My First Post! - Protecting 'property'

[MajorPowerchord]

This site is great. I am trying to catch up on all the threads so I hope this doesn't repeat a question. I also apologize if this is in the wrong section.

Here is my question/scenario:

I and my wife are walking our Dachshund (small yappy dog) on a leash on the sidewalk. I am carrying (because it's legal and it's my right!). We notice a threatening dog (doberman, pitbull, german shepard..whatever) running towards us. It's obvious the dog is about to eat my dog. I see the owner 30 seconds behind the rushing dog. In this situation, I would have no problem drawing and firing. I would fire the first shot in the ground to see if the sound would scare the rusing dog away or stop it in order for owner to catch it. If that didnt work, I would fire COM.

Question: Does this sound OK? I can't imagine picking my dog up and then being attacked myself as the attacking dog tries to get my wimpy dog. I also can't imagine letting my dog get eaten in front of me while my wife watches in horror.

Is there a 'better' way to handle this? Do I have to take a bite first to prove the dog was dangerous?

 

[trickyasafox]

whose to say the dog is going to attack your dog and not you and your wife. the distinction between the two would be hard to percieve in that short of time. im a dog lover, but if i feel one is rushing me or a loved one, sometimes they need to be put down

 

[Mad Chemist]

At <10yds, I don't think I could draw and fire from concealment before a charging dog would be all over me. You may be faster, I don't know. Have you timed your draw?

This scenario has an inherently higher risk of self-inflicted GSW or hitting bystanders. I've read of 2 incidents (both involving LEOs) where these were the results. I'll try to find a link for the articles.

Trying to shoot a dog off of yourself or another seems like a losing proposition.
Unless I have plenty of time to draw, I'd go with the old boots and blade combo.

JH

 

[hso]

Rounds fired at the ground can be problematic. If you're on pavement you've got a ricochet. If it's towards the oncoming dog you've got a ricochet that's now traveling about a foot above the pavement that won't stop until it hits something.

 

[MajorPowerchord]

At <10yds, I don't think I could draw and fire from concealment before a charging dog would be all over me. You may be faster, I don't know. Have you timed your draw?

I have not timed my draw. Lets just assume I saw the dog coming down the street and had time to draw.

I think my question was answered though. Shooting a loose dog to protect a leashed dog is OK.

Also, as far as the boot & blade tactic goes; I dont want to:

A. Go on long walks in boots carrying a knife AND a gun
B. Kick, fall, get eaten while trying to unholster my gun

 

[Herself]

You don't routinely carry some sort of knife? Gosh!

Why not?

At one time, smaller-caliber revolvers were sold to carry as protection against attacking dogs. Still kind of difficult to be sure you have a clear shot.

--H

 

[MajorPowerchord]

You don't routinely carry some sort of knife? Gosh!

Why not?

--H

Wow...this group gets rough quick. I feel like chum in the water.

OK, next time I go out, I will take a walking stick, knife, katana, pistol, and light saber...all while wearing a suit of armor made of kevlar.

 

[wmenorr67]

Major
Don't get to bent out of shape. Most of the people on this board try and think of alternative measures of defense before having to use the last resort. I know that I carry a small folder, clipped inside my pocket everywhere I go.
Welcome to the board and remember not to take anything someone says too personnally. We all are here to try and learn plus help out those who may need some insight themselves. You have people from all walks of life on here and almost to a person they have learned as much from this board as they hae taught.

 

[Herself]

Sorry (what happened to that smiley?), I was kiddin' you.

Though at one point in time, just about everyone carried a penknife, at least. Handy things to have on hand. Why do without?

--H

 

[CalamityJane]

We have a small Dachsie and walk him often. Fortunately most around us observe leash laws, but on occasion both here and while traveling have had loose dogs around. I'm in the habit of carrying a club of some sort (from the days before I decided to become a gun person), for protection from 2 or 4 legged threats. Sometime I carry an old billy club that I got from a retired chief of police who made them; a golf club--an iron--works well too, and doesn't scream "weapon". I guess if a dog is charging us I would try to beat it off first, especially if the owner is behind it, in which case I might shoot the owner by mistake if I miss the dog.

