S/O If you have a pit bull...why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not even sure I know what the "rebel factor" is. Pretty sure they're not found in my town.

Our dog was not a rescue. We got him as a puppy, 6 weeks old, from my husband's co-worker. He owned both the parent dogs and had one litter before the female was spayed. We treated him like any other puppy. I'm not a fan of crates or tie-outs. He was with us in the house almost all the time. We took him for walks and allowed him to socialize with other dogs from the beginning (no "waiting until he has all his shots"). We took him to a puppy training class. We played with him a lot, taught him commands which he learned very quickly, and made a point of desensitizing him to common aggression triggers by taking toys out of his mouth, removing his food bowl while he was eating, etc., He was an extremely good-natured dog. Everyone who met him loved him--unless they hated dogs already. Several people independently called him a "pit bull ambassador."

But you know what? We would have done the same for any breed of dog. Pit bull puppies need the same things all dogs need: love, discipline, and responsible owners. Human aggression is not in their DNA, quite the opposite.

The fact is, many people do want a pit bull because of its image, and they don't raise them or treat them right. As a result, they don't get what every dog needs. Of course, a few become aggressive and dangerous. And it's a fact that they can exhibit dog aggression--though ours never did, and dog aggression does not translate to human aggression. But in the vast, vast majority of cases, a pit bull puppy that is raised as ours was, will be an amazing pet. Call me blind or self-deceived if you will, but when I hear that a pit bull who attacked someone was a "family pet," I have a very hard time believing that it was a dog raised as ours was. It was either a rescue with an unknown background, possibly abused or used for fighting, or it was kept chained in the backyard, or in some similar environment.

There are very, very few other breeds, if any, that are so consistently abused and mistreated as pit bulls. And somehow, the blame then goes to the breed.

Theee is a mom who watched her sweet loveable raised from puppy pitbull maul and kill her gorgeous child about a year ago. Everything you say sounds just like what she said about her dog.

[Anonymous]

^^ so did the Goocheland woman who was just eaten. There is a reason why 700 cities have outlawed pitbulls.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a family in our neighborhood with a pitbull. I pet her once and she seemed fine but I have to say...I plan my route around their house so I don't have to pass by when walking with my 15 pound greyhound or my little kids. She just has this look in her eyes and it kind of scares me. Maybe that's judgmental...I don't care.

It's not judgmental - it's smart. I get uneasy when I see them out in public (not true of any other dog), and with good reason - the story out of goochland this week just serves as further proof. She had raised those dogs since they were puppies, and EVERYONE they talked to described them as sweet, loving, gentle, affectionate...they never would have suspected this could happen. That's the scary thing - they are "sweet lovebabies" until suddenly they SNAP. How anyone could feel that's worth the risk is beyond me

Right. Don’t these people read the news articles? Nobody ever says, “yeah my pit bull has always been super aggressive, so I’m not surprised he bit a child at the park.” No. They say all the same things the people in this thread are saying.

I’ve had dogs my whole life. None of them are 100% predictable. I’ve had dogs who have bitten family members. But they bit once - usually for a clear “reason” and backed off. Pit bulls don’t seem to back off.

Yes. This. My toddler once rolled off the couch onto our sleeping yellow lab. Dog was startled and swung his head back and snapped at DS. But the dog immediately "came to" and relaxed. There are Lots of situations where a gentle dog has an instinct to bite, snap or nip. But pit bulls seem to become more prey driven in that state.

[Anonymous]

(our yellow lab didn't even get his teeth on DS)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^^ so did the Goocheland woman who was just eaten. There is a reason why 700 cities have outlawed pitbulls.

Every article that I have seen about the woman in Goocheland states that the dogs were being neglected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

See, this is what sets pitbull.owners off as a special kind of stupid.

They are so desparate to prove to the world that their pitbull is gentle as can be that they do things like take zero precautions to keep their pits away from children, or worse allow their own kids to walk their pits unsupervised, have their babies sleep on their pirbulls and allow their toddlers unattended with and or to climb allover thier pits.

They cannot reason at all when it comes to basic animal safety and their pitts because "he's such a big goofy cuddlebug"

How can dog owners of such a dangerous breed be so deliberately stupid?

