This is an open letter to all Victoria citizens, especially directed to UVIC, Grounds Management, and the Dog Walkers who frequent the Disc Golf Course located at Mystic Vale, on Cedar Hill Crossroad.
Today, Sunday Jan 27 2008, I was witness to an attack on a fellow disc golfer. This disc golfer is a well known, respected professional player in the community and has a long standing reputation as a good mannered, non aggressive individual.
Today he was confronted at the teepad Hole #3 by an aggressive dog that was lunging at him and barking, he repeatedly asked for the owner to control his animal. The dog is a black and white stocky mutt if you want to know when to pull out the pepper spray during a nice round of golf. Anyways, the dog was quite vicious and the disc golfer felt quite threatened, because the owner was not making any attempt to prevent this attack from happening. So the disc golfer felt it necessary to defend himself, and had a small box cutter from work in his pocket. He again demanded that the owner of the dog control it, or if the dog attempted to bite him the dog would get cut with the box cutter.
At this point the dog walker did a very stupid thing. He pulled out a large, 5" blade pocket knife, and threatened the life of the disc golf player. He approached the disc golfer with his knife in a stabbing position. He was ready to kill, but not ready to control his dog. Of course, our disc golfer was a kind person who just wanted to enjoy the Sunday afternoon without having threats to his life, so he basically told the guy to get out of there, and waited to play hole #3 as he intended. By the time Police could be called the guy had left the property, and unfortunately we did not get his license plate.
TO ANYONE WHO WALKS THEIR DOGS IN VICTORIA - if your dog is aggressive, or showing signs of agression and a person feels threatened that person has every right to defend themselves, including taking the life of the animal. That person will not go to court, or have to rationalize why the animal is dead. So if you don't like that, get rid of your animal or move somewhere else. If you want proof look at this link. Anybody finding a dog running at large and harassing people or domestic animals can kill the dog except in the case of dog fights. In British Columbia there is no rule that every dog is entitled to one bite before the owner is held responsible for vicious acts by their dog. The law recognizes that every dog has the potential to bite and that owners must safeguard the public.
I personally have been attacked 4 times in the last year at the UVIC property. I now carry Pepper Spray at all times in my disc golf bag.
This has got to stop now. It is one thing to feel threatened by dogs, it is a completely different thing to have a real threat of having a disc golfer stabbed by an agressive dog walker. We will be talking very seriously about this with the UVIC Grounds Management, and I am sure that we can convince them that this is serious enough to do something about the huge amount of inconsiderate dog walkers that use the property.
UVIC doesn't need a pile of dog crap on thier property, but they need a lawsuit even less. I am sure that the dog walkers will find somewhere else to go once they find that they cannot have off-leash dogs there anymore. This is really the last thing I would have expected. I am used to irresponsible dog owners that cannot control their animals, but to have a very real threat of a knife attack as well as a simultaneous dog attack is really out of control. I will lobby and work to make sure that dog walkers are held responsible for their inability to control their animals, and that violence such as this is not going to be tolerated at the only disc golf park on southern Vancouver Island (and the only one south of Nanaimo).
Dog walkers, take responsibility, but be aware that forces are working to make sure there is no off-leash animals allowed at the UVIC Mystic Vale Disc Golf Course property anymore. We have made a lot of warnings but now this is real and so we are going to act on that threat and prevent it from happening again.
Mark Hoskins
- Team DiscHeads
Yes, I will call the pound if you cannot control your dog, and yes, I will pepper spray your dog if it attacks me.