I remember watching a few animal rescue videos on YouTube, and it was interesting to see that some of the easier rescues they did were of pit bull type dogs. One even ignored some food and water that had been set out for it, just because it wanted a good scritch behind the ears. On the other hand, some of the more difficult rescues (padded gear, restraint poles, etc.) have been of smaller breeds like chihuahuas...
I think it just comes down to their training.

 

Here are some statistics from this site on deaths from dogs:

 

He may have been protective. He attacked ME as I was holding the baby. He may have seen me as threatening the child.

I have studied dog traits, and unpredictability, especially when children are left alone with family dogs that grew up with the child, there have been Many instances where say a child was let out to play with the family dog(s) and friends/relatives dogs were also visiting, otherwise friendly when adults present.
When adults are not present, something happens between the two groups of animals that were otherwise very friendly and repeatedly end up with the death of the child.
There was a sad case a while ago where the parents of one such girl that had died and the parents were blamed and imprisoned until after 5yrs, paramedic photos surfaced that showed the girl died from severe dog mauling.

 

I have studied dog traits, and unpredictability, especially when children are left alone with family dogs that grew up with the child, there have been Many instances where say a child was let out to play with the family dog(s) and friends/relatives dogs were also visiting, otherwise friendly when adults present.
When adults are not present, something happens between the two groups of animals that were otherwise very friendly and repeatedly end up with the death of the child.
There was a sad case a while ago where the parents of one such girl that had died and the parents were blamed and imprisoned until after 5yrs, paramedic photos surfaced that showed the girl died from severe dog mauling.

What a nightmare scenario:

- A child
- that childs dog
- other dogs

Eventually packs form and there will be a conflict. Adults leave this situation unattended should not have dogs or children.

Children should never be alone around dogs. The thing is, dogs are predictable. Children are not. On my walks there is maybe 1% of children that DO NOT just run up to my dogs shoving their hands everywhere. My older dog (pit) has arthritis. Guess what might happen if that child finds a painfull area? I check Pats hips for pain constantly now and we are careful on our walks. Luckily he is a sucker for attention and ha sunbelievable pain tolerance so not much "hurts" him.

p.s. biggest "fault" of pitbull breed is how much pain they can bear without showing. They suffer in silence and you will not know that something is terribly wrong until it is too late.

 

deaths from dogs

Another couple of potentially dangerous dogs that didn't make the list are the Doberman Pinscher, and Chow. They seem to have lost their popularity in the last few decades. One extremely dangerous dog is the Wolf & German Shepard cross. Which is illegal to possess without permitting in some states and illegal in most states. I knew a man in Birmingham Al that had a business of placing guard dogs into business properties as night guards and was permitted for and used the cross. He told me they were extremely dangerous even to him, especially when injured such as catching a claw in the kennel's chain-link fence. They had to be sedated to doctor them when injured.

 

Another couple of potentially dangerous dogs that didn't make the list are the Doberman Pinscher, and Chow.

My mistake, I corrected my previous link that mentioned why the UK Police did not use Rottweilers to Doberman. It should have read Doberman that would not act on a reversal of a command.

 

On another now-gone forum for those who worked with utility metering, one poster spoke of reading notes for the location where he was to do some work, and which said "Beware of chow". He gets there and he sees one in the yard just panting and wagging its tail. He was completely unprepared for the second one charging around the corner and biting him on the leg!

I had a couple interesting experiences working as a meter tech -

One day I pulled in at one rural residence and saw a Doberman just standing there, and I just had a feeling I shouldn't come out the driver's door and instead used the van's side doors. I go around, ring the doorbell, and the owner looked at me like I was nuts. He said the coop is ALWAYS supposed to give 24 hours' notice before they come over. He told me to stand still and he'll get the dog inside. I promptly did a pretty good impression of a statue until the owner was able to lead the dog to the garage side door and usher it in. The meter was just a few feet behind where the dog had been standing. I still get the heebie jeebies thinking about it.

