To answer those who asked about spaying a bitch at six months, surely you need factor a 'solution' in before you buy a bitch with the knowledge that you may be unable to take her anywhere for the times she's in season? That's entirely up to you to decide, some I know have had their bitches spayed before their first season, not something I would personally do, but they made the choice and the decision to get round it. Or buy a dog?? Then you won't ever have the problem to face in the first place

I am still not getting the argument that it's ok to walk in season bitches generally when you live somewhere built up with other dogs and dog walkers around, I really don't. If your dog was incapacitated because of a leg injury, you wouldn't walk it for it's own good. I had to keep my bitch in and on very limited exercise for nearly six months due to a cruciate rupture, she was 18 months old when it happened, so a young bitch and VERY energetic. Yet to allow her to overdo things in the short term would have meant risking her long term recovery, so she was forced to sit, lie down, play small silly games, do bits of heelwork. And once she was eventually let out to lead walk again, she loved it, and I still remember her very first free run off a long line, brilliant. So if it's possible to keep a young fit Labrador bitch on very limited exercise for six weeks, and slowly build up to allow them to free run after six months, isn't it possible, where necessary, to confine an in season bitch to a garden for two or three weeks so that your problem doesn't become someone elses problem possibly? Owners are the ones deciding to take the dogs for a walk, not the dogs.

What about those that dont own a garden then? If I had a garden I would have no issue letting her out in the garden for a run. Unfortunately I dont. However I do take full responsibility for her when in heat. You have to cant believe people are saying some owners blame the dog. Only the other week I had Totts and Muffy on a walk, Totts was a few days in. Hadnt seen one dog and was heading home when I saw 3 rotties up ahead off lead. Shouted ahead to them that my dog was in heat just to make them aware and picked up Totts. Yes I had a dog jump up to have a sniff but its not the dogs fault at all. Only picked her up to avoid any chance of a dog getting to her. Felt awful had to clarify to them I love rotties and was not picking her because of the large dogs by any means lol!

I'm on the other side but even if I wasn't and had an entire male I still don't get your reasoning for why a bitch in season should be kept in all the time.

I have heard horror stories of dogs going after bitches in season but have never yet come across anyone who has actually had any problems and wonder how much these stories are exagerrated or if they are simply urban myths.

Maybe in the days when dogs would wander around on their own but nowadays that isn't allowed. surely it's up to every dog owner to keep their dog safe and not allow it to wander around on it's own giving it the chance to follow any scents.

I certainly don't think that owners who walk their bitches while they are in heat are irresponsible. Dogs have been around for many years, there have always been bitches coming into season and they have always been walked, up to a few years ago dogs were often out on their own doing their own thing during the day.

I can only go by the area I live in but not one person has said or hinted in any way that they think bitches should not be walked when in season. I really fail to see your reasoning. Many of the regulars in the park know she is in season as they were there when I first realised and we know which dogs she can play with although I still go at the times when they are not there.

They know what time I go to the park so occasionally one will come at this time so Lana has their dog to play with. With others, the owners know that if we happen to be there at the same time as soon as I see them I will put Lana on the lead and take her off in the opposite direction. We just wave in the distance and know we will catch up in a couple of weeks once Lana's season has finished.

Sorry but I really can't see an argument for keeping them in.

If I was out with Lana and some dog was determined to get his way with her and I couldn't stop it I certainly wouldn't be blaming the other dog or their owner. Dogs do what they have to do but as previously said there have been no dogs running across the park to get to Lana, no dogs following her nor are there loads of dogs sitting outside the flat panting in anticipation.

We'll just have to agree to disagree

I will drive & run ours somewhere quiet. I run our Entire dogs & in season bitch together for quiet a while certainley for the first week,& dont keep them separate until after the first week, maybe longer.

