Posted on 07/03/2006 7:10:02 PM PDT by GVnana
My sweet little cocker spaniel dog was nearly killed by two pitbulls who jumped a fence to get to her. She crossed a nearby driveway and they got her.
By the time my neighbors got the dogs off, (within seconds) the pits had grounded my dog, tore out her left eye, dislocated her left leg, and left ten gaping wounds in her body. She couldn't move or even howl in pain. That's how I found her.
My dog weighs 40 pounds. She's large for her breed. She's AKC registered and pedigreed. She was a very beautiful dog.
This happened 10 days ago and I'm still stunned at the viciousness of the attack. I don't know if a human child would have survived what those animals did.
I have since learned that homeowner's insurance will not cover pitbulls.
I'm posting this as a warning and also as an invitation to comment.
It was a nice break from the "you're to blame 'cause your dog was loose" crowd here on the internet -- people who know nothing about my neighborhood.
My neighbors adore my dog.
I got an update on the old black lab that used to come around my place. He was put to sleep a couple of weeks ago. Old age and health issues. A renter down the street from us has a sweet shepard mix, but they don't pay much attention to it and keep it chained in the back yard. We'd like to see them build a pen at least. One of my neighbors has two chihuahuas. They used to come running onto the sidewalk barking when I'd walk my dog, then the three would have a doggie sniff fest. Needless to say, the owners are real upset about the pitts getting out.
So far there's a consensus on getting a city ordinance to ban pitts within the city limits. Too much potential for harm.
They are being accused of having a dog that is known to be loving and friendly and a family pet that would never harm anyone and then in an instant is gnawing the nose off a toddler and clamping onto someone's limb with such a vicious grip that it mouth must be pryed open to free the victim.
If you really don't understand, think of it this way: It is the same situation as Sigfried and Roy went through. Or, it is no more appropriate to have a pitbull in a residential neighborhood than it is to have a cougar for a pet. It is simply too dangerous to leave to chance that it will not strike, especially given all the instances as described in the first paragraph.
Good analogy.
A cougar is just a cat, like a pittbull is just a dog.
Which dogs would be allowed in your neighborhood?
This incident just kills me....
PIT BULL ATTACKS OWNER
Jun 6, 2006
OAKLEY, Calif. (AP) -- A pit bull owner in suburban San Francisco owes his life to a police officer who killed the dog as it was mauling its owner's face. The officer, on his way to a call in Oakley, California, saw the dog on top of the owner, biting his face. As the officer approached, the dog growled aggressively. The officer, afraid he'd be attacked, shot the dog to death. It's unclear what prompted the attack, if anything. The victim was treated for several bites to his face.
There you go!
First answer, no pitbulls.
Second answer, if we want to turn to a good source, let's check with the insurance companies to see which types of dogs they will not insure on their homehowner policies.
But, I am sticking with my first answer. No pitbulls in residential neighborhoods.
OAKLEY, Calif. (AP) -- A pit bull owner in suburban San Francisco owes his life to a police officer who killed the dog as it was mauling its owner's face. The officer, on his way to a call in Oakley, California, saw the dog on top of the owner, biting his face. As the officer approached, the dog growled aggressively. The officer, afraid he'd be attacked, shot the dog to death. It's unclear what prompted the attack, if anything. The victim was treated for several bites to his face.
Don't let you neighbors feed your dogs while they are away. Likely it is a trick to poison them while you are unsuspecting. I'd be careful if I were you. Neighbors can be very devious.
The first things is, they want the story about what happened. I tell them and make sure I say, "She WAS in their driveway." The universal response to that has been, "So what?" usually followed by: "I have dogs wander into my driveway all the time. They don't get attacked."
Much different attitude than that displayed by some of the posters here, who seem to think a "trespassing" dog -- as if such a thing existed -- deserves such a fate.
I remember when I was a kid watching my father and the other men getting ready to hunt deer. They all had their dogs, and the dogs had to get along. The dogs were fit, and smart and aching for the hunt. My father's dogs would be so hyper from the night before when they got the first smell of the gun oil. But they were never violent. Even in the company of all those other dogs. All the dogs behaved. They knew better.
I guess Pits just can't help what they do. They certainly wouldn't make good hunting dogs. They'd just tear-up all the meat!
Apparently you don't like to learn new things. If you had read post 375, you would see that scientists are saying that cocker spaniels have high rates of aggression, and in some instances it can be traced.
There has NEVER been a single study that came to that conclusion over pit bulls. Not that there haven't been many of them. All the research people have done over the years on pit bulls has turned up a very large percentage of tempermentally solid dogs. Not so for cockers, dalmations, and many other "nice" breeds.
And as for your "lab is not a pit bull" speech, here's one for you. http://www.wtkr.com/Global/story.asp?S=5019915&nav=ZolHbyvj
This happens all the time, (and if you want proof, I have quite a few stories that somehow made it to the news in the past few weeks) but very few people end up reporting it, so the only ones you hear about are pits, even though the numbers PROVE that pits bite WAY less than many other breeds. If they represent 10% of all dogs, yet only represent 1 to 3% of all bites, that says they are SAFER than many other dogs. Cocker spaniels DO have waaaay more bites each year.
If you would just bother to actually do the research yourself instead of relying on news stories, you might learn that you are talking out of your rear end and change the way you think of things.
Two years ago I had a dog shipped on Continental Airlines from Florida to Texas. When I called to make the reservation the only question they asked me was "is it a pit bull over 6 months old?". I wonder why they asked me that? Prior experience maybe?