At another coop, I get around to one location and see a Golden Retriever in the backyard. He stood there with his head down for a few seconds before charging the fence and barking like Cujo. I was back in the van and on the road ten seconds later! I stopped back on the way in from the field to see if the owner was back yet, and luckily, he was. He said the dog used to be friendly, but something happened with the meter reader (my assignment at this coop was to help with a system-wide deployment of an AMR system, in fact). The owner got the dog inside then helped dismantle the part of the deck railing that was in the way of the meter socket so he wouldn't have to wait for the coop to finish up the locations my company couldn't do.
The following day, I picked up with the next house around the corner, and they had a yellow lab retriever. Again, the owner spoke of the dog hating strangers (it was already around the corner and straining on its rope). Again, the meter reader was mentioned. As I came around the back, I passed the screen door on the back of the garage and the dog saw me and just flipped out - the barking was deafening. What did that meter reader do?!
I did eventually meet one of the coop's meter readers, and I couldn't figure out what, but I could tell something wasn't quite right with him. Was he the one? At any rate, he was probably out of a job within the year anyway once the deployment was completed.

 

He was completely unprepared for the second one charging around the corner and biting him on the leg!

That's not my dog!

 

Here are some statistics from this site on deaths from dogs:

I don't have as much trust in that site as you do. I've been bitten 2 times that drew blood. Both of those breeds are on the list of non biters at that web site, a border collie and a king charles spaniel.

 

I don't have as much trust in that site as you do. I've been bitten 2 times that drew blood.

And I don't much trust anecdotal comments about how pit bulls are such nice dogs.

Getting a bite that draws blood is rather different than being maimed or killed.

To borrow a phrase from an old pop song "They're a dangerous breed, mate...".

 

This is a link to our local county kennel. Note the overwhelming numbers of dogs waiting on adoption are pit bull or pit bull mixed. My wife and I have gotten several dogs from there and while we never got a pit bull we know server who have and with some proper training and love every one of them became great house dogs including families with small children. I have also seen the bloodbaths after a pit bull attacks another person or dog.. It gets ugly. Anyway, it's all how the dog was trained and treated.

Wife and I have always had a two dog family, we did peak at 3 dogs at one time. Below is bear a very large boy who peaked at 130 LBs. Bear was very protective.


The little girl is our granddaughter who just graduated HS. The dog would not move till she would wake from her nap. She could lead that dog around by his jowls, She loved him and he loved her serving as a guardian. He was 8 weeks old when they bonded and he naturally became her protector. The only time he was aggressive was once when my daughter tired to spank the child in front of him. No bite but squared my daughter into a corner and would not let near the little one. Told my daughter to never try and discipline the little one in front of him. Hard to believe that little one just graduated HS with honors. Any breed can be taught to be aggressive and kill small animals.

The other issue with Pit Bulls is that people buy them for their reputation. They want a ferocious dog, so they go for the one with that kind of reputation. As the dog grows, the bias by the owner toward violence can push the dog toward violent behavior whether intentionally trained or not. This happens with Dobermans, Rottweilers and other dogs as well. I personally think that this is the issue with most of the errant Pit Bulls that make the news by attacking people. They may not be overtly trained to be violent, but they're also not trained to be controlled properly.

Starting young as puppies is when it begins for a dog.

Al, if your friend is that concerned she may wish to look for a No Kill Shelter. Many of our best dogs came from out local shelters. A dog is for the most part what people around it make it.


Ron

 

And I don't much trust anecdotal comments about how pit bulls are such nice dogs.

I can tell you didn't read the whole link you gave. Just headline shopped.

"Pit bull owners are more likely to be irresponsible

In nearly all of the cases in which I have been consulted, where a pit bull killed a person the pit bull owners had no insurance and therefore the victim's family received no justice in the form of compensation.


Published, peer-reviewed studies in authoritative journals of psychology and forensic science establish that pit bulls owners as a whole -- statistically -- are more likely to be socially deviant, engage in crimes involving children, domestic violence, alcohol abuse and violent crimes against other persons"
From -https://dogbitelaw.com/vicious-dogs/pit-bulls-facts-and-figures Which goes back to my claim they are trained to bite.

 

That headline belongs in the captain obvious thread.

 

Amazing how long ago Michael Vicks dog fighting case was. Those dogs are proof of what pit bulls are not and what people are...

https://ckcusa.com/blog/2016/october/the-champions-documentary/

This dog has become an accessory to certain groups of people because of the way it looks. Like a "muscle car" of sorts. Problem is it is not a car but a living being. A dog with many good traits.