When the bitch is ready i do not walk her, tend to keep the bitch with the other bitches/neutered dogs & keep the entire dog upstairs, although with some bitches id do this the other way around

Well i have 2 entire bitches and now i will not walk them when in season because it was a nightmare when we did! We kept them on lead and drove but still dogs found there way to our house and it meant i couldnt leave them in the garden either because of the local dogs. During the whole walk Ela pulled, whined and screamed and was a pain in the backside. At the end of the walk she was more wound up then when we started. Will did this for the first 2 weeks then i had had enough and instead played with them in the garden, added some extra clicker training and got them large bones reducing the chicken wings in there diet. We also took them to my parents who have a large garden that they love going to and my brother in laws who has a field they use to exercise there dogs. The 2 weeks we did this all my girls were much happier and so were we.

So this season we will not bother at all with walking and stick to garden time.

Funny how everyone experiences something different.

When Bo was in season (she is now spayed), I did walk her almost as normal for roughly the first week or two. Most of the times and places I walk are relatively quiet anyway and we tend to only cross pathes with a few other people; we often don't see anyone. The dogs that we did come across were not interested in her at all. Granted, most of the dogs around here are neutered, and I avoided the one place I know a few owners of entire dogs walk.

After the second week, I only put her in the car and drove her somewhere quiet (a very rural area). Even my neutered boy was trying to hump her during her 'fertile' period.

I have got no problem with people walking in season bitches provided they are responsible about it.

You are lucky you have such agreeable dog owners walking nearby

There are quite a few people who obviously do walk their in season bitches, and don't appear to ever have any problems, whether that's luck, or because their bitches seasons aren't *normal*, I really don't know, and it wouldn't be possible to tell without them testing to see if there's something out of the ordinary. Perhaps they will never have any problems, perhaps they may have a horrible problem one day that may make them change their mind. As I said at the beginning, I'm lucky to have the use of adjacent fields to exercise my dogs whether my one entire bitch is in season or not.

There are several reasons (see bold bit):

The risk of a dog trying to mate your bitch in season
The risk of several dogs being attracted and starting to fight over your bitch in season
The risk of your bitch being mated and injury occurring
The risk of your bitch being mated and contracting an STD (or passing an STD on)
The risk of your bitch and any attracted dogs fighting (not all bitches in season are tarts )
The risk of dogs coming across your bitches scent and trying to follow, possibly becoming injured, even killed in the process, which you may never get to know about
The risk of incurring the displeasure from someone who does actually object to you taking your in season bitch to an area other dog walkers use frequently, not everyone is so amenable, so prepare to perhaps be shouted at one day.

There's a few off the top of my head, and why I don't consider it responsible to walk a bitch in season, but each to their own. I agree with your last sentence, we will just have to agree to differ

I didnt really change where I walked mine as I tend to take them to less populated areas anyway. If I did see another dog approaching then I would put her on a lead.

Not a problem now though as she is spayed.

No offense, but a lot of this is scaremongering. Yes, all of the above can happen. But, really, how often? it is easy to make a blanket statement that 'bitches should not be walked when in season', but the reality is that everyones situation is very different.

As for entire dogs, if an owner chooses to keep their dog entire, then surely the dogs should be adequately trained so that they don't disappear on the slightest wiff of a bitch in season (which, in a built up country like ours, there probably is 365 days of the year!). If this proves to be impossible, well that is why neutering exists. It swings both ways.

No offence but the person I quoted said they couldn't think of ANY reasons, so I just thought of a FEW off the top of my head, it's not intended to be scare mongering, and I did also point out that some people do not appear to ever come across any problems, which is fine BUT, if it happens once, and it's your dog, then that once is probably too often.

And eh? re the entire dogs?? The average dog owner (and I include myself in this statement) struggles to train their dog to a fairly basic level of obedience, how on earth would you expect them to recall a dog away from a bitch in season, people have already said on this thread that they can't get their dog back and have had to go and retrieve them? Particularly if that bitch in season is in front of them, not just a distant whiff?? And what about owners of dogs who have had them neutered to try and do the responsible thing, and they're STILL attracted to in season bitches. Or owners of bitches who are attracted to in season bitches, it isn't JUST entire dogs that the scent has an effect on.

I also made it very clear from my earlier posts that this is my point of view and accept others will see it different, and understood that others have different situations, I hope I made that clear by saying I am aware how lucky I am to have fields next to me that are private, where I can walk my one entire bitch when she is in season, or whenever really. So please don't pick on just part of my post, but read the whole of them, in context with the other posts I've made