I WAS too busy to take my dog for a walk as I had lots of shopping to do so decided to fool her into thinking she was going for a walk by taking her shopping with me.

I had several places to go, and everything was fine until I went to Bitterne.

I went into one shop where she was allowed - she was made a big fuss of by one of the staff and everything was fine - until I went to pay for my goods!

As I was at the counter talking, she gave a loud growl, and I looked around in surprise and saw a two year old boy backing away from her. When I asked his mother what was going on she said, "Don't worry he was trying to poke her with his stick."

As I proceeded around Bitterne I noticed there were lots of young children running loose with no parental control, and again a child came running up to her with arms and legs all over the place and again she growled. Luckily the boy backed off!

The parents couldn't have cared less, didn't bat an eyelid and went about their business with their children running all over the place.

This happened several times and I spent most of the time dodging young children.

If my dog had bitten one of them the media would have reported Two-year-old Mauled by Dog, she would have been taken away and classed as a dangerous dog and I would have spent hours in a courtroom defending her!

I noticed that none of the parents had hold of the child's hand and, of course, reins went out of fashion years ago! It was a nerve racking experience.

When my children were small I always watched them around strange dogs as children can be cruel and dogs are frightened of small children as they are so quick.

It's always the dogs and owners that suffer, never the parents.

It's about time the RSPCA got off their backsides and launched a campaign to educate parents how to teach their children to behave around strange dogs, and even their own, and then perhaps so many children wouldn't get attacked. As dogs don't usually attack for no reason.

The only time I ever got bitten was when I was a small child I ran up to a Jack Russell and flung my arms around it and was promptly bitten on the face. My parents told the owner it was my fault and thiers, not the dog's.

After all if we were to run up to strangers with a stick or to fling our arms around them we would expect to get a smack in the mouth, as they wouldn't know what was happening.

So in future when I take my dog shopping I shall watch out for two-year-olds on the loose, as their parents won't be.

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