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I had a strange incident between my GSD and a pit bull.

I was walking my GSD late at night. A young lady was walking her pit bull across the street. The pit bull somehow slipped its leash and charged running at my dog. I screamed at the owner to get her dog.

Because a pit bull once charged my GSD from a garage, I had taken to carrying a Spyderco knife with about a 4-inch blade. For the life of me, I do not recall that knife getting into my hand and flipping open. All I know is that without conscious action, the knife was in my hand and at the ready to kill that pit bull if it attacked my German Shepherd.

The dogs engaged each other with lots of barking. I could see little in the darkness away from the street light. I was yelling at the pit to back away and I started kicking it with all my might.

Then I started screaming at the young lady to come and get her dog or I was going to kill it before it could kill my Shepherd. I think I terrified her with my screaming and knife brandishing, because she just stood well outside of the circle of me, my dog, and the pit bull, and she was crying and screaming. I mean, really screaming in fear that I would kill her dog.

I kicked the snot out of that thing but never had the heart to kill it. For whatever reason, I just could not muster the will to stab the pit bull with my knife, even as both dogs were engaged, circling, bouncing, and barking between my legs with my dogs leash almost tripping me up.

Eventually the pit bull disengaged and the young lady charged in and grabbed him and ran off. She went through a nightmare but at least I hadn’t killed her dog. The only question in my mind was how badly the dogs hurt each other and did I need to immediately take my dog to a Vet. I couldn’t see a thing throughout the melee and just assumed the dogs were going at each other and assumed my dog had got the worst of it, but hoping he at least got a few good licks in himself. German Shepherds go down fighting.

I petted the fur on his neck expecting to feel it full of wet blood. Nothing. Bone dry.

The dogs had just been playing. They had been barking, and bouncing and rough housing each other in play. I couldn’t see and had already convinced myself the pit bull was charging to “attack” my dog and the possibility never once occurred to me that the pit bull was just anxious to play with another dog. The way he slipped his leash and charged my German Shepherd, it just seemed he was in “attack” mode.

I could not have been more wrong. Man, I kicked the hell out of that dog’s ribs. Fortunately I’m a pretty weak old man and I know I didn’t do any permanent damage. I could tell I was not getting any real kicks in. The dogs were underfoot and I couldn’t really wind up my leg to land a good blow with my soft shoe. So it was a really meager attempt kicking the thing, but boy I was kicking as fast and hard as I could under the circumstances.

Long story short, I am SO GLAD I did not kill that young lady’s pet. Neither dog had bitten the other. My dog nips other dogs to herd them and that is probably all he did to the pit bull.

The point of my long winded story is, you can’t tell the intent of a dog charging you, and while the victim in the story had every right to shoot the “attacking” dog charging him, it could very well be like in my situation, the pit bull was charging his dog to play, not to attack.

We will never know. Had he waited to see if the pit was truly attacking his dog before firing, then we would know one way or the other. Such a shame as it is possible he killed a dog just playing. I won’t judge him. I don’t blame him. He had every right to do what he did. I will just always wonder if that pit was attacking or playing as in what I experienced.

We will never know.

I had a huge German Shepherd I raised from 6 weeks in Mansfield Ohio when I was 24. Over 90 lbs., his nose was at 5’6” with his front paws on my shoulders. A gentle, loving, well-trained & obedient dog that loved children.

One evening walking him in town on a leash, a mutt about 1/3 his size tore out from the porch of his house and tore into my GS and was ripping him to shreds. Or so it looked. My GS tried to defend himself, but just wasn’t as aggressive as the mutt.

Being an ignorant idiot, I tried pulling the mutt off my GS. Huge mistake. If I didn’t have heavy leather gloves on (cold winter day), I would have no right hand.....the mutt saw movement thinking my hand was my dog, and grabbed it. I was stunned at the force of its grip as it was a small dog....I could not get my hand out of its teeth. I had separated the dogs, but now I was the object of the attack. Only by repeatedly kicking the mutt as hard as I could did it eventually release its grip. My hand was bruised and hurt for some time - but no blood drawn.

NEVER try to separate dogs in a fight, regardless of how small.

My GS wasn’t hurt as his fur was incredibly thick with his winter coat.

Although I have CCW, I don’t carry when walking in my neighborhood. However, to protect myself and my dog from vicious dogs and their thoughtless and stupid owners with these items, I always carry and have used in those circumstances:

DAZZER II, MACE/Muzzle, and Self-defense, collapsible baton. On high wind days I carry Kimber Pepper BlasterII. Remember when you use a defensive spray to direct the spray at the dog’s mouth for best effect.

Bottom line, though is stay aware of others with large dogs, that are having difficulty keeping their dog under control, which is all too common today. I have found that it is best to avoid them by moving to another side of a street or walking path so their dog does not pass close to your dog.

If I shot every out of control dog that I saw and have seen with their stupid owners, there would have to be a full time collection crew to remove the dead carcasses of those dogs.