The dog was not leashed at the time of the incident.
FOX NEWS – A family dog in Florida is now dead after a visit to the park took a turn for the worse.
Wildlife authorities said Joshua Wells was following his usual lunchtime routine earlier this month.
He would take his dog, a 40-pound black Labrador retriever named Toby, out for a walk and a quick game of fetch at a local park. This time, the pair were attacked by an alligator.
Wells and Toby traveled to the J.R. Alford Greenway Trail, a popular park in Tallahassee, for their usual outdoor activities, when an alligator that was just over 9 feet long leaped out from a nearby waterway, grabbed the dog by his head, and carried it back into the water.
The incident happened so fast that Wells said the dog never had time to respond.
“Boom, the water just sort of exploded,” Wells told the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, FOX 13 of Tampa Bay reported. “He never barked. He never saw it” …
Think your unleashed dog is no big deal? Read this …
SF NEWS, 9 FEBRUARY 2022
Weeks after a golden retriever puppy was mauled to death by a dog at Mission Dolores Park, the puppy’s owners are demanding the attacker be held responsible.
Luna the golden retriever was just four months old when she was killed at Dolores Park, near 20th Street. Her owner, Matt Rosenberg, explains they were at the park the morning of January 26, when Luna went to sniff a boxer who was not leashed. Dolores Park includes two off-leash areas for dogs to play, but they aren’t fenced off, so unleashed dogs often run freely through the entire space.
Rosenberg says when Luna approached the unleashed boxer, the larger dog went into a frenzy, viciously attacking Luna for several seconds before Rosenberg could get her away. He rushed her to a nearby pet hospital, where Luna died.
Berkeleyside, Feb. 19, 2022
On a picture-perfect October evening, my 5-year-old son ran onto the sports field at Codornices Park, intending to play some soccer. As usual, several dogs populated the field, and, as usual, virtually none of them were leashed (a violation of the park’s rules). My son neither looked at the dogs nor was he particularly close to any of them. Yet one herding dog sure noticed him, tearing several dozen yards across the grass and sinking its teeth into my son’s leg.
My son thus became one of 50 people in Berkeley who reported being bitten by a dog in 2021. (Seven additional reports involved dogs biting other dogs.) These are likely undercounts, as not everyone relays such incidents to Berkeley Animal Care Services.
Nationwide, roughly 4.5 million Americans suffer dog bites every year, of which hundreds of thousands require medical care. Even worse, dogs killed 568 Americans from 2005 to 2020, according to a dog bite victims’ group that compiles such statistics.
Off-leash dogs are also major harassers of wildlife. Nesting birds, in particular, may abandon their chicks and eggs when overly disturbed, while migratory shorebirds, hordes of which stop in the Bay Area as part of lengthy journeys to and from the Arctic, are forced to use up their fat reserves fleeing dogs rather than feeding. As a birder and conservationist, I feel huge amounts of frustration every time I witness a dog in avian attack mode.
THE NEW YORK TIMES, Jan. 26, 2021
Jasper bit down into Chloe’s neck as if it were a jelly doughnut. My sweet senior dog did not stand a chance against the pit bull, half her age and holding a grudge.
Chloe, whom I rescued from a shelter in New Jersey more than a decade ago, has been my best friend and constant companion ever since. I am a reporter at The New York Times. Over the last five years, as I was holed up working on investigations about Donald Trump’s finances, Chloe’s job was to guard the president’s tax return information. She kept me sane. I kept her safe. Until now.
Chloe and I live in a cabin in the Catskill Mountains. My exercise is hers, long walks together, through fields, forests and often country lanes in our neighborhood. On the morning of the attack we were on one of those roads, with my friend Shawna Richer and her dog, Scout.
Jasper’s frenzied barking began as we approached his house. I looked over at Shawna. Silently we calculated the possibility of passing with Chloe and Scout, both leashed, as swiftly and softly as possible. Jasper had other ideas. He shot off the porch and across the sprawling front yard as if launched from a slingshot.
Then he stopped at the edge of the property. He sized all of us up and his eyes locked on Chloe, a solid 60-pound Labrador-basset hound mix who is 12 years old. Suddenly a woman emerged from the house, screaming for Jasper to come back. Instead he advanced toward Chloe until they were nose to nose. Then he lunged, locking his jaw around her neck.
A few days later, one of the dogs was on death row and the other recovering from deep puncture wounds to her neck and abdomen. One person was in the hospital.
Chloe first encountered Jasper two summers ago. She was on a walk, on leash, with my brother, David. They met the wayward pit bull alone on a road. Jasper came at Chloe but David kicked him. Jasper went running. Chloe escaped without harm. We did not report the incident, something I now regret.
