MR Waldron’s response to my letter regarding the attack on my puppy seems to indicate it should not have been off the lead. Many people may agree.

Although I don’t know if Mr Waldron is a dog training expert, I know I’m not.

Therefore we took the advice “start as you mean to go on” and let the pup off as soon as we began to go out for walks. As anyone who has ever trained a puppy will know, recall is one of the hardest things to teach.

Training classes and your back garden can start the basics but only proper walks provide the necessary experience.

The alternative is for all dogs to be walked on leads. This seems somewhat heavily weighted against the owners of friendly, sociable dogs.

I can appreciate how irritating it must be to have other dogs approach your own if you are perpetually anxious that your dog may bite them, in fact many otherwise friendly dogs may retaliate, escalating the situation. Surely the way to protect both dogs and take the stress out of the encounter would be for the aggressor to wear a muzzle?

IMost adult dogs in my experience seem to be fairly tolerant of puppies or will warn them off with a bark, growl or nip.

I can only repeat that this attack was not intended to scare my puppy away but to pin her down and inflict as much damage as possible.

Susan Clarke Redlake Drive Stourbridge