Rotties always cast as the bad guys :(

MrsElle

MrsElle

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Our Rottie is the daftest creature imaginable. Soft as anything, but does get a bit wound up if a dog runs up to her when she is on the lead as she was once attacked by a loose dog while she was on the lead herself. As soon as she realises a dog is ok, she is fine and is then generally let off the lead and goes off to play with her new pal.

Yesterday we took her to the beach, and on our return to the car she leapt in the boot and sat nicely while I unclipped her lead. Out of nowhere a small poodle appeared, and jumped in the boot with Elsie :eek:

Elsie was understandably nervous, in an enclosed space with no escape (I was in the way) and a small dog yapping at her. She did a half bark/half growly thing that she does when she is surprised and frightened and the poodle yelped. Elsie didn't touch the dog, but its owners came running over screaming that Else had attacked their dog and she needed to be put down.

I just stood there holding Elsie's collar with my mouth open. I couldn't believe it, and the poodles owners walked off telling anyone who would listen that their dog had been attacked by a Rottweiler.

I love Elsie to bits, but do find owning a Rottie an absolute nightmare at times. Everyone loves to hate her (until they know her, then they love her too :)), and she always seems to get the blame if another out of control dog runs up to her and has a go and she retaliates verbally.

I am going to get a Papillon next time :D

Sorry for the rant, I am stressed about horrible people saying my lovely dog is a vicious devil dog who needs putting to sleep, when she is the exact opposite.
 
I feel your pain! Had it myself with my family's GSD's. One in particular is very nervous of dogs she doesn't know and if she can't run away she will act aggressive through fear. That's brilliant news when someones out of control terrier decides its going to come charging up to her and not only yap all around her which freaks her out at the best of times, but latch itself onto her back leg....Obviously despite this terrible ignoring its owner as she screeched at it to come back when my Ellie was called a vicious, dangerous dog.

Sigh. :( She really is the sweetest dog and has come so far with her fear....however it just takes one incident like that to send her right back to square one and the happened far too often.

I tend to find its usually owners of smaller dogs that have absolutely no control over them and the little ones are often the instigators in any dog related bother. I find owners of larger dogs then to train them better and let the dogs get away with less.
 
I know hindsight is a wonderful thing but I would have screamed back that their dog was out of control to the extent that it ran over to your car and jumped in it, knobbers.

As above, had years of it with GSDs, best thing to do is to not set them up to fail, make sure they are good ambassadors for their breed and try not to let the idiots get you down!
 
She has come a long way CC, but as a rescue we will always be dictated by her past to a certain degree. She really hasn't a nasty bone in her body, unless you are a rabbit, then you are fair game (if you will parden the pun!), but the way people react towards her does get me down and makes me stressed, which no doubt gets transmitted to Elsie.

The way to go is no more rescues so next dog can be trained and socialised with no baggage, and something no one can be scared of....... :)

Seriously, I wouldn't change her for the world.
 
Is it really a rescue issue though? In the nicest possible way, if a dog popped into my boot it would get chased by me AND the dog!! I don't like rude people, I will tell them to go away and leave me alone. Elsie doesn't like rude dogs, she is telling them to go away and leave her alone . If she had wanted to do damage to the poodle, she would have done. I wouldn't worry too much x
 
With the likes of Chris Packham tarring them, nothing will change soon. Went to his talk at Dorking Halls on Wednesday night in which he said Pit Bulls and Rottweilers were a problem in this country (he was comparing them with the stats on fox attacks). I was quite cross,particularly as he has two poodles which are more likely to have aggression problems as a breed! He said a few things that grated with me that night, which was a shame, as I really liked his talk last year.

