Date: Sun, 28 Oct 2001 13:01:53 EST Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Rick Sussman Subject: Re: Dog days at Layhill Park MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a message dated 10/28/2001 10:46:51 AM Eastern Standard Time, marshhawk@WORLDNET.ATT.NET writes: > Before we birded the north end we attempted to bird the south end of the > park. Before we got out of the parking lot we were accosted by two > ferocious-looking and ferocious-sounding pit bulls. The owner laughingly > assured us "Oh, they won't hurt you." Once we got out of the parking lot > and into the south field we were accosted by more dogs as their owners > watched and sipped coffee. When we pointed out to a legion of dog owners > there that morning that Montgomery County and the park have leash laws we > were met with comments such as "You people just want this whole park for > yourself", "No, there are no leash laws", "Yes, we saw the leash sign but no > one ever pays attention to it and neither will we!". Oh, and there was the > guy who just stared at us with great hostility when we pointed out the leash > law sign. > Norm, Mike Moffatt and I ran into a similar problem here a couple of weeks ago, but we were birding the north fields. We were standing at the first field when a dog (unattended) came running up the trail, jumped up on me(getting mud/dirt on my pants) and then ran off down trail. Shortly the owner and his son arrived around the corner, and I actually yelled at him to please keep his dog on a leash. He sheepishly apologized and said they usually walk the dog here, off-leash, and didn't expect to run into anyone, and that they would take him another way (still off-leash). Now I love dogs (and have had one most of my life, still do), but after having one killed on the highway, I would never, never again let one off-leash, unless in a fenced dog park. There is now one of these in Gaithersburg, with thoughts about opening others. It happened to me in Layhill Park again yesterday morning, also in the north fields, with an older couple walking their lab off-leash, with total disregard for the many signs the county has placed around the park.It seems there is little we can do but let the owners know our feelings, and get the reactions you experienced. It really, really pisses me off to see the attitudes of the dog owners. Perhaps a call to the humane society to let them know how prevelant this behavior is at Layhill Park would help? Surely there must be something we can do... Regards, Rick Sussman Ashton,MD warblerick@aol.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================