Client News : Mike Silva

I just wanted to give you a great big thank you, for the Bulli Ray Dog Bite Prevention Training I received a few weeks ago.
 
I just returned from visiting family in Oklahoma, and because of an incident that happened while I was there, I found out just how valuable the skills I learned were.
 
My relatives live in a rural area, and there’s not much to do there but eat, so in order not to return home 10 pounds heavier, my wife and I took a brisk two mile walk on one of the county roads every night. Usually the worst thing we would encounter, would be the occasional cricket, butterfly, or bunny rabbit, (the latter startled us both, and was accompanied by spontaneous laughter.) That is until the night that we were confronted with a large, 100 pound+, black Labrador-mix dog, which looked similar to the dog pictured below, teeth and all.
 
We would always walk to this little country home, where the pavement on the road turned to gravel, and then turned around to come home. This time though, their dog was outside in the unfenced yard, and he spotted us right away. Because of the training I received, we didn’t just turn around and walk away though, which is a good thing, because the dog went immediately into a crouch and tore out after us. My wife’s first instinct was to run away, but she noticed that I wasn’t following her, and stood behind me. Remembering my training, I threw my arms out as big as I could, and stepping forward yelled, “GO HOME!” The dog hesitated a bit, then started toward me again, but I repeated the stance and shouted again, “GO HOME!”
 
At this point the owner of the dog came out onto her front porch, saw us, and then went back inside. Obviously I wasn’t going to get any relief from her. The dog saw her too, and renewed it’s efforts. Again it met the same response from me, but now it was changing it’s strategy, it was now trying to get around me to get to my wife. Every time it would move though, I was there stepping toward him, arms out wide yelling at him. He tried this another 4 or 5 times, before he realized I was not going to back down. Finally he went back to his yard, checking over his shoulder to see if we were going to turn around. We didn’t. We walked backwards down the road, facing him until he was out of sight.
 
When we returned home we called Animal Control, because we had hated to think if someone else was walking that road, what might have happened. What if it was a lone person, or a kid on a bicycle? Animal Control wanted us to meet them at the house, so we drove down to meet them. After describing to them what had happened, they cautiously went to the house to talk to the owner, and when they went to the front door, the dog proceeded to attack the door. Our job was done though, so we went home.
 
The next walk we took, I was carrying a big stick.
 
I really feel that the training that I received, was what helped us to get out of this situation without a scratch, and I want to thank you for following through with this important training.
 
Thanks
Mike Silva