General Cycling Discussion - Do you bike with your pet?

I had a golden retriever who needs lot's of exercise, so I bike her around when I got sick of throwing balls for 2 hours straight.

There were many cars round my neighbourhood, so I had to leash her along, and we got used to each other quickly, like she knows to stop, turn left or right just with a little pull and commands.

Maybe some of you walk your cats or fish.... I don't know:)

I used to ride with my lab he was a great bike dog! I have a cat now thought of riging some kind of carrier on it but she is skitterish as it is, but since she is an outdoor cat maybe whe will like it. There used to be this guy I saw on my commutes along the Burk Gillam trail years ago that had a parakeet he rode with,. saw it pearched on his helmet one morning it was so funny, now I carry a little APS camera (looking at digitals) so I can chronicle my adventures.

My bike is my pet.

I sometimes find small wee beasties living under my saddle. does that count ?

Originally posted by MichaelW
I sometimes find small wee beasties living under my saddle. does that count ?

one to three or four can be considered pets. Anymore than that and you would have to be a farmer or rancher :)

I would ride the trails with my dog, but he is easily distracted, and wonders. Also I tried it earlier on my old bike, and well its not worth it.

Some of the remote places we ride around here see very few bikers. At least not spandex wearing bikers. We have our regular places to stop for water, some of them convenience stores, and some of them have little booths set up where all the local old kodgers meet to drink coffe and gossip. I swear, at some of these places we would get LESS attention if we were space aliens. You can usually hear one of them mutter something like "them ther boys look like a bunch of dern gays". Now let me picture one of us pulling a trailer with a little kitty cat inside...

My Dobie loves to run with me and the bike. She is traffic dumb! so I only ride with her on the dirt road I live on and some trails and across my hay fields never very close to paved roads or traffic. Even so when we see a car/truck/tractor she runs up to great it! besides 2 to 5 miles a day is enough for her and it gives me a warm up before a longer ride. The vet says she looks greeat!
Joe
:beer:

Originally posted by Cdude
I would ride the trails with my dog, but he is easily distracted, and wonders.

What does he wonder about? :p

I'd take my dog on the trails, but she's 8 years old and has arthritis....part of the reason I felt free to get into biking this year is that I can't take her on long walks anymore, anyway. Still, sometimes she runs alongside when I'm doing little runs to test adjustments. And sometimes, if someone has let her out, she meets me coming home on my commute. :)

On last Fall's tour,I was coming from the north into the town of Santa Maria, California.. A really weird thing I saw was an older man on a Cruiser type bike had built a little platform atop his rack on the back of his bike.
He had a medium sized dog riding with him within the platform that had sides on it like a milk crate. That was pretty strange, I thought. Older guy probably not ride too fast. I would hope the dog would jump off the bike safely, if he needed to. The dog looked pretty content..

Originally posted by cyclezealot
On last Fall's tour,I was coming from the north into the town of Santa Maria, California.. A really weird thing I saw was an older man on a Cruiser type bike had built a little platform atop his rack on the back of his bike.
He had a medium sized dog riding with him within the platform that had sides on it like a milk crate. That was pretty strange, I thought. Older guy probably not ride too fast. I would hope the dog would jump off the bike safely, if he needed to. The dog looked pretty content..

I saw a guy and dog riding like this the other day, but the bike was a Harley!
Joe
:beer:

Originally posted by velocipedio
My bike is my pet.
for me its the other way around "my bike" I am the "pet":D :D :D :roflmao: :roflmao:

My roomate has a golden retreiver and sometimes I bring the dog with me. But usually if I am in the conservation area or somewhere like that. I would never consider taking her on the road.

See Spot.

See Spot run.

Run Spot, run.

See Spot run after the paceline.

See spot try to hold a wheel at 45 km/h.

Draft Spot, draft.

See Spot get dropped.

Run Spot, run.

See Spot...

Waahahahahaa! :)

The only way to tire out a Hungarian Vizsla is to cycle in the forest with him running along beside you, for an hour or so. Then when we get home he only wants to play football for an hour or so.

Originally posted by chewa
The only way to tire out a Hungarian Vizsla is to cycle in the forest with him running along beside you, for an hour or so. Then when we get home he only wants to play football for an hour or so.

My golden retriever can dislodge my arm for fetching. She can fetch on land for 1.5 hours straight and 2++ hours in the water.... daily:eek:

The funniest thing I saw was a couple of years ago, I was at my rest stop standing outside the market and a tandem went by. The captain was wearing a backpack and sticking its head out of the backpack was a little dachshund.

