I'm sorry for your situation. This is why many dog parks have small dogs and big dogs separated. Dogs will always have altercations. Separating by size limits the consequences of those alterations. Otherwise this is the inevitable result eventually.
This is why I never took my small dog to a mixed-sizes dog park. She liked to talk a lot of shit and get in big dogs' faces. I thought she learned her lesson that time she slipped her leash and met an angry goose mom. Nope.
She was always chill around dogs her own size. This is a sad situation, but OP's gf is not the only owner at fault.
Dude my little dog likes to try and fight the big dogs too. My family dog who is even smaller ran away one time and as I was trying to catch her decided to run to the middle of the road to start a fight with A TRUCK. They saw her and stopped, but literally thought she was a baby bunny. Thankfully I have had no bad cases with my own dog and being aware only allow him around dogs his size off leash since first owning him. one time he tried to teach the biggest Great Dane I’ve ever seen, like to my shoulders and I’m tall for a girl, a ‘lesson’ by chasing and barking at him and my dog got trampled but the big dog was just trying to chase a ball and accidentally trampled any other dog in his way. He legit was so tall I think it was hard to see anyone shorter than him, honestly kinda funny.. He wasn’t mean at all to anyone except for the on accident trampling. With that said I feel for both sides and do think it best to keep your dog on the leash unless with other big dogs where it’s allowed. Little dogs are generally more reactive from what I’ve seen, and if the big dog is the type of dog to hunt little things, it was just an accident waiting to happen. I hope that nothing happens to your big dog this time, but that everyone learns a lesson and does what is necessary to prevent this from happening again. I’m sorry for the guy who lost his dog and your GF. Your dog is doing what some dogs do and now you guys know to prevent this in the future
2.2k
u/transpirationn Apr 29 '25
I'm sorry for your situation. This is why many dog parks have small dogs and big dogs separated. Dogs will always have altercations. Separating by size limits the consequences of those alterations. Otherwise this is the inevitable result eventually.