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We adopted a stray that at one point was in a Texas shelter < 24 hrs away from euthanasia. He was ~3yrs old, had Heartworm, and was riddled with buckshot & pellets... so his prospects weren't great. His impound papers said "came in darted, contact Animal Control Officer before release".
Fast forward a little bit. He's incredible. Outgoing, super intelligent, loyal, goofy, amazing with kids. Does still sometimes bark at strangers if startled, but never bites (even when other dogs have drawn blood).
He's an integral part of the family, and just about the best thing that ever happened to me. Healthy now, and seems to be aware he's got it pretty darn good these days. I can't imagine if it had gone the other way.
Then & Now: https://imgur.com/a/35AvfBD
Not disputing the tragedy of overpopulation in parts of the world. Not even trying to encourage everyone to go out and adopt a dog. Just wanted to share this experience as a reminder each little guy has their own individual story, and when contemplating large-scale decisions it's important to retain empathy and cognizance of the implications.
I adopted a mutt from the shelter about 7 years ago. They said an older person brought her in because she pulled on the leash (she never pulled me). She's the smartest, most fearless, and easiest dog I've ever been around. She just knows what I want, I rarely have to tell her. Great around all humans and other dogs. Your plate of food is safe.
I don't know if I got lucky or what. I walked in, she was about the 6th or 8th cell, and I knew I was keeping her as soon as we met.
Anyway, that's two data points. Adopting dogs from the shelter is wonderful.
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1 point by johnea 10 minutes ago | prev | next | edit | delete [–]
I'm all for the cull.
Absentee/incompetent owners are overwhelming the ability to control the noise, agression and dog shit everywhere that's resulted from treating a living entity like a video game console.
It's not the dog's resoponsibility to sooth neurotic primates.
The reason they "love you so much" is because they were stolen from their actual mother, and handed to a primate before they were old enough to remmeber their actual parent.
The entire phenomenon of pet ownership is basically infant kidnapping...
I wish a lot of people who get dogs wouldn't. Too many people don't train them or look after them properly. I'm not a dog person at all, but I'm conscientious about animals and I've had to rescue far too many loose dogs from the roads. Usually the only reward is getting shouted at by other drivers by blocking them to stop a dog getting run down.
I'm also shocked at the complete disregard some people have for their pets. Like moving overseas and giving up their dog. "Didn't you have that dog since it was a puppy?" "yes, but we want to move" "you can take a dog with you" "It's too expensive" I've moved my cats between continents 4 times so I know it adds up but it's not insurmountable for anyone with a tech salary "wait, what do your kids think about this?" "oh they're pretty upset :shrug I guess we'll get another one". Well if you think thats OK then that's also the end of our friendship.
I did notice when I lived in the US that American's seem to treat their cats and dogs a bit better on average. More like family members. Here there's too much of a "farm dog" mentality, which is fine, maybe, when it applies to actual working dogs, but not to pets.
>when it was unclear how easily pets could transmit the virus to humans, the UK government considered ‘that we might have to ask the public to exterminate all the cats in Britain’. Three years on, the mere suggestion of a cat cull was met with horror.
History repeats itself
> The British pet massacre was an event in the United Kingdom in 1939 in which over 750,000 pets were killed in preparation for food shortages during World War II.
> Estimates say that over 750,000 pets were killed over the course of the event. Many pet owners, after getting over the fear of bombings and lack of food, regretted killing their pets and blamed the government for starting the hysteria.
> History repeats itself
... apart from the bit where it didn't actually repeat itself? There didn't end up being another massacre and the potential for it had absolutely jackshit to do with war and food shortages.
In the 15-year period of 2005 through 2019, canines killed 521 Americans. Pit bulls contributed to 66% (346) of these deaths. Combined, pit bulls and rottweilers contributed to 76% of the total recorded deaths [1]
The pit bull is bred so that it keeps biting no matter what.
Their bite force is about 235 psi and some can pull over 3000 lbs.
It's the most abandoned breed and the one with most safety incidents.
So:
- keeping a pit bull on leash doesn't make a difference
- once it's aggravated you cannot control it anymore
- nobody actually needs a pit bull
- it can disfigure or kill a person or animal at any moment: you, your family, your neighbors, their pets, dog sitter, etc.
And literally the only ways to get a pitbull off a person are to a) kill it b) choke it unconscious.
No other internet trick works on them, they've specifically been bred to bite and bite hard.