My dog gets so excited when I return, I couldn't imagine denying her the wait. Besides, her route would be very different than any I might take since I seldom try to catch jack rabbits or hummingbirds, let alon other dogs:p

Do you bike with your pet?

No. I have a cat. She's not into cycling.

Do you pet with your bike?

Not on the first date.

This weekend I volunteered for a bicycle event in Portland, Oregon (Bridge Pedal) and saw a guy on his bike with a sling over his chest with his white little mutt dog poking its head out.

I thought, "Hey, I should try that!" only my lab Maggie would be a bit large.

Maybe a BOB just for her?

I had a pet rat that would sit in the middle pocket of my jersey.

When I was younger I had a "Mobo Cross 70", one of those chopper style bikes with a long banana seat and cissy bar, central car type gear lever controlling a 3 speed rear derailleur gear. bright yellow

Anyhow, we had a small chocolate brown chihuahua at the time and she used to sit inside my jacket either tucked in or occassionally with her head poking out the part opened zip, and her behind on the front part of the banana seat.

She used to scare passersby by barking as we passed when I was cycling to my gran's.

Thanks for starting this thread. i haven't thought about those early cycling days (25 years ago) for so long and now I feel all warm and fuzzy.

As soon as my pet is able, she will get a bike and come with me. My pet...is my wife...and my best friend. Unfortunately, she does not fetch balls, beg, or chase her tail.:D

I've tried it a few times, but I stopped after the last. My dog decided to bugger off home by himself ;) Lazy mutt, hehe :)

I've tried it a few times, but I stopped after the last. My dog decided to bugger off home by himself

Smart dog! Mine used to have instant rigor mortis the moment I put the leash over its head.

I recall a really unpleasant thing where a friend used to cycle slowly with her dog trotting alongside. She stopped at the end of the road, and when she rode on, the poor dog caught it's tail in the chain and pinched it very badly. It needed several stitches and a mountain of steak and choice meat as a guilt offering to the hapless hound. From then on, I thought to myself, I'd never put any of my pets at risk like that. Accident maybe, but it could have been avoided. The dog made a full recovery and that pleased everyone who knew and loved it.

I put my dog in my Burley cargo trailer, she loves it and so do the people who see us. ( She has bad hips and can't run or walk very far at all)

Ride for Life
PAT

Bokkie, ouch. I'll bear that in mind if I ever try cycling my dog again as he has a big bushy tail.

For some reason I have an urge to get a sidecar for my bike, hehe, I'd bet I'd get some looks then ;)

I take my dog with me when I go mountain biking and running. We have some rather secluded trails near my home. We know all the water spots (it can get very hot where we are).

Recently I haven't had much of a chance to do either running or MTBing (though I've done tons of bike-commuting) so she's a little out of shape. I'm working on getting her back.

She's a smart dog, stays right with me, and can go for quite some time. She absolutely has a blast.

There was one time, however, when I lost sight of her on a downhill return home. By the time I realized she was gone I was facing a 1/2 hour climb back up, at least. So I decided to continue on. I called my wife and she met me with her van. We loaded up the bike and set off to find Shelby. We were very concerned because by now more than 1/2 hour had passed since I last saw Shelby and we live in Coyote Valley, near Coyote Creek, if you catch me drift. We tried two or three places along the way and no sight of her. Now we were really getting concerned. To our great relief she had found her way back to our customary starting point, at least a couple miles away, just resting under a tree, waiting for us!! Shelby came running, tail wagging furiously, my wife broke out in tears, and I was one lucky dude for I'm sure my wife would have kicked me out had she been gone forever!!!

To our great relief she had found her way back to our customary starting point, at least a couple miles away, just resting under a tree, waiting for us!!

I once read a heart-warming and, yes, wrenching tale about a dog in France somewhere in the 1890s I think it was. Wherever, it is a true story. It was about a young girl who used to go to a country school. Every morning, the family pet, a Belgian Shepherd would walk with her to school, and she'd send it back home. Even more amazing, the faithful hound would be waiting at the school gates in the afternoon. And so this went on, day after day. She was taken very ill, I think it was TB, and she died. Noone could explain it, but after she died, the hound pined for her and never ate again. It made one final journey back to the school and lay down by the school gates. It passed away where it lay that day. I think the town where she lived erected a statue in memory of her and the dog.

If I could, I'd cart my 2 cats around. Maybe one would be ok in one of those kiddie attachments. What a hoot that would be!
Think of the dogs faces as the cat zoomed by! ;0

I have a photo somewhere, a lab mix (ringer for ol' yeller) riding on a piece of plywood on my tandem's stoker seat.