[phone]

Agree. My spaniel mix is a lovable doofus who has never met a person he didn't love and he ADORES DD (it helps she feeds him half her dinner at mealtime...). I am still incredibly careful about how I allow them to interact because as much as I love my dog, he's still a DOG and accidents happen. Plenty of incredibly kind dogs will nip if they get jumped on when they're sleeping or get their tails stepped on, etc. My precautions are about protecting my daughter AND my dog.

[Anonymous]

We have a family member with a pit bull and our rule is it can not come to our house and it can not be around our kids (situation where it was at a 3rd party home and we left upon seeing it was there).

I have had dogs my entire life, love dogs, but this is one breed I'm not risking my kids around. They're all "so sweet" until they rip the baby's face off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

See, this is what sets pitbull.owners off as a special kind of stupid.

They are so desparate to prove to the world that their pitbull is gentle as can be that they do things like take zero precautions to keep their pits away from children, or worse allow their own kids to walk their pits unsupervised, have their babies sleep on their pirbulls and allow their toddlers unattended with and or to climb allover thier pits.

They cannot reason at all when it comes to basic animal safety and their pitts because "he's such a big goofy cuddlebug"

How can dog owners of such a dangerous breed be so deliberately stupid?

[phone]

Agree. My spaniel mix is a lovable doofus who has never met a person he didn't love and he ADORES DD (it helps she feeds him half her dinner at mealtime...). I am still incredibly careful about how I allow them to interact because as much as I love my dog, he's still a DOG and accidents happen. Plenty of incredibly kind dogs will nip if they get jumped on when they're sleeping or get their tails stepped on, etc. My precautions are about protecting my daughter AND my dog.

Yes.

And if your dog unexpectedly bites your daughter she might need a few stitches. Traumatic but not life threatening.

If their pitbull unexpectedly bites their child, the child will most likely suffer major trauma, years of reconstructive surgery, loss of limb or death.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

See, this is what sets pitbull.owners off as a special kind of stupid.

They are so desparate to prove to the world that their pitbull is gentle as can be that they do things like take zero precautions to keep their pits away from children, or worse allow their own kids to walk their pits unsupervised, have their babies sleep on their pirbulls and allow their toddlers unattended with and or to climb allover thier pits.

They cannot reason at all when it comes to basic animal safety and their pitts because "he's such a big goofy cuddlebug"

How can dog owners of such a dangerous breed be so deliberately stupid?

[phone]

Agree. My spaniel mix is a lovable doofus who has never met a person he didn't love and he ADORES DD (it helps she feeds him half her dinner at mealtime...). I am still incredibly careful about how I allow them to interact because as much as I love my dog, he's still a DOG and accidents happen. Plenty of incredibly kind dogs will nip if they get jumped on when they're sleeping or get their tails stepped on, etc. My precautions are about protecting my daughter AND my dog.

Yes.

And if your dog unexpectedly bites your daughter she might need a few stitches. Traumatic but not life threatening.

If their pitbull unexpectedly bites their child, the child will most likely suffer major trauma, years of reconstructive surgery, loss of limb or death.

Agree. The story of the dog that killed the newborn because the mother sneezed when they were all in bed together and the dog snapped is a story that will stick with me forever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we moved into our neighborhood with our two spoiled rotten and very docile big dogs, we immediately spent $6000 on a sturdy privacy fence for our large yard. A few weeks later we went to a neighborhood get together and everyone was going around introducing themselves because there were several new families there. When we introduced ourselves and said where we lived, someone immediately popped up and said, "Oh - YOU GUYS have PIT BULLS." You could have heard a pin drop. Everyone looked at us with huge, frightened eyes and mothers held their children close.

Here are our dogs:



Both are mutts. Both are rescued dogs. Both have been spayed/neutered since they were 9 months old. They are both completely worthless as guard dogs because they are so spoiled that they cannot IMAGINE anything bad happening to them (we got them both when they were less than 6 weeks old).

The black dog is, according to our vet, a lab/pit bull mix - not sure of the ratios. She is absolutely wonderful with kids - she has never even growled at man or beast. I am not sure she even knows how to growl! She will, however, lick you to pieces, and she is capable of knocking someone down with her exuberance. She loves nothing better than to have kids roll all over her. She weighs 75 pounds and due to her extremely LOVING nature, I don't ever leave her alone with kids. For that matter, I don't leave any kids alone with either of my dogs, even though the other dog has no features or evidence of pit bull lineage.