When I looked for a dog several years ago the local animal shelters were mostly filled with pit bulls. Very few other breeds (except maybe chihuahuas). I certainly wouldn't want one in my home, especially not knowing its background. Most of them are probably fine but you never know. Not worth the risk.
Stray dogs are a real issue in developing countries like Russia and India. They can be aggressive since they're wild animals.
Even if they're not killed, the strays have fight for survival on their own. Even in developed countries like the US, there are more dogs that need to be adopted than people to adopt them, so many are left in shelters and some are euthanized because the shelters don't have enough resources to care for them.
The common argument seems to be neuter and spay. See https://www.reddit.com/r/india/comments/yr20xj/how_do_we_add...
This is interesting. Stray cats and dogs are all over Istanbul but the city appears to take care of them collectively. The government keeps them all up to date on shots etc., and there are little bowls and kennels all over the place hosted by citizens and cats loll about the stores.
Strays are much more a problem in the southern US. In the northern states, rescue shelters often advertise that the dogs up for adoption came from Florida, Georgia or some other southeastern state. This is because the spay-and-neuter programs up north have been so aggressive and wildly successful that animals in need of rescue are much rarer in those states. Another consequence is that you can easily obtain an animal for no or little cost in the south, whereas shelters can charge hundreds of dollars even for a rescue animal up north, and unless there is, for example, a glut of beagles rescued from some science lab that used them for experimentation, it may also sometimes be difficult to find a suitable animal.
Rabies is also rampant in India (not sure about Russia)
For me, the modern war on dogs is that I can only walk my dog in my neighborhood (I live near the beach), before 7am and after 6pm. I get it, there are plenty of bad dog owners. It is still just a bummer that a few bad seeds ruin the fun for everyone else.
Where is that wonderland you live in? Around here there is only regulation that dogs cannot go unleashed on specially labelled public parks, such that they do not leave the paths. Many of those parks have playgrounds, public orchards and so on. But, as nobody enforces that, basically each time I take a walk there is at least one dog owner literally shitting (or, having their dog do so...) on that regulation. Same at supposedly dog-free lakes meant for human swimming.
To me it looks like there are not a few bad seeds, but the majority of seeds are bad.
Dogs are completely forbidden during those hours? Or only off-leash is forbidden?
Dog always need to be on a leash.
Pretty hard to round up sheep that way.
Especially at the beach.
'round here if the sheep are on the beach they've fallen off the cliff .. that's a whole other carcass of worms to deal with :(
No cliffs at my beach.
Realistically, if your dog needs walking you are a bad dog owner. Under this definition most dog ownership is bad.
It means it lives in a confined space not meant for a dog.
Dogs are for farms not cities.
You're thinking of a larger dog. This is a small dog (Bichon Frisé), with the temperament of a cat. Probably wouldn't survive long in the wild.
Plenty of larger dogs are couch potatoes. Take your Newfie or Great Dane for a couple km and they're happy to snooze for the rest of the day.
Plus dog walks aren't just for the benefit of the dog.
Open your front door and let's see if they prefer the sofa.
A dog that loves your house is like the old guy in Shawshank Redemption that only has a life within the jail.
If the dog was intelligent, would it still protect you from intruders? And if it didn't, would you still keep it around?
If the dog was intelligent and it was truly part of your family, would you pay for its college tuition? Or do things you would do with an adopted member of your family like inheriting your house? Or it would be more like a slave that is only there to defend you?
So, in the end, it is all just abuse. You kidnap an animal, then restrain it, neuter it so it cannot be aggressive, discipline it to adapt to an unreasonable and unnatural standard of cleanliness and behavior, etc.
Your dog likes you because you took away its family and essentially marginalized it so that it is forced to bond only with you. And also because of artificial selection for those traits. If it was aware that it was kidnapped and forcibly sterilized it would never like you. You are just abusing a lesser form of intelligence.
It still does not belong in a human habitat no matter how much you want to make it a thing.
A dog has to be among their own species and have a dog life. Cover large areas, sniff around, spread their scent, interact with other dogs, etc.
In a human house, living in isolation among humans that have unreasonable expectations, a dog life simply sucks.
In Morocco there seem to be an ongoing dog massacre.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/brutal-dog-massacre-morocco-blame...
That was a disconcerting read.
I'm all for the cull.
Absentee/incompetent owners are overwhelming the ability to control the noise, agression and dog shit everywhere that's resulted from treating a living entity like a video game console.
It's not the dog's resoponsibility to sooth neurotic primates.
The reason they