 

The problem I have with these man made animals is that they are quite capable of doing damage to other animals, humans included, they are probably perfectly OK when under the supervision of their owners, but on instances where they are alone, they make decisions based on instinct, NOT reason, and can easily be come confused, it is one of the reasons that provinces here have banned certain species from being owned at all.

I can relate one story I experienced in the UK, way back, a friend had kept a Doberman for some time and used to bring to the PUB with him every week, He was very friendly with everyone,.
I went back with him one night when the pub closed for a chat and a drink, as we sat there the dog slept in front of the fire, suddenly the dog awoke and attacked his master, and nothing could deter the dog at all.
If I had not been there to pull it off him, who knows!!
Whether it was dreaming or what, but very dangerous.

 

Why is this discussion always nature VS. nurture? Can neither side see the other? Plainly both arguments have merit.

Nature.
Dogs have been bred from wolves over thousands of years in hundreds of different directions, for thousands of different desired traits. Among them, color coat, height, weight, bone density, intelligence, and various innate aptitudes including hunting, swimming, running, livestock management, contraband sniffing, and regretfully, fighting. If we can acknowledge that a Mastiff is (by its mere nature) more likely to be big than a Chihuahua then why is it taboo to acknowledge that a Pit Bull is (by its nature) more likely to be aggressive than a Yorkie?

Nurture
Of course training is a huge factor. Just as a Beagle can be trained to override its nature to devour any treats within a 10ft radius of its face and instead balance the treat on its nose until you say "go," a pit bull can be trained to override its nature to maul smaller dogs and babies, and instead protect them. But if you're not there representing yourself as the pack leader to enforce the rules, make the Beagle do his balancing act, do you think if you leave a treat out he will put it on his nose and wait 8hrs for you to come home and say "ok?" Do you think it is safe to leave a toddler home alone with a Pit Bull as a baby sitter? Just as there are some Border Collies who are exceptions to the rule and actually quite stupid as dogs go, there are some Pit Bulls who are exceptions to the rule and actually quite docile. Maybe there are some Pit Bulls worthy of babysitting toddlers, but I've never met one.

 

Why is this discussion always nature VS. nurture? Can neither side see the other? Plainly both arguments have merit.

I've been pondering my own question for the past 2 hours as I sort parts and I think I know the answer. Or at least half of it. I still can't fathom why anyone would refuse to admit that training has anything to do with temperament, but the argument that breed has anything to do with it might be too dangerously close to the human race debate for some to entertain. Maybe they feel like if they admit that Dobermans (Dobermen?), Chihuahuas, and Pit Bulls are x,xxx% more likely to bite them, then they put themselves on a slippery slope toward being confronted with questions about Jews being more likely to swindle them, Blacks more likely to rob them, and Asians more likely to beat them on performance reviews. If that's the case then I get it. I don't see it that way, but I can see how another would.

And now that I've cracked the door to race, I will unceremoniously barge right through it. My dog is racist. Patently, verifiably so. For a White or Hispanic stranger, he will stand in the driveway and put on a show, all ferocious barking while they are in the street, but as soon as they pass the threshold between the street and the driveway (where the invisible fence is), he wants to be friends. Like this:

https://youtube.com/shorts/JyVCMRjcdVg?feature=share

But if the stranger is Black he will actually go after them. My wife keeps close tabs on deliveries now so that she can have him inside the house any time a package is to be delivered just in case the driver is Black, since since he bit one Black delivery driver and chased another guy back into his truck (and followed him through the invisible fence into the truck). I don't know why he is that way. We got him as a puppy and never trained him that way, so it's all him. I suspect he just doesn't have enough exposure. We rarely have visitors outside our own family and all our neighbors are White, so he has only seldomly encountered a Black person. Maybe just fear of the unknown.

Something I've observed -please try to be grown up about this; it's an observation, not a judgement- is that black people are more likely to be afraid of dogs than anyone else (and I'm not talking about just the scenario with my own dog and delivery drivers). Why is that? Is my racist dog not an anomaly? Are Black people more like to be attacked by dogs and therefore justifiably more afraid?

 

People, ALL PEOPLE, put off "Vibes" 100% of their lifetime, asleep or not.
A Dog can read those "Vibes" like a big Red Strobe-Light on top of your head.
Most animals can "read" these Vibes,
they are a very real and tangible thing,
but most people can't detect them, ( but a few people can ).