Hey: I bike with my dog! On the weekends, myself and husband take him into the woods while we mountain bike. When I am alone, I hike with the dog. I can't handle the dog and the bike at the same time. I have only been doing this for about one month now. My dog (Dakota) a yellow lab/retriever was getting a little large( 90 lbs.) and had too much energy to burn. I too was getting sick of throwing balls at him so decided to turn his energy into FUN! I was afraid he would not come when I called him, but decided to try. Actually, he stays right with me. When he goes to far, I call out "BYE". Dakota thinks I am leaving him in the woods and comes running. The only downfall, when I go to leave my house in the morning he expects to come too!!! We both enjoy the time together very much. :D :beer:

Pyramid Bike Leash.
This looks like abuse.

I have a Jack Russell terrier that has been leash trained. We live in a RV park with over three miles of road. He runs beside me on the left side. I hold the leash in my left hand and let him set the pace. Most of the time we do around 6 mph. When he wants to he will run up to eighteen miles an hour. It is great fun to watch him stretch out and run.

Bob

We have a tom cat called Peanut He doesn't ride on my bike yet but he can do 25mph easy when he's chased by the wife's dobbie :D :D

Joeprim's post about riding with his "traffic-dumb" Dobie brought back some bizarre memories. With two Dobies on a leash, I used to ride along the Dr. Paul Dudley White bicycle path along the Charles River (the moat between MIT and BU).

Leashing myself and an old Raleigh touring bike to a few hundred pounds of Dobermann was not a brilliant idea- but it eventually worked with some adjustments.

I learned to keep both Zara and Rufus on the left side with Zara the high-IQ Dobie outboard and "bike-path dumb" Rufus inboard. Rufus and Zara were yoked together at the collar by a ball-bearing fixture sometimes used with pairs of hounds in Ireland. Why left side? Well, I was born lefty and I learned to do emergency dismounts from horses and iron horses from my right side.

Most crashes occurred when I did not release the leash quickly enough whenever Zara chased a rat. BTW, Dobies were bioengineered from a bad tempered greyhound who gave them the speed genes that the Marines favor.

Those still reading this post may be wondering why the leash? Well, the forementioned "Dr. Paul Dudley White Bike Path" has manic inline skaters, beserk racing bikers, even occasional Harleys- but just a few illegal, unleashed dogs.

If the pioneering bike-friendly cardiologist were to try to pedal today along this dangerous racecourse, he would probably persuade the pols to rename it the "Dr. David H. Janda Sports Injury Lab Raceway". Check out "The Awakening of a Surgeon" at:
http://www.ipsm.org/book.asp

:roflmao:

my shepard puppy and i just went for our second ride together. the first one i figured she would tire after going around the block (about half mile) at 10-12mph, right? WRONG! remember, she's only four months. the problem is she's a puppy with an amazing amount of energy. so tonight, we did a mile at about 8-10. but it didn't even wind her! i'm not going to run her any more than that for at least a few months, i've heard if you run them too much when they are young, it's hard on their joints.

and has anyone heard of using the doggie boots for running them on pavement? i've heard that concrete eats the pads off their paws.

E...

Ha, ha, ha! Back when I was in better shape, I took my 3-month-old shepherd puppy on a 5-mile jog with me, after which I collapsed on the couch, and she jumped all over me, telling me she was all warmed-up for playtime!

That particular pup never had any joint problems, BTW, though she grew up with an attitude problem. (She thought she was smarter than me, and sometimes she was right.) I think it's a shame what the breeders have done to the GSD, a dog meant to be bred to run after sheep all day...they're breeding so much for extreme hip angulation that more and more can barely walk.

I never heard of using boots for that reason, but sounds like a good way to avoid broken-glass cuts, too. If your dog will wear them without chewing them off, that is.

Originally posted by Inkwolf
BTW, though she grew up with an attitude problem. (She thought she was smarter than me, and sometimes she was right.) I think it's a shame what the breeders have done to the GSD, a dog meant to be bred to run after sheep all day...they're breeding so much for extreme hip angulation that more and more can barely walk.
Inkwolf, I have a 3 yo GSD b*tch who doesn't think she is
smarter than me, she knows she is :lol: . My favourite anecdote
about GSD's is when you're getting a treat out of the cabinet
and your GSD is sitting behind you cocking his/her head, its not
because the dog is trying to figure out what you're doing its
trying to figure out how he/she can open the cabinets without you. Too true.
My GSD is a south african breeding, from Schitzund lines and
does not have extreme hip angulation, and yes she can run
all day long.
Bike Content: she barks at bikes but doesn't chase them.
Marty

Originally posted by unrelated
I had a golden retriever who needs lot's of exercise, so I bike her around when I got sick of throwing balls for 2 hours straight.

