Oh no poor Roman,I sympathise with the scent tracking problem having 2 beagles and foster hound. My little monkeys know if someones got food in their pocket even if they don't treat them! Hope he feels better soon x I also have to explain to people where I walk on our local common sometimes why I can't let them off lead to play as it is surrounded by busy roads .I will say to them that if they could smell
bread or a chip on the otherside of the road they would happily go under a truck to get to it.....but I think some people think I'm being over cautious !

I'm sorry your dog got hurt but...how did he end up half a mile away from you following someone who had given him treats before? Even if someone had given my dog a whole chicken before she wouldn't have the chance to follow them that far away from me.

When a scent hound is scenting, not all but most will go deaf on a recall,unless you have owned a scent hound you probably never had this problem.As Egyptgal pointed out, they can smell food from a distance and thats why most Beagles are either stuck on the lead or will only be let off in big areas where hopefully they dont do a runner, and Crysania if you can follow a Beagle scenting at full speed you must be some athlete.

This thread made me think of when i fed this big strange rottie x? dog a piece of my sausage roll... It then proceeded to bite the whole thing out of my other hand leaving me with the little piece i had broken off to offer it!

The owner was there and offered to buy me another one.. I just smiled.. and told him i didnt need one. - it was my fault!
But I always ask first as a rule. I would never just randomly give a strange dog treats as lots of dogs poor tummys or special diet needs and i would hate to make any dog ill.

I really hope your guy makes a full recovery soon! Beagles are notoroious for being real gannets and liking their food, we had one in at the rescue once and all the time on the walk he would try and scent and lead us back to the butchers. Sod the rabbits and the foxes when the man in the butchers has nice big joints of fresh meat and sausages hanging in the window already caught!

Sending out my + vibes and hoping he will be well soon for christmas dinner.
Big huge well done to the RNLI they are a great team of people all over the country.

Frankly if I had a dog like that I wouldn't let the dog off lead. Period. I'm sorry to be a bitch but I don't have much sympathy for someone who knows their dog may run off after food and lets them off lead anyway. I'm sorry the dog got hit but it's not the person's fault who had been treating them. Shifting the blame away from the owner to someone else who has no idea that their dog is going to run off is ridiculous.

Edited to add: I see the OP says the dog was following his scent trail. I sure would like to know how the OP knows exactly what this dog was following. Could have been anything, so why assume it's the person who treated him? Sounds to me like the OP is just looking to blame someone else when it's fairly clear whose fault this is.

I will try and explain again, the dog is walking on the beach, he has then bolted over the sand dunes and headed towards the town, what he has done is either heard a dog bark which he has recognised or he has picked up on the scent he has also recognised, the only time he will bolt is if someone has treated him, so what my point is dont treat the dog and then the dog will not follow. That person could of been on the beach twenty minutes before the wife and he is just following the scent. So now i have to keep my dogs on the lead because irresponsible people want to treat strange dogs so that it makes them feel better.

MY point is that if your dog is likely to bolt (and since you seem to "know" exactly what scent your dog is following this has happened many times before) then don't let the dog off lead. This all could have been prevented by using a leash.

And yes you SHOULD keep your dogs on leash. If it's not a person, the dog may follow the scent of a squirrel or rabbit or some other creature (and really? you THINK you know what scent he is following but you cannot possibly know what he follows every single time). If the dog doesn't have a solid enough recall that YOU are more interesting than those scents then the dog shouldn't have the freedom to run off. It's really pretty simple.

I'm VERY sorry your dog got injured and I hope that he makes a quick and full recovery. But placing the blame on someone ELSE doesn't help the situation.

hi

whilst i feel sorry for your poor dog(hope he recovers soon) if he follow trails like that he shouldnt be off the lead in unenclosed places you cant blame other people on a hound following its instincts

re the treat thing... my old lurcher suffered terribly with colitis people would always say only one etc..and my boy would suffer later

We have a similar problem here only it's allergies. Give Rupe wheat and he gets itchy as hell, give him enough and we'll be at the vet with ear infections. I used to carry my own treats and if people wanted to give him a treat I'd let them give him one I knew wouldn't cause problems. It was almost always elderly people wanting to feed Rupert for some reason.

You don't even need to feed some dogs for them to refuse to leave you alone. A border collie at class used to be all over me from the minute we walked in because she could smell the treats I had.

So true. When I first got my dog and she had no recall and no real bond with me she would mob anyone who even had treats on them (at the dog park, enclosed space). Even now she totally would if I didn't have a really good bond and she didn't have excellent recall.