We used to look after a Rottie when I was a kid. Big soft lump, she was. She did put me in hospital with a sprained wrist though. Don't wrestle with a Rottie when you're a scrawny 11 yr old, lol! I fell backwards and it hurt. I still love Rotties, but not sure my cat would... ;)
 
Some people are just stupid :( all of the rotties that I have had the pleasure to meet have been lovely :)

If her poodle had done that to my dog, I doubt it would have ended so well :(

The owner obviously thinks it is ok to allow her dog to run riot, causing upset to others
 
OH and I applied for a couple of live-in jobs last year and Elsie had to go to be interviewed too, because of her breed. If she was a Springer or a Lab, we wouldn't have had to take her, but becasue she is a Rottie the potential employers wanted to know she was as quiet and calm as we said she was.

She passed both interviews, we passed one! :D

The nastiest dog I ever met was a Lab, would try to take a chunk out of anything that moved, human or animal. Never met a nasty Rottie yet.
 
MrsElle,

a strange dog jumped into Elsie's bed, and joined her? She didn't set about it? Really? I'm staggered. Any of mine would have nailed it there and then. I think that Elsie was contained and well mannered, which was more than can be said for the vulgar and stupid poodle, and it's twinsy owner.

I wouldn't give it a second thought. Anyway, it was only a poodle, a lesser creature, and the dog of a fop! :D

Alec.
 
We are now onto our third rottie. We've recently moved and the dog walkers round here are more into dogs being designer than actually loving them if you see where I'm coming from. People walk the other way when they see us, hide in bushes or cross the road...

Sometimes it has its advantages, I wouldn't want to speak to people like that!
 
Lol Alec! She is a good girl, just misunderstood by misinformed members of the public.

And don't tar all Poodles with the same brush ;) I am also a lover of Poodles, although they do have to be Standards and not have a poncy clip - I have seen a fab working standard poodle before.
 
Maybe they are a bit more understanding down here in Cornwall, as most people are fine with my Rottie.

As for the uninvited dog in your boot :eek: my springer would have given it what for, and I would have given the owner a rollocking :p
 
Well I have a sprollie and to be honest if something jumped into the car with her I think she might do more than a little growl!! The collie half of her would nip first and ask questions later.:D It is maddening that anyone would think it is ok for their dog to be so out of control that it was able to get far enough from its owner and jump into someone else's car. I wouldn't worry to much if that owner is honest about how her dog came close enough to be 'savaged' by your rottie I am sure most dog people would think it was her fault and the dog was lucky not to be really harmed. A friend of mine has a rottie and she is the most gorgeous girl and loves everybody but when he walks her many people cross the road out of her way. As her owner says its not the breed its the way it is brought up that counts but there will always be people who are ignorant of that. Must confess I never liked English Bull terriers (was bitten by one as a child) and then met one on the beach which we used to go to every week, having avoided this dog for a few weeks we did eventually meet to find that she was a lovely dog and played with ours with no problems at all. She really changed my opinion of the breed.
 
:eek:

That would have been a "never mind the dog, beware of the owner!" moment for me! I'd have seen red!

Stupid bint.
 
All the rotties I have known have ben lovely! Slobbery, but lovely.

I'm nervous of big dogs I don;t know.

We had one of those massive malamute things with weird blue eyes running round the yard snarling and barking at the two yard dogs who had the sense to stay in their pen. Couldn't catch the thing - so had a bright idea of opening the boot of the truck and calling "wanna walkie" - in it jumped and sat down really quiet. Closed the boot and then realised I'd caught this massive brute in my car and I was more than a bit afraid of it.


Clipped it on a lead rope from the back seat and he was absolutely lovely as soon as the lead was on!

The only dog I have ever got a deliberate and quite nasty bite from was a Corgi. :eek: ****** went out of it's way to bite me. I didn't like the look of him either, but I wouldn't have run across the park to bite him!
 
One of mine would have had a poodle lunch in those circumstances (the other would have cowered in the corner until I removed the little swine) and I would be quite unrepentant about it; serve them right for having no control over it.

