D10 vs. charging dog

I was out for a midnight walk recently and stopped at a water fountain on a dark school playground. In the distance I started hearing the rattling of a metal collar and the panting of a dog. It was getting louder and I could barely make out the silhouette of the dog about 50 yards away under the available moonlight. When I did I realized it was running full speed straight for me. I didn't know what sort of dog it was nor it's intentions. My D10 was in hand and I made the decision to wait until the dog got closer before lighting it up. My thinking was that if I turned on my flashlight when the dog was too far away it would diminish the startle effect and it may actually become more interested in investigating. If I waiting until it was almost upon me the startle effect may cause the dog to attack out of fear. I wanted the dog to think "flight" instead of "fight". At 30 feet away I hit the piston and the dog was sufficiently startled and veered away. From it's point of view it was probably focusing on my image until that was suddenly replaced by a bright and unexpected light.

As the dog passed I could see it was a pit bull terrier. About 10 seconds later the dog's owner rode past me quietly on his unlit bicycle. Now I know the dog wasn't alone and probably just out for an exercise run with it's owner. I never got the impression the dog was going to attack me, but being in the path of a charging dog isn't something to turn your back on either.

Comments welcome, and if you have a flashlight vs. animal story please post that too.

When I walk my dogs at night, I use my Deerelight DBS V3 to quiet barking dogs that people in the neighborhood leave outside all night to bark and annoy their neighbors.

As I pass by the yards and their dogs bark, I give them a nice facefull of the focused R2 emitter to ensure that they are contained in their yards. Usually shuts them up.

I doubt that a dog intent on attacking will be turned away by a flashlight, but the surprise might be enough of a distraction to redirect a curious dog like you experienced. if I was very concerned about dog attacks, I'd carry pepper spray.

I've never seen a dog put off barking by a light. Granted, most of my lights are "only" the 100-200 lumen range, but still. My experiences...

I was attacked by a pitbull at the age of 10 or 11... I think running from it didn't help... And trying to climb a telegraph pole to escape its jaws was a good idea at the time. So well done on standing your ground! Even if it didn't cause it to alter its direction its well worth a shot. Oh my knife collecting also started somewhere around this time too

Theres a discussion about fending off dogs that ended up locked on EDC forums. Ive been working with dogs professionally for about 2 years now. Training and really just studying their behavior around other dogs. Lets just say do NOT count on your light stopping a dog. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesnt. The best thing you can do is make yourself look really big and intimidating and start making loud noises. That will work just about every time.

If you would really like some advice on protecting yourself against all kinds of dogs (Avoiding physically harming yourself or the dog) Feel free to PM me.

Ditto the prior post. Having worked with a specific breed of dog for some years now and others from time to time please do not count on a flashlight, no matter how bright, to protect against a dog that is challenging you.

On the flip side, I have found that bright lights, especialy those that strobe, seem to work well to move skunks along. During a few evening walks this past week I ran across one of the neighborhood skunks. Hitting him solid with LX2 high beam did nothing but get a curious look. Manually flashing / strobing it got him to literally turn and hustle the other way. On another walk I used the signal beam (double flash) from a JetBeam III-M with the same results. Please note that this was the same skunk, so your results may vary.

Last year I broke up two skunks that were about to fight and moved them along using the strobe from a Fenix PD3. While they made it clear they were not happy they did move along. If you have never seen a skunk snarl they are actually quite ornery looking.

Overall I would say I have had very good results on close to ten occasions from as close as four or five feet (Not my choice - Sometimes they surprise you) and as far away as perhaps 50 feet.

I am starting to work on the family of crows that collect on the telephone pole outside of our bedroom window at about 5 AM every morning to greet the day, preen their feathers, and make a heck of a ruckus. They don't seem to like the business end of a Streamlight SuperTac, but I have not had enough test runs to see if it really works to move them to a new location long term. And no, there are far too many houses around to use any "permanent" means of relocating them.

GreySave said:

Ditto the prior post. Having worked with a specific breed of dog for some years now and others from time to time please do not count on a flashlight, no matter how bright, to protect against a dog that is challenging you.

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Right - remember that sight is # 3 in importance in terms of a dog's senses. He operates first on smell, then by hearing, then by sight. A completely blinded dog who is determined to attack can do so without much impairment.

This is one reason why pepper spray is much more effective - it completely overwhelms the dog's olfactory senses, which occupy most of its brain capacity. A dog who can't smell his environment is a severely impaired dog.

A less motivated dog MIGHT be put off by a bright light, but it changes nothing about his sense of exactly where you are.

GreySave said:

I am starting to work on the family of crows that collect on the telephone pole outside of our bedroom window at about 5 AM every morning to greet the day, preen their feathers, and make a heck of a ruckus. They don't seem to like the business end of a Streamlight SuperTac, but I have not had enough test runs to see if it really works to move them to a new location long term. And no, there are far too many houses around to use any "permanent" means of relocating them.

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I found that the dancing dot from a green lazer projected on a tree or whatever is next to them scares them off every time. This was on ravens and not crows, but I'd guess the results would be similar. I tested it out on other smaller birds and it had no effect. :thinking:

I always wonder if the practice of shining powerful movie lights to film wild life at night, could permanently damage their eyesight. Similarly bright LEDS might cause damage and we should exercise some caution when using our flashlights in the direction of animals.