"I guess Pits just can't help what they do. They certainly wouldn't make good hunting dogs. They'd just tear-up all the meat!"
You don't know anything about this breed! You are making yourself look worse. These dogs were bred to bait bulls! Their job was to grab onto the bull to keep it contained until it was ready for the slaughter. For a time, the only meat you could get was baited by these dogs. It was later, when bullbaiting became illegal, that they were trained to fight each other. Even to this day people use these dogs to go hog hunting because they are very effective at it, and they have no reason to "tear up the meat". They do it for the same reason coonhounds hunt coons.
During all of this history, they had to be extremely human friendly. A referee, the other dog's owner, or anyone had to be able to walk up to two dogs ferociously fighting and not get bit. ANY DOG not within those standards was IMMEDIATELY culled. They didn't even want to breed those kinds of dogs. Unfortunately, a few breeders nowadays don't have the same standards, and are breeding for human aggression. But I say few because if there were many, there would be literally millions of people getting hurt by these dogs.
No one is telling you that your dog deserved to get mauled. That is illogical. You are the reason your dog was in the driveway. Dogs cannot be held responsible for the things they do because it is ultimately up to us to be responsible for them. They do not know right from wrong, have no idea what morals are. They are instinctual beings, and therefore must be cared for as if they were small children. Which means NOT LETTING THEM RUN THE STREETS.
There are tons and tons of dogs running the streets. Some once belonged to someone but somehow ran away, some were abandoned, some were born there. When a dog you care for disappears, it isn't always cars that get them. Other dogs are a VERY real danger, regardless of the breed. What if it had been a pack of dogs? Your dog would be dead, no matter the breed.
Dogs that are out a lot sometimes meet up and form packs, which is another thing you should be thinking about when your dog goes on its jolly way. ANY breed can join a pack. Near my neighborhood, there's a purebred yellow lab, a chow/golden mix, and two other dogs of unknown breed in a pack that roams the area. They don't attack people, but they do bark as people walk by, and when I walk my dogs, they get pretty close. I have no doubt that they would kill my dogs if I wasn't there with them, pit bull or not.
I feel for you and your dog, but you need to face the reality that it could have been any number of things that hurt your dog. And if you continue to let your dog roam, it's a distinct possibility that your dog will die from something out there. What if someone was driving a little too fast down your street and your dog darted out? What if someone was scouting the area to steal dogs for research? It happens, believe me.
I am still amazed that you don't have a leash law in your area. Many places have them because of safety issues, not only for dogs, but for people. Just because it isn't the law there doesn't mean it isn't a smart thing to do.
That is because ONE dog which happened to be a pit bull, got out and chewed very important machinery. If you knew what pets experience on airplanes you would probably want your pet driven to wherever you're going. They endure very extreme temperatures, the noise from the engines, which isn't dulled by the insulation because there isn't any in cargo, sliding around, bumps, and no human to reassure them. A smart dog that is also very scared is going to try and escape a situation like that. If it's as smart and strong as a pit bull, apparently it can.
It doesn't mean they're vicious. Airlines and insurance companies are good at loss preventionm, and even though they have extremely strict rules just in case that 0.0001% chance happened, that doesn't mean it will. That is all they are about. They are not experts on pit bulls, dog behavior, aggression, bite strength, or anything else that has anything relevant to do with the breed. They only know what they have seen on the news, and they want to appease the general (ignorant) public into a false sense of security.
More people get struck by lightning every year (LOTS MORE) than are attacked by pit bulls. It's the truth. Look it up if you don't believe me.
The crazy PitBull-lady omitted this information about the SPORT of Bull Baiting:
"Bull baiting was most popular sport at Wakes in North Shropshire at all events. James Gryce of Myddle described (in 1878) a bull baiting at Loppington at which he had been present when a boy as 'the most barbarous act I ever saw. It was young bull and had very little notion of tossing the dogs, which tore his ears and the skin off his face in shreds, and his mournful cries were awful. I was up a tree, and was afraid the earth would open and swallow us all up!'.
http://www.oakengates.com/history/bull%20baiting.htm
I never said I agreed with the history of the breed. However, you are missing a HUGE, GLARING fact. PEOPLE trained the dogs to do that, and seemed quite happy about it. These "events" were not put on by pit bulls.
Do you know, statistically, if most pit bull owners do not have children?
Going by the few thousand in the network I am in, the same percentage as non-pit bull owning people, and none of them have any problems. It could just be because nothing has happened "yet", or it could be that these people in the network are responsible owners, and if they ever saw any indication that their dogs were unstable, they would do the right thing and euthanize the dog themselves.
A few have had rescues that were too badly traumatized and had to be pts, but for the most part, rescues, poorly bred dogs, and purebred, papered dogs all seem to have the same temperament. Many of them also have multiple dogs of various breeds. Some of them have to "crate and rotate", but many of them live peacefully with all kinds of other pets, including iguanas, cats, and even chihuahuas.
So you have no hard stats?
No stats are available for any breed of dog. I have a pretty good idea, though. Since there's anywhere from four to six million of them in the United States, in every kind of neighborhood, with every kind of owner, it stands to reason that there are going to be lots of people with children who also have them. And the network I am involved in has a pretty varied selection of people and living situations.
Not to mention, the Staffy bull is known as the "nanny dog" in England because they are considered the most reliable playmate for children, and many people who know the bully breeds get them to entertain their children, because the dogs will put up with a lot of abuse, and contrary to what you see on the news, are much less likely to bite, especially when raised in a loving home environment fully socialized around children.
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