How to deal with dogs on public hiking trails?
I occasionally try hiking or cycling, and I notoriously have to deal with the silly issue of dogs roaming freely through villages, even on public trails. Until now, never have I been threatened by a human or a wild beast – but by a domestic dog, many times.
They may ignore me, or allow me to pass but still bark at me, often they chase my bike, barking, maybe trying to bite my rear wheel or my heel; sometimes they escort me, following me calmly but steadily until I leave the village. Sometimes they allow me to pass the first time, but threaten me when I return home through the same village a few hours later. Once a dog seemed to seriously attempt to attack me – admittedly, I detoured from the track that time, though AFAIK I was still on a public road, not on a private property.
I wouldn’t like to get bitten one day…
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Statistically, most of the dogs in the world are dogs that are not pets, but live around humans and scavenge food or get food from humans who give it to them. These dogs are in my experience never aggressive with humans.
When a dog is kept as a pet, it will tend to be territorial about its home. When I've been out running, hiking, or cycling, there have been many times when these territorial dogs have hassled me. In nearly all cases, they acted aggressive and followed me, but never actually tried to bite me. So although it's annoying and their owners are being irresponsible, in nearly all cases all you really need to do is move on through, and nothing bad will happen.
People do, however, get bitten and even killed by dogs. Because the world has so many dogs in it, the risk is actually fairly high in order-of-magnitude terms compared to other kinds of accidents and injuries. Population-wide, your chance of getting killed by a dog is orders of magnitude higher than your chance of being the victim of a terrorist attack, but orders of magnitude lower than your chance of dying of a heroin overdose or in a car accident.
One way to protect yourself when running or hiking is simply that if a dog acts aggressive, you pick up a rock or a stick. Often such dogs will shy away even if all you do is pretend to bend down to pick up a rock. If you like, you can carry pepper spray. Personally, I bought pepper spray for this purpose and then ended up not bringing it with me on runs because it just didn't seem worth the hassle.
Many cyclists carry pepper spray. If you have a tire pump in a holder that's within easy reach, you can also pull it out while riding and use it the same way you would use a stick -- the dog gets intimidated when you swing it.
Where I live, in a city in the US, Animal Control is very responsive to complaints about dogs whose owners let them wander around acting aggressive. When a neighborhood dog was repeatedly chasing my kids, and the owners weren't willing to deal with the problem, calling Animal Control was what got them to stop. My understanding is that there's a significant fine, and they warn the owner that if it keeps on happening, they'll take the dog away and kill it. I would hate that to happen to my dog, but then I don't leave my dog running around on the street biting kids.
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I have experienced this problem, mainly in Spain, Germany, or the Alps. Some things I have found to work:
- Be assertive. Show who is the boss. This doesn't come naturally to me at all but the last time I encountered an annoying dog, on a rarely used trail that was passing next to a house in Spain, it actually worked.
- Hike with hiking poles. If you move the tips of a hiking pole into the direction of a dog, it will likely back off.
- Put your backpack in front of you as a protection.
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This is more of a road experience for a rural area in Washington state. Near a lake a group of pet dogs (all had nice collars) would form a pack during the day and liked to chase bikes. On flat ground I could outrun them. I carried pepper spray but was hesitant to use it. One day they caught me on an up hill and the pack leader turned his head to chop on my leg. As that point his intentions were clear. I got him clean in both eyes with pepper spray and he never bothered me again.
Bike or foot from bark to bite you will typically see them prepare to bite. Have pepper spray or other defense ready.
Walking a walking stick / pole is good defense.
Try and remain calm and proceed with a look of confidence. If you show fear is when they get more aggressive.
This a set of dogs that were probably not going to hurt the guy but no one should have to deal with that. dogs farm road
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Disclaimer: I am from Romania, my answer is a bit tailored to this corner of the world.
This issue is very common in Central/Eastern European countries and in the Balkans: not only the household dogs in villages, but stray ones (even in cities), and especially the shepherd dogs. Might be a bit repeating the other answers, but I really must point this out, as it has been the source of many accidents, attacks and (yet unsolved) disputes on law inforcements.
Shepherd dogs are bread to be aggressive: whether assertive barking when turning the hundreds of sheep, giving alarm of an intruder or scaring away bears. The herds can be met literally anywhere (I met them near my hometown, or also at 2200 m altitude in the mountains), and if you approach them they most probably become aggressive.
Methods of staying safe:
- Stay aware of your surroundings. Dogs can notice you from far, and you can also hear them. If you hear the barking from afar, slow down, don't anger them with some running pace. When approaching a village, you can automatically slow down: house guarding dogs tend to be more suspicious of hurrying/running people. Also with the sheep herds: these can be heard already from hundreds of meters - dogs barking, bells ringing etc. You can make a few hundred meter detour to avoid them/not to raise too much awareness.
- Walk with a stick. May it be a trekking pole or a random stick you find along the path, it is a good protection against dogs. No need to hit the animals, just swing it around yourself to keep them away. Find this stick in advance, not when the dogs are already behind your heels.
- Pick up stones - in time! Don't rely that you will have stones randomly laying on the ground, waiting for you to pick them up (especially in settled areas). This adds some weight to your bag, but you wouldn't notice it so much. Have a few smaller stones in your bag's side pockets, at an easily reachable spot.
- Pepper spray is an option too. Same applies: keep it at an easily reachable spot. You will have no time to search for it once you are surrounded with barking, angry dogs.
- Rather an empiric thing: I noticed that talking to the dogs helps calming them a bit. Also, if you try shouting, there are better chances the owner realizes that the dog barks at a human, so they would call their dog back (rarely applies to Romanian shepherds, though... my - and my friends' - sad experiences show that they rather stand there and laugh on the poor trekker who tries to chase the dogs away, instead of calling them back).
- If possible, make sure the owner can see you and realize you mean no harm.
- Have some food you can spare: a small piece of bread you can throw farther, or something interesting for the dogs. Of course, not sharing your whole bag, but it helps calming aggressive dogs down. They might follow you afterwards, though.
- someone recommended ultrasound dog repellents (like this one), but they seem a bit cruel to me
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