My abiding childhood memory of rotties is of visiting my great aunt and uncle - they lived in a big ramshackle farmhouse in the middle of nowhere with a bazillion animals roaming around, terribly exciting for me as we lived in London at the time. We visited once and they had a little rottie pup who I got to play with all afternoon. The next time we visited there was a nine stone brute of a dog in his place who thought he could still fit on my lap. :D

I remember being given a big slice of chocolate cake to eat and him sitting at my feet with big strings of drool from chops to floor but he didn't once try to budge or snatch even though I was at face height back then. I think his name was Cromwell. :)

brucea said:
We had one of those massive malamute things with weird blue eyes
Click to expand...

Not a malamute then. ;) :p
 
I think your Rott was a good girl! My Rottie on the other hand would've thought it was THE BEST EVER, but there's not much that isn't for her. My Collie.......not so.
Stupid poodle owner, i cant abide people that cant control their dogs!
 
I love rotties.

My friend has one who is so friendly.

I get the same with my collies. Everyone gives us a wide berth esp with big collie as he can look very intimidating but wouldn't hurt a fly.


I've been more wary of my grampys springer gun dog who has nipped me before.
 
Tell me about it, anything not small & fluffy is clearly a danger to society. Whereas anything that suits a hair ribbon or a pink diamante collar is just being playful when it sinks its fangs in. Also well known fact that rotties/dobes/gsds/staffs etc regularly tear precious mummies & their offspring to shreds whenever they are walked in public.
 
I feel your pain but then I have 3 staffords. I take the opposite view, the more people yelp about my dogs, the more I dig in my heels. Rude people are confronted but politely so, by the time I have questioned their manners and laziness in not looking at the facts for themselves they are normally really regretting having ever said anything. (correction, muttered to their friends). Your dog sounds lovely and taking a puppy is not guarantee either of perfect behaviour! I am never ever rude but equally will never let someone whine behind my back. I am very proud that my lovely dogs have converted a lot of people to"my" breed as well. So be proud and if you see those people do confront them. Tell them you do not want to hear them badmouthing your dog and that they should thank their lucky stars your dog did not attack theirs for coming into your car. Tell them if you hear any more unpleasantness or their inability to control their dog, you will be reporting them to the dog warden. Don't let them bully you!

and the dog that killed a friends big Douge do Bordeaux was a lab. I am a big fan of labs but hate the fact that people just assume these dogs come pretrained and ready inherently. The most out of control dogs locally are labs...yet I know very well just how nice these dogs are with proper owners!
 
Mals don't have blue eyes - huskies can do but they aren't great hulking things, they're little slim sprinting things, you'd never use 'big' to describe them. Your description makes me think American akita but they don't have blue eyes either.

Help me, AAD-ers! :p
 
Could have been any number of things with all the cross-breeding for wolf looks going on, could have husky or collie breeding for the blue eyes, had some GSD or Malamute or Akita chucked in. I immediately thought 'not a Malamute' as they tend not to bother with people!!

If it makes you feel any better Bruce, while they look intimidated, those breeds (huskies and Malamutes) tend not to be very people orientated, even if they gob off at other dogs.
 
Well this big ****** and his staffie pal chewed up a dog walker and her dog in the woods above the village earlier that week.

I'm used to the labx size dogs at the yard - this was a good bit bigger - more full up GSD size but without the low back end obviously - but the haunches and shoulders were really muscled up. Solid dog. beautiful deep coat as well and a ruff round his face with darker line along the jaw.

He was in the field with the driving pony at one point and he wasn't bothered - they were sniffing noses and saying hello.
 
I don't often make a scene but the owners of that dog would have had a proper public dressing down from me about control and responsibility.

Rot ties are amazing. One of our lot is a lab x Rottie rescue and is a big, daft, sweet lump. She is all black with full tail and I would be rich if I had a quid for every person that has come to fuss her, comment on how big and square her head is and promptly walked away on me telling them she is half Rottie. I have actually laughed in people's faces for it.

The world is full of idiots :rolleyes:
 
I have to sax the opposite, i get compliments about mine all the time, if i had a £1 for all the people coming to my house for a rescue n clapping eyes on my rottie and asking if she is a rescue and is she up for adoption i would be rich ha ha. to be honest none of mine would bat an eye if another dog jumped in the van ha ha.
 
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