There were many cars round my neighbourhood, so I had to leash her along, and we got used to each other quickly, like she knows to stop, turn left or right just with a little pull and commands.

Maybe some of you walk your cats or fish.... I don't know:)

I love animals... one of my best friends was "Mr Bear". He went everywhere with me, except when I went riding. He was trained to the max with great social skills.

However, being a dog he wasn't for running along with my bike and other bike riders. To many things can happen in a sudden moment.

:D

Originally posted by lotek
My favourite anecdote
about GSD's is when you're getting a treat out of the cabinet
and your GSD is sitting behind you cocking his/her head, its not
because the dog is trying to figure out what you're doing its
trying to figure out how he/she can open the cabinets without you. Too true.

Ain't it the truth! My current GSD has learned to open the car door from outside in two different cars. The night after she figured out how to do it, I was thawing some chicken in the microwave, when she started watching me open the door with a very speculative expression. I distracted her immediately, and fortunately, she hasn't put her mind to the problem of helping herself from the microwave yet! :eek:

Since we're now discussing GSDs.
Mine is too smart for her own good. She anticpates everything
so training is lots of fun. Her other problem is she probably
should have black patent leather and a whip she is so
dominant. Her line is all schitzund 2s and 3s with the exception
of her mother who was an obedience champion in south
africa.
Opens car doors? I can't even mention the word car
or ride (for fun we ask her if the gopher died?) without her
running to the leash, turning circles and sitting in front of the
garage door. You seen the commercial with the dog driving?
well Sassy would do that if I let her :lol:
Bike content: She knows not to bother me when I'm on
the rollers :D
Marty

Some memories of Mr Bear, my friend. He was a text book 105lb Rotti... world champ sire and state champ ***** of a mother. Champion crown and stature. I trained him completely, obiedience on lead and off, including hand signals. But most importantly he was a natural friend to those who feared his size and look. I loved to watch him make friends of people that feared him when they came in my home. A temperment, like no other.

The eight years Mr Bear was in my life, he saved my sanity and gave like no other animal i've owned. He went every where with me, including my office, loved long rides in the car, went cross country sking, backpacking, boating, swiming and out to dinner at friends.

I recall this 3yr old child of an old girlfriend walking him on his lead. He knew never to creat tension on the lead. I have a vivid image of that little girl struggling to lift his hind leg to get the lead untangled while Bear was looking at her.

Mr Bear and I use climb and straddle the top of the jungle gym in the park, while kids climbed up to pet him. He loved attention. He went down the slide, sat in the swing and would crawl across the park on his belly with the wave of my hand. He'd even play hide and seek with a sit stay command.

Sadly, he died some years back, but still walks at my side every moment of my remaining life.

Anyone rides with snake?:D Just wondering.

I also remember a dog that belonged to a mine manager in the east rand area of Johannesburg. As young kids, a mate and I used to ride around the tracks on the mine, and the dog used to tag along as well. One hot afternoon we spotted a bees nest in a tree and threw some stones at it. The air was suddenly heavy with buzzing so we rode like the wind as best we could in the sandy conditions, with the dog running with us. We passed a small shack, and an old black zulu man who called himself Whitey, was sitting on the stoep of the shop he ran smoking his pipe, and he laughed his head off as we rode past, screaming in panic. Moments later Whitey, saw the reason for our worry, and he rapidly overhauled us, and the laugh on his face was lost with ours. We managed to stay ahead of the swarm. A while later, we sat on his stoep, drinking cold cokes, and the dog had one too. Whitey told us african tales that kept us spellbound until we left for home with the setting sun still warm upon our backs and we took the dog back to the mine manager. I don't think I ever had a ride with an animal that was such fun and full of adventure.

Now there's a good story! :)

Though my dog acts as though leaving the yard is Nirvana, she bonks within a block or two of simple walking.

She very much prefers to wait until I return to use my legs as a salt lick.

bokkie,
man, that was beautiful. i'm an aspiring writer and i'm impressed! have you ever considered writing?

E...

Originally posted by SpiderMike
I had a pet rat that would sit in the middle pocket of my jersey.

No kidding? I've never heard of that....Wow. I had a pet Rat years ago. Never thought of taking her on a bike ride.....