The Pit Bull Dog Notoriety….What Should Be Done?
Posted: Tuesday, September 11, 2007
by Joel Hendon
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I may be biased when it comes to dogs. Most dogs. With exceptions, I think they are perhaps the greatest thing created by God. I do place humans over them in many ways but not in all. Man is able to reason, learn to communicate with each other and is superior to dogs in those kinds of things. But dogs have us beaten terribly in such things as unfeigned love (for man), loyalty, devotion, nobility, fearlessness and respectfulness. Selective breeding by men for their own satisfaction has altered many of their natural attributes, improving some and ruining some.
It seems to me that about every month or so, I read of an incident of some Pit Bulls mauling some child or elderly person seriously and even a few die from it. It is so much that some actually call for destroying or outlawing the breed or at least placing very strict laws on all owners of them to assure the safety of people. I acknowledge that there are measures which ought to be taken but most of the things suggested are not the answer. For example, we don’t outlaw eggs because some get bacterial infections from them. It is an exact comparison to that of blaming a gun for killing someone when it was the hand that held the gun that was in the wrong. Or a car controlled by a drunk.
Pit Bull dogs are one of the finest breeds of dogs ever developed. Except for some strains who have been purposely developed into mean dogs, the breed is a loving and loyal animal This author has owned 5 Pit Bulls over a lifetime and only one of those 5 had an ugly and threatening nature. She was a puppy but as soon as it was obvious that she was not responding to love and affection, nor discipline, I considered having her euthanized, but another fellow wanted to see if he could not make a good dog of her. I was happy to see her go but I never heard how successful his efforts were.
Unfortunately, these dogs were developed for the purpose of fighting and whoever did the breeding, did a great job. They truly are specimens capable of fighting. They are strong, fearless and perhaps have the strongest jaws of any dog. They can break another dog’s leg with one strong clamp. But, they are not natured to go around spoiling for a fight or to attack a child or elderly person. Something has to be amiss when these things occur.
One of my daughters and her husband bought me the last Pit Bull dog puppy that I ever owned. They let me pick him from a litter. I wanted a female but when shown the litter, all but one failed to give me their attention when I tried to pet them. But the one, a male, came up and started pawing at my hand and gnawing on it playfully. And, in fact, I could not get him to go away so I could pet one of the little females. So I determined that he was the one I wanted. I named him Spike, because the name sounds tough. He was healthy, ate a lot and grew fast, up to around 85 pounds of pure muscle.
Instead of running to the car when I came from work each day, Spike waited on the porch in the center of the steps with a sneaky look (almost like a smile) and would silently try to bluff me from getting onto the porch. I would shove and he’d lunge to stay back in front of me. He would take my wrist gently in his huge jaws and pretend to bite me. When I was home, and outside, he was at my heels and was concerned if I ever under took a chore which he deemed to be dangerous. I occasionally had to crawl under our house to repair a leaky pipe or such. The ductwork was almost to the ground in spots and I often had to crawl almost the full width of the house and back on the other side of the duct work to reach my problem. This entire procedure would almost drive Spike bananas. When he would see me opening the door into the crawl space, he would come and try to block me from going under there and would really get upset when I got on all fours to crawl in. He would get in front of me and lick my ears and whimper. Finally when he was able to see that I was going anyway, he stayed by my side wherever I crawled. Then he was elated when I came back out and stood up.
We lived in a rural area where the neighbors houses were about a quarter to half mile distance. Some of them were afraid of Spike and I knew it but I did not confine him. He meant no harm to anyone. Spike did not approve of me mowing the yard on a riding mower. He seemed to think that the thing had me in it’s power someway, so he was extremely nervous when I mowed and he developed a habit of leaving the yard during my mowing. One day I started mowing and I saw him go into the bushes in back of our house. In about 45 minutes, I was still mowing and I saw him walk into the yard from one side and he could hardly walk. I stopped the mower and called his name and he laid down, all the way down with his head also flat on the grass. So, I ran over to him and he was hurt badly. His legs had chunks of meat taken out, all the way to the bone. The bones were exposed in several places. He wasn’t too bloody but had been bit in many places. My wife and I put him on a tarp and carried him to the porch. Our oldest daughter was an animal lover as I was and she came over and we carried him to the veterinarian who patched him up where he could and gave us some salve to keep on his huge open wounds which could not be sewn up and some antibiotics to help keep down infection.
My daughter came daily and changed his bandages and cleansed his wounds and redressed them. He was able to move, but except for going out of the porch to eliminate, he hardly did move for several days, but finally, old Spike began to improve and his wounds healed, although the huge holes in his legs never grew back. But he soon was acting himself again and all seemed well until another time when he just disappeared. We had one family in the neighborhood who were evil. They were involved in raising marijuana, illegal intoxicants and drugs, etc. They were constantly in trouble with the law, but somehow, managed to stay free.
One day another neighbor of mine stopped by and asked me about Spike and I told him he had disappeared. He then told me he had seen the grown son of the troublesome family shoot Spike with a shotgun. I wasn’t surprised to hear it. I don’t know why Spike went up there, but I did nothing about it because these people would as soon shoot me as the dog. Ironically, about 2 weeks later, that boy was arrested on drug charges and sentenced to prison for several years.
I also learned later from a man who had witnessed the fight that had wounded Spike that two large Chow dogs had jumped him as he passed by their residence. He told me that Spike killed one of them and finally got the other one hurt badly enough that he left the fight.
I decided then that I would never again get another Pit Bull. They are like the old western characters who had the reputation of being the fastest gun, or the toughest fighter. Every dog seems to want a shot at fighting them and every human wants to scold them and send them on their way or kill them. A good Pit Bull will not instigate fights but neither will he back down or run. You can depend upon that. I’ve loved every dog I’ve owned but the Pit Bulls are my favorites.
I now own a registered Rat Terrier and an unregistered Yorkie who thinks he is an outside dog and insists on it. Because of it he looks like a ragga-muffin. Both of these sissy dorgs (as Popeye refers to them) are almost my age in dog years. Mitch (the Rat Terrier) is small but is twice the size of Corky (the Yorkie). They both vie for my attention, if I speak to Mitch and he barks with excitement, Corky is immediately in his face yapping angrily.
The plight of the Pit Bull, however, is something that ought to be addressed by our lawmakers. But they should concentrate on the culprits, not the breed. Every dog owner who has one should have to register it with the county or state and be held responsible for keeping them confined and keeping stray people out. If one does become involved in a mauling of some innocent person, the owner should be prosecuted just as surely as if a gun in his hand had gone off and killed or wounded someone. Penalties should be stiffened severely. But breeders should be the first ones to be regulated. If a mean strain exists, require that they are not to be bred.
Dog fighting should bring severe penalties…like 30 days in the electric chair. These illegal activities must be stopped. It is not the dogs, but rather the owners who need punishing. Of the five Pit Bulls that I have owned, even including the mean puppy, never harmed anything except those (dogs) who attacked them. Don’t be hesitant to own one, just keep him in a fenced yard and don’t allow people to go inside the fence, especially a child who is likely to harass the dog. They are normally very protective of children, but if a strange child starts hitting him or something, he might defend himself. You don’t want to see that.
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