the need to hit her. It is very sad. I would hate to have my baby wear a muzzle because of irresponsable owners who strangly through lack of knowledge think they have a well behaved dog and blame everything on them 'still being a pup'. Mine is still a pup but its strange how i can keep her under control when i am out and i am a first time owner.

new owner, I completely get your point. I am fed up with irrisponsible owners myself! I have a 5 months old Chihuahua who is for now very affraid of larger dogs. He's always on the lead and I'm not the kind of person to constantly lift my dogs up, just because there's a dog across the street, but you wouldn't believe how many times I had some person with a dog that was out of control and came running straight at my boy. Billy was usually so scared that he started screaming and hiding behind me (bear in mind that he's only a bit over 1 kg). And the only thing that owner would say is...."he's not going to do anything". I don't care!! My dog is already freaking out and I seriously don't want him to be scared for life!

It is frustrating Ory, when i first took her out i had to pick her up twice, once a dog ran out of the house and went for her, second time the owners had a pug on a long extension lead, it was growling at my puppy (sounded more like purring at first!) and the owners thought it was hilarious with my dog being bigger that she was scared and they took the lock off of the extension lead. Ive refrained so far from saying anything because i dont want to scare her anymore than she already is, one day ill snap though

I muzzle my Mastiff, Bullmastiff and Rottie when I go anywhere that I may come across other dogs through the day or in a highly populated area.
I do this because a while back my Mastiff was attacked by a tiny little JRT. If it weren't for the fact that she was laid down at the time and she, thankfully, didn't respond to the attack she could have easily killed defending herself.
If that had been the Bullmastiff he would have responded although he's not generally dog aggressive.
In this situation it wouldn't have been my dogs fault but I would have felt terrible for the damage to the other dog.
My dogs don't mind their muzzles and I have no poblems with people being scared of them now whereas before the muzzles no-one wanted to stroke them. The muzzles give people, who may be a bit timid of big dogs, the added security that they won't be bitten.
My dogs also have 'muzzle free' time at night when there aren't so many people about.
I must admit I don't muzzle my JRT in case a big dog comes upto us and has a go at him. He is always on a lead so doesn't get the chance to approach any dogs he doesn't know.