This week was interesting. While my wife and I were walking our dog, he was attacked by another dog. This is the second time by the same dog, and yes, the other owners need to address the issue. But that is another topic. Last May, when the dog attacked (appx 60 lb Dalmation), my dog Indy got in front of me, and, having never been in a fight before, proceeded to bark and make noise, while the other dog went for his throat. Indy defended himself well with his big paws, knocking the other dog around, but had his neck punctured, and had bloody rear paws from pushing off the ground. The other dog was off leash, and has attacked at least five other dogs that we know of (post our attack, neighbors came to find out how Indy was)
Tuesday, the other dogs' owner was riding her bike with the dog attached to a zip lead to her handlebars. They were a block away. My wife told me to hustle, we were on the cross street and wanted to get out of view of her dog. Indy and I got out of view. Next, my wife told me to run! The dalmation pulled his owner off her bike, and broke free. I made it two more houses and the dog was on us. I got into a cat stance (from karate, this is where you take weight off the front leg to use it to kick). My move was instinctive, from 34 years of martial arts. I lifted my leg to kick the dog, but he was WAY quicker than I could imagine, and I only succeeded in glancing him around to behind us. As he launched at Indy, Indy pulled back off his collar, and the fight began. Indy went round, with a lot more effort than last time, he knows this dog is dangerous.
I tried to break it up. I did not want to kick, I was afraid I would hit Indy, and he kept running in front of me. I pushed, pulled, yelled and kicked, and next thing you know, I was on the ground. My wife told me I was on top of the dalmation when I fell, he got underneath me. Snapping jaws everywhere. When I was on the ground, I kicked under Indy's legs, pushed the dalmation back a few feet. Indy was in between us. At that point, the dalmation went to leap at Indy, but Indy perceived the attack was at me!
Game over. Indy knocked the other dog on his back, bit him up his underside until he got to the dog's neck, then slammed the dog into the concrete next to me. I was on my side next to the dalmation, Indy had him by the neck. The owner finally shows up (took at least two or three minutes, she had to run up hill one tenth of a mile!), and we get them apart. This is not totally the end of the story, but I will cut to the stretch part now!
Needless to say the fight or flight mechanism worked very well indeed for my self and my dog. Later in the morning, I could feel the muscles that were activated and on guard. I sat on the ground and stretched and found muscles to be sore. I really didn't want to stretch, actually, but did anyway. As I released the tension in the muscles from the attack, I felt separate from the whole incident, it had a surreal quality to it.
Oh, you can see Indy here: Indy
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