But our neighbors still think we have pit bulls. They would tell the media in an instant "They have pit bulls over there" if asked. They have asked us off and on if our fence is secure, and when we assure them that it is, they always say, "Oh good - because we wouldn't want your pit bulls to get out."

Sheeze!

The issue with pit bull and pit bull/mastiff mixed breed dogs is that they are so often sought out by BAD OWNERS - owners who neglect them, leave them chained in a yard, or ignored outside for days at a time. They often don't neuter them either, or allow them to interact with the family much if at all. They encourage "tough behavior" from these dogs.

I used to have a boxer. Not a pit bull - a full bred boxer. We were clearly told by the breeder as well as in books we read, that we should not encourage tugging sorts of games with a boxer, because they can get carried away and clamp down with their jaw - it's instinct.

I know it's an old line, but there are no bad dogs, only bad owners.

We have owners like you in our neighborhood.

Everyone in our dog friendly neighborhood HATES that you brought pitbulls into our safe neighborhood. We all warn our kids to be very careful if you have your pits outside, even on a leash.

Your dogs do not belong in a safe family neighborhood.

Keep them away from kids.

When they die, please get a safer breed.

+1. It really sucks that you did that / that we now ALL have to worry about it. Read the story out of goochland, read the dog bite fatalities link someone posted - there's a reason we're all so nervous. You think your dogged insistence that your dogs are sweet lovers who "don't even know how to growl" should be sufficient evidence that we don't need to worry about our kids now?? You're f*cking delusional - they're ANIMALS. There is a reason for the stereotype this breed has. I hate that we have to always have this in the back of our mind when our kids are outside now - and yes all us neighbors are talking about / judging you

[Anonymous]

My family had a pit bull growing up. I loved him to death! He was the sweetest dog - so patient and loving - even when I would pull his ears or tail (like most kids, I could be rough on pets). He never growled at me or anyone in my family, BUT if anyone rang the doorbell or if we had other people come over - he would go berserk! We were a military family and when we moved to base housing, we weren't allowed to bring him. I cried for days when my parents gave him away.

Looking back as an adult, I think we may have just gotten lucky. It's impossible to know for certain, but I would never take that kind of risk with my own kids. That being said, I'm nervous around ALL new dogs. My good friend has a scar on her chin from where another friend's border collie (you know, a Lassie dog) bit her in the face.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^ so did the Goocheland woman who was just eaten. There is a reason why 700 cities have outlawed pitbulls.

Every article that I have seen about the woman in Goocheland states that the dogs were being neglected.

So? How many breeds of dog would turn on someone who "raised them From puppies" because they were "indoor dogs were moved outside where they stayed "in the cold." Stephens visited about five times per week so the dogs subsequently became more isolated". They were eating her rib cage when they found them. There are many dogs who would fit this description of neglect (left outside in the cold, visited 5x a week) but they sure as heck wouldn't turn on the person that raised them and eat them!

[Anonymous]

It is mind-boggling to me that people are willing to take this risk. I hope they are completely banned in the near future.

[Anonymous]

By nature, pit bulls are not great guard dogs, they are not territorial, they engage in far less resource guarding (food, toys, chew bones) than a lovable lab or Golden retriever does. Pits are naturally friendly towards humans. Aggression against humans is not the norm for them although they can be protective of their human families.

Yes, there are exceptions and when they happen they are horrible. But the reality is, Pits - as a breed - are not naturally aggressive against humans. Quite the opposite.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is mind-boggling to me that people are willing to take this risk. I hope they are completely banned in the near future.

Herding dogs herd - it is in their genetic make up and intrinsically makes them happy. Why are breeds known for agression any different? It's genetic and under the right circumstances that lovable, wouldn't hurt anyone pit will kill. For those who think agression isn't a function of genetics I encourage you to read this articles. Research now shows the argument "“That aggression is not heritable is not tenable"

http://www.animals24-7.org/2015/11/10/the-science-of-how-behavior-is-inherited-in-aggressive-dogs/