I guess, right or wrong, even though I now own guns and feel completely comfortable with the thought of using them to defend myself and family, outside the home I will probably continue to use any other means possible first.

 

[ken grant]

Dog

Tuner has the right idea! Squat down with pistol in hand,extended forward. The dog will try to grab the nearest part to him. When he has chomped down with the pistol in his mouth,pull the trigger!!!!!! No one can say it was a bad shoot and you don't have to worry about a stray shot.

 

[Moondoggie]

First thing to consider; what do you local/state laws say about shooting a threatening dog at large? Look it up on the web, or ask an attorney...DO NOT call the cops and ask them because there's no telling what answer you'll get. Some answer "off the top" of some anonomous officer's head will not save you if it's the wrong answer.

I'd consider getting some shotshells for my carry pistol. Chamber one/put one in the next hole in the cylinder when walking my dog. Reduces the richochet problem and might convince the advancing dog to cease and desist without inflicting a fatal wound. If it doesn't stop the attack, then the next round would be a hollowpoint.

I'd also "keep my shields up" for the approaching dog owner in your scenario...there's no telling how irrational they might be over seeing their dog get shot.

BTW, my draw time from a Kydex holster to first rd fired is about 1.65 sec. The Dobie is probably closing on you at about 35 mph. Do some math and leave yourself at least 15 feet for a second shot, if needed.

 

[neoncowboy]

When I'm out on the evening dog walk, I can pretty much expect the bad dogs from the neighborhood to come approach us. Therefore, my Fox OC spray is already in my weak hand. Any dog that even comes close gets a squirt in the face and so far none of them have continued to show any interest in us at all.

No way I would open fire on the neighbor's dog just for running up to us and there's no way I'd know whether that dog were an actual threat until it was too late to shoot.

I also tend to feel a little safer spraying OC than I would say, getting in a knife fight with a dog that has attached itself to my wife's leg

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Tuner has the right idea! Squat down with pistol in hand,extended forward. The dog will try to grab the nearest part to him. When he has chomped down with the pistol in his mouth,pull the trigger!!!!!! No one can say it was a bad shoot and you don't have to worry about a stray shot.

With advice like this, no wonder anti-gun folks fear gun owners.
First, the dog may or may not grab the nearest part of you to him/her. I certainly would not count on that happening with a charging dog. Why? For the dog to grab the closest part, it means that the dog will be able to grab it while charging. There is a good chance the dog will miss unless he is used to charging full speed and grabbing a stationary object placed 1-2 feet in front of a large object such as a person.

There is also the assumption that since the hand is the closest thing to the dog that the dog will see it and go after it because it is closest. That is just plain wrong. The dog will attempt to grab whatever has his attention the best. To get the dog's attention, the hand would likely need to be moving about. So that means you need to be waving the gun around to get his attention.

Now the good part. You wait until he bites down and then you pull the trigger.and ken grant says that nobody can call it a bad shoot and you don't have to worry about a stray bullet. Both of those aspects are crap if you are counting on them as hard facts as they are indicated to be. If the dog doesn't go for the hand or misses the hand, what are you left with? You are left with a doberman crashing into you and biting you various places. Because you have gotten down on the dog's level and have allowed the dog to approach at full speed and counted on the dog to bite the pistol, then you have pretty well left yourself open to attack where the dog has ready access to your face and neck. That would be really stupid.

Say the dog does grab your hand and chomp down. This assumes he doesn't grab your hand at an angle and chomp down, causing you do discharge your gun is some direction other than into the dog itself because we all know that dogs will only bite straight on and we know that a man with a gun waiting to stop the attack of a charging doberman will keep his exteneded gun hand with gun pointed straight at the dog and not flinch.

So charging in, the dogs bites the gun and hand and you discharge the gun into the dog. Just where the hell is the bullet going? Are you counting on that all important brain stem shot? How true does your aim remain after a 60 lbs dog collides with you and bites the hell out of your hand?

