Something off my chest.

I usually don't lose sleep or fret about too many things but this one
is really getting me.
And I've seen lots of ugly things re: animals and shelters and such,
lots of graphic pictures and RL things too.
Yesterday the animal control officer from the city came in the shelter
and stuck this 8x10 photo in my face and said "Now I guess this will
change your mind about pit bulls". It made me mad first because I never
was particularly a defender of pits and second she didn't give me any
warning.
It was a two-year-old child whose face was pretty well gone from the
nose down. They were visiting relatives from out of state. The dog was
a "nice dog", never been aggressive in it's life. They were sitting
around the living room, as I heard the story, and the little girl went
running across the room to throw herself into the lap of the owner, as
toddlers do. The dog just went berserk. For the first time in its life.
Parents have just got to hear stories like this, I think. I am doing a
piece in the newsletter I think. Parents just have to do a better job
protecting their small children from strange dogs. All dogs. They are,
after all, animals, and all animals are unpredicable. I can even see
Happy doing something like that; he was never exposed to children, and
the ones that visited, he didn't much like. When my sisters wild-child
twin grandsons visited, I always locked him up somewhere. I think he'd
have bitten, although his dachshund self wouldn't have caused as much
damage.
That poor little girl is going to have years of surgeries ahead of
her.

Sorry for the OT, I wish I had something like a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser
I could just rub across my head and get that picture out.

Monique Y. Mudama...

I'm so sorry for this little girl.

I do think people overreport "pit bull" incidents. In a lot of
communities, almost every dog has a bit of pit bull, so I don't know
if that means pit bulls or dangerous, or that some percentage of all
dogs may get territorial.

Enfilade...

I went to a web site once called "Spot the Pitbull" or something like
that. It was a collection of images of dogs and you were to guess
whether or not they had pitbull in their ancestry. Some of them did,
and some of them didn't, but it was hard to tell. It also doesn't help

dnr...

Duh....what is a "dog run"? I racked that in on Mozilla and got all kinds of
"dog fencing" from places like Home Depot/Lowes and the few photos show
kids beside what looks like an ordinary wood fence to me (maybe 6 ft.).
Whatever it is, my dear RB Akita never had one in his whole life of 13
years;
he lived in the house w/us and the cats and only went in my unfenced yard
with me. I do admit when I am ignorant of whatever and this is one....
does anyone have pics of "dog run"? All I get is ads for fences.

Jo Firey...

No pictures, but the dog run our friend has his hunting dogs in is about
eight by twenty feet, dog house on one end. Concrete floor sloped to a
drain at the far end. Faucet and hose at the near end so its easy to give
the dogs water and wash down the floor. Chain link sides and top and locked
gate.

Twice a day the dog is let out to run in his orchard. The current dog is
worth close to $3,000 and I'm pretty sure he added an alarm when he got this
dog.

mlbriggs...

Picture a big playpen for dogs. MLB

that "pit bull" is a generalized term to describe several kinds of bull
terrier, and lots of folks generalize it still further so that any
unfriendly-looking dog, or any brindle dog, or any dog with cropped
ears gets labelled a pit bull.

Here's a variant sort of site...not the one I'm thinking of but very
similar.

Kreisleriana...

I don't think there's a single dog in my neighborhood (except for the
tiny, foofy ones) who isn't some sort of pitbull cross.
Breed-specific legislation in my town could conceivably depopulate it.
Theresa

Make Levees, Not War

sriddles...

Oh, yes, I believe that. We see all kinds of litters with alleged pit
bull heritage and you'd never know it. Technically, the "rule" is,
don't adopt out pit bulls. . It's a requirement for liability issues.
The shelter manager cannot bring herself to send those puppies over the
animal control. The Board looks the other way. It's frightening to
think about. I just hope we're making the right decision.

Monique Y. Mudama...

My local shelter sent flyers to its supporters about "Why we adopt out
pit bulls." They explained all of the reasons that this breed can
make a good pet. I can only imagine they put a lot of thought into
their position and the risk they'd be taking.

Sherry

polonca12000...

I'm so very sorry!
Lots and lots of gentle hugs and purrs,
Polonca and Soncek

I do wonder if this dog had ever been exposed to children before.
Were they justified in expecting the dog would be comfortable around
a child, by definition a creature that moves unpredictably and darts
here and there? There's no way to know.