Respect is earned. you pick your battles. Now what, you gonna to loose your job over this because some one lie to you about their name to avoid a ticket. 9 out of 10 people will lie to avoid a ticket.

I live right there. The guy was about a mile from the trail head, so he wasn't going to get a gun. There are no signs about leashing your dog. The GGNRA took over the land a month ago, so we don't really know the new policies yet. (well, now we do.) I only know of one person there who leashes his dog, and that's because it's an aggressive pit bull.

The guy could have handled it better, but the ranger is the one who really screwed up. She told the guy that his dog had to be on a leash. So he immediately put his dog on a leash. That should have been the end of it. Given that they took over the land so recently, a simple warning instead of a ticket would have been the way to go. I'm sure the guy didn't know a leash was required. We've been walking dogs out there forever without leashes.

It's 4500 acres of wide open spaces, and leashes are ridiculous. Taking my dog out there on a leash is pointless. Since there's nowhere else to walk and give my dog some real exercise, I'll guess I'll just throw Teddy pine cones on our street.:mad:

Well at least we know the ranger is now qualified to work in TSA, probably supervisor material.

Leashes are ridiculous? Have you considered the flip side to this situation? Dogs are unpredictable. Dogs (of all shapes and sizes) not on leashes have been known to come up to a person, unprovoked and: hump their leg, jump and scratch all over them, slobber/lick them, startle the person so they wind up injured, force a person to attempt avoidance and wind up injured, and of course bite them. I have also seen them go after and injure protected animals in parks too. I have lost count at how many times I have been witness to such dog not on a leash behaviors. Everytime the owner would not accept responsibility and everytime the owner would repeat that common phrase "he/she has never done that before!"

While I do not own a dog right now, I have in the past. So I am not anti-dog by any means. I am also not for punishing a dog because well a dog does what it does. I however am not for tolerating dog owners who will not take responsibility for their unleashed (or even leashed) dogs.

Let me give you some examples of what I've been witness to when it comes to unleashed dogs:

- Woman running on the side walk. Little poodle sized dog comes from nowhere, startles her. She veers into the street startled to avoid the dog, car then hits her.

- Unleashed dog in a state/city park on a hiking trail (dogs with permits in Boulder are allowed unleashed in Boulder for some reason) goes up to another (bigger) dog (which is on a leash). Picks a fight. The leashed dog owner tries to break it up. The unleashed dog bites him.

- Unleashed dog walking ahead of it's owner on a sidewalk where there are dining tables. Person is turned and food on the table is open. Dog goes right up and takes the food.


So my question to you would be, considering that you feel leashes are ridiculous, let's agree to not make them a requirement. In doing so however, if your dog was to do anything to another animal or person which was not warranted or desired, would you in turn agree to (a) not deny responsibility and (b) also accept any response/reprisal that an offended person deemed appropriate?

So do these leash laws apply to cats also...or is that OT?

Ranger exercised very poor judgement. Her union will demonize the dog walker and justify her actions. Once the dog was leashed and the walker turned his back there was no imminent threat. The only thing threatened was her ego.

Leashes are a good idea in many areas. My statement pertained to the area where the ranger incident happened. It's a very large area with few people. I've never seen any problems with unleashed dogs in the area. There is a chance that something could happen, but the odds are low. In this particular area, a risk/benefit analysis would probably show that the benefit of providing your dog with an opportunity for exercise outweighs the risks.

North of here, Fort Funston, in San Francisco, is a very popular place to take your dog for a walk. It gets very crowded. If dogs went off leash there, it would be mayhem. In my area, I could walk for an hour and see maybe 1 or 2 other dog walkers at the most.

In fact, a GGNRA spokesman said that they would look into allowing dogs off-leash in some areas of their new parkland. They just don't know where yet.