Well, let's see. ken grant says you don't have to worry about a stray bullet. That is garbage. You may very well just shoot out part of the dog's cheek, the bullet encountering very little tissue in the process and that bullet then traveling down range and striking a person. Heck since this is happening as the dog collides with you and is biting, you may end up shooting your girlfriend as once the dog is colliding with you, you are not going to have very good muzzle discipline. Do you actually think you can keep the gun pointed in the intended direction as you are being hit by a 60 lb dog traveling roughly 30 mph? No, you cannot.

So if your shot over penetrates through the cheek, or anywhere else and travels down range somewhere and strikes a person, you no longer have a good shoot do you?
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MajorPowerchord, unless you are on your own property and nobody down range from you anywhere, firing a warning shot into the ground to scare the charging dog is a very bad idea. If you feel justified in using lethal force, then use it in the manner intended. Shoot the dog. If the warning shot does not dissuade the dog's progression, what makes you think you will have the time or aim to get off the second shot with which you hope to stop the dog? What happens when your gun malfunctions after the first shot? If you spend some time on the various gun boards, you will find that for good guys and bad, there is a goodly number of times when a party will get off only one shot because of some malfunction issue. We are all certain it won't happen to us, but when it does, the consequences are usually very bad.

 

[Oldtimer]

One of my neighbors has a "yappy" little dog that he takes on nightly walks. He carries a common plastic bag (the kind that they put your groceries in) and a full-sized shovel. The first time I saw him with that shovel, I jokingly asked him, "Is that a super-sized pooper scooper?". He explained that it was a dual purpose tool....for scooping dog poop AND for big dogs.

A few years ago, I was walking toward my home when a huge dog started running directly at me while fiercely growling. The neighbor that owned that dog yelled to me, "Don't worry! He doesn't bite".
I was THIS (- -) close to unholstering my pistol and shooting that dog, but I had instantaineously surveyed the background, spotting several children directly behind what would have been my aiming point.

The dog got within about 5 feet of me when it leapt up to my chest level. I had placed the situation into a "no shoot" category and immediately went into a front kick. My shoe smacked the snout of that dog solidly, and it ran off yelping in abject pain.

The neighbor who owned the dog saw all of that, and yelled, "You didn't have to do that! He doesn't bite!"

About 2 weeks after that incident, that dog owner neighbor and his wife went on a weekend trip without their small kids. They had Grandma baby sit the kids at their home.

On one afternoon, Grandma heard the kids screaming in the backyard. She looked out the window and saw the dog attacking the kids! Grandma "armed" herself with a shovel and started beating the dog with it. The dog let go of the little boy's leg, but Grandma kept on beating the dog....until it was lifeless. The little boy needed numerous stitches on his leg, and the little girl required some stitches on both of her arms.

Believe it or not, but when the mother and father returned from their weekend, they BLAMED Grandma for having over-reacted!

HMM! Wasn't it Winston Churchill that said, "Walk softly, and carry a BIG....shovel!"??????

 

[Brother in Arms]

Use a good chemical defense spray. Mailmen where the first I remember carrying such no lethal devices and that was quite a long time ago. The mailman in my neighborhood when I was a kid extolled the virtues of his when I was a boy (80's) I believe he actually carried Mace not pepper spray though. Dogs have much more sensitive nose's than we people do and I suspect it would work much better on them then on people.

Brother in Arms

 

[Brother in Arms]

Oldtimer
"Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far."
Theodore Roosevelt

But I knew what you ment

your story reminds me of an old newspaper cliping I read about my Great Grandfather. Many years ago though I am not sure when, my great grandfather was out surveying his property which was in a rural area of Maine. He was well into his about 92 years old and he always carried with him a walking stick. While he was about his property he was attacked by a bobcat, and he beat it to death with his walking stick!

My Dad still has the article clipped from a very old news paper in his geneology books.

