@eeeefarm said in How did you get your basenji to walk off leash?:
What I find interesting is the change in attitude to dogs on leashes.
At that time, many people walked their dogs off leash, and many left them loose on their properties all day long.
First, and probably foremost, you're a excellent owner. We disagree on a lot of training things (like e-collars) but you are uber responsible.
On the "in the old days"... I see parents talk about not how they roved the neighborhood or all over small towns and how safe. But I also worked with women over the age of 70 who had been sexually assaulted as children and never reported it. I am not sure kids were massively safer in the good old days except for the fact that back then, your neighbors DID look after your kids... they'd scold them or call you without being fearful of being called meddling... because it was about caring. We've lost that. As for dogs, yep... we're similar aged and I remember my grandmother's farm and the fairly steady stream of new farm dogs because they got killed by wild life/snakes etc or roving dogs. It was business as usual. Dog disappeared or dead-- get another one. I know many still feel that way. Rather have to dogs run free and happy and dead young than "cooped up." Our value for dogs as companions has dramatically changed, and our view of our responsibility for them. We always had cats and dogs who were allowed out, and like you, most stayed on the property. But I remember 3 dogs who didn't (one small, probably stolen) and cats didn't live long. We just took that as the norm. Obviously I have look back at that and am horrified. (Though there was an Irish setter who would NOT stay on his property and if the owners weren't there, he followed me about a mile to my house when I walked home from school. His owners laughed, would come get him when they got home if he didn't go back. I thought that was kewl back then but not so much then.) But my experience, and I lived in a very small town then, and a smallish one now, is very different. Then and now, dead dogs and cats on the road are incredibly common.
The litmus test is research statistics. Cats who are even allowed out a few hours a day loose have dramatically decreased life spans. I haven't bothered to look about dogs, though a look at shelters should be enough to prove that dogs loose are often dogs lost. The number with electric fence collars demonstrates how ineffective even that is if prey drive kicks in. (for the record, your dog your choice. Loose cats however have an almost unimaginable impact on wildlife, so it IS my business if your cat runs loose.)
Yep, times have definitely changed.