Not to mention the huge world of "odors" that everyone, and every animal, puts off.
This goes double or triple for Hounds that have a very refined sense of smell.
Any one of my dogs could tell You who is in their front-yard by sniffing at the crack under the front-door,
and if it's anyone they didn't know, they would start grumbling, growling, and sometimes barking.
.................................................................................................................................................................................................................
strantor
Your Dog isn't "racist", that's just your erroneous conclusion,
( maybe it was just some sarcasm leaking out ).
The Dog doesn't care what color anybody's skin is, Dogs are mostly color-blind in any case.
The Dog can tell when someone is scared from a hundred feet away, with no effort at all,
( not to mention a wide variety of other Emotions or attitudes ).
..................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Your "mental-attitude" is "broadcast" out at all times, and the Dog instantly knows exactly what it is.

If You have a particular "concern" about certain other people, the Dog can sense that instantly.

Your Dog will remember every single person, or animal,
that has previously been "checked-out",
and properly sniffed all over,
and approved by You, AND HIM, as being "OK".

New people, or other animals,
who do not very obviously put-off a genuine "Friendly-Vibe",
are immediately suspect.

But, of course, just like with people,
some Dogs are naturally smarter than others,
and will probably have different natural dispositions.
...........................................................................................................................................................................................................
Do You keep any friends that will readily start a fight at the slightest instigation ?,
or do You tend to stay away from those types of people ?
If You would tend to avoid those types of people,
why would You take in a Dog as a part of your family with that sort of a reputation ?
.
.
.

 

People, ALL PEOPLE, put off "Vibes" 100% of their lifetime, asleep or not.
A Dog can read those "Vibes" like a big Red Strobe-Light on top of your head.
Most animals can "read" these Vibes,
they are a very real and tangible thing,
but most people can't detect them, ( but a few people can ).
Not to mention the huge world of "odors" that everyone, and every animal, puts off.
This goes double or triple for Hounds that have a very refined sense of smell.

I know they are very keen about this sort of thing. Some people say they can "smell fear." I don't think that it works exactly that way, but maybe it does. I think they can perceive fear from microexpressions and maybe our bodies release some detectable chemicals in response to fear so they literally can "smell" it. And I think they react to it like police. If you turn a corner and there's a cop, and you immediately turn and run away, he's probably going to chase you. So I have considered that maybe it's fear he is reacting to rather than skin color but I have seen CCTV footage of him barreling down on a guy before the guy even knew he was there.
EDIT: Just considered: Maybe it was someone he already had encountered and filed away as "suspicious." And if there was prior experience, maybe the guy was approaching the house with fear even without having seen the dog.

strantor
Your Dog isn't "racist", that's just your erroneous conclusion,
( maybe it was just some sarcasm leaking out ).

I am quite often sarcastic so I can understand your assumption but no, this time it wasn't sarcasm. You've never met my dog so I don't see how you can so casually dismiss a conclusion that I have years of data to support.

The Dog doesn't care what color anybody's skin is, Dogs are mostly color-blind in any case.

I can assure you that he does care. And even in black and white movies it's obvious who is Black and who is White. If humans can be racist, why can't dogs? I believe they can be sexist too! My aunt had a chihuahua that hated men. She would only let females pet her. Men, she would bite every time.

Your "mental-attitude" is "broadcast" out at all times, and the Dog instantly knows exactly what it is.

If You have a particular "concern" about certain other people, the Dog can sense that instantly.

Are you insinuating that I harbor some race-based fear that I am subconsciously broadcasting to my dog? If so, I would point out that every time this has happened, I didn't know it was happening until I heard the shouts outside.

Do You keep any friends that will readily start a fight at the slightest instigation ?,
or do You tend to stay away from those types of people ?
If You would tend to avoid those types of people,
why would You take in a Dog as a part of your family with that sort of a reputation ?

He had no reputation when we adopted him. He was just a nameless puppy at a kill shelter and we saved him on the day before what was to be his last. Now he has been part of our family for 5 years. I'm not going to have him put down just because he's racist, when simply keeping him indoors on delivery days has proven effective already.

 

strantor

You are really projecting human characteristics onto dogs. These do not exist. Dogs learn from their experience combined with their instinct and their training if there is any. They also pick up on owners body language and cues.

There is an excellent movie, called "White Dog" that was actually banned in the states (made in 1982 and not released until 2008). It deals with the topic you brought up.