I guess old people are good with blugeons

Brother in Arms

I thought that was rather amusing.

 

[trickyasafox]

ps welcome aboard! lots of the posts here have a bit of humour in them that is hard to detect without the smileys. if a post seems malicious, chances are its not.

again welcome!

 

[crashm1]

How 'bout dog pych 101?

I think I would try being the most dominant personality on the sidewalk first. Dogs are pack animals and are programmed to back down from the pack leader. A loud assertive NO, GET DOWN! will get the dogs attention and 95% of the time it will back down unless it has been trained to respond only to it's owner which is pretty rare. You may not be the dogs recognized pack but you can shock it out of it's prey drive at which point the owner or you should be able to get it under control with out blowing it's dumb animal head off. We are supposed to be smarter and less controlled by our base instincts/emotions than the dog IMO.

 

[springmom]

it's a dachshund...

This site is great. I am trying to catch up on all the threads so I hope this doesn't repeat a question. I also apologize if this is in the wrong section.

Here is my question/scenario:

I and my wife are walking our Dachshund (small yappy dog) on a leash on the sidewalk. I am carrying (because it's legal and it's my right!). We notice a threatening dog (doberman, pitbull, german shepard..whatever) running towards us. It's obvious the dog is about to eat my dog. I see the owner 30 seconds behind the rushing dog. In this situation, I would have no problem drawing and firing. I would fire the first shot in the ground to see if the sound would scare the rusing dog away or stop it in order for owner to catch it. If that didnt work, I would fire COM.

Question: Does this sound OK? I can't imagine picking my dog up and then being attacked myself as the attacking dog tries to get my wimpy dog. I also can't imagine letting my dog get eaten in front of me while my wife watches in horror.

Is there a 'better' way to handle this? Do I have to take a bite first to prove the dog was dangerous?

....and your first thought is NOT to just PICK UP THE DOG?????

No, don't shoot.

Springmom

 

[CORDITE]

http://www.thetimesonline.com/artic...e_county/4a17ec4fc6fcc671862570e9000a0e3c.txt

Think about this...^^^

 

[carlrodd]

This site is great. I am trying to catch up on all the threads so I hope this doesn't repeat a question. I also apologize if this is in the wrong section.

Here is my question/scenario:

I and my wife are walking our Dachshund (small yappy dog) on a leash on the sidewalk. I am carrying (because it's legal and it's my right!). We notice a threatening dog (doberman, pitbull, german shepard..whatever) running towards us. It's obvious the dog is about to eat my dog. I see the owner 30 seconds behind the rushing dog. In this situation, I would have no problem drawing and firing. I would fire the first shot in the ground to see if the sound would scare the rusing dog away or stop it in order for owner to catch it. If that didnt work, I would fire COM.

Question: Does this sound OK? I can't imagine picking my dog up and then being attacked myself as the attacking dog tries to get my wimpy dog. I also can't imagine letting my dog get eaten in front of me while my wife watches in horror.

Is there a 'better' way to handle this? Do I have to take a bite first to prove the dog was dangerous?

if you are grown man, there is no dog you should not be able to put down without a gun. start off with a nice kick to the head/mouth. if the dog does not back down, and you have no blunt anything handy, get a hold of its neck. from there you can ensure that the dog has no head movement and it should not be able to bite. if you're feeling extra mad, no one would blame you for pounding away on the snout a bit. dogs seem to be especially sensitive to strikes to the snout.

my father was a mailman for 25 years. i was blessed with a multitude of doggy self-defense stories. he confirms that a kick to the snout is the most effective course of action. and square off and look mean as well. he was never bitten.

 

[Mainsail]

I sit with the "gun = last resort" crowd on this one. I've had good results against a dog with a strong pepperspray.

JMHO

 

[carlrodd]

I sit with the "gun = last resort" crowd on this one. I've had good results against a dog with a strong pepperspray.

JMHO

oh yeah, forgot about the pepper spray. +1

 

[Sinsaba]

When in doubt...

PUNT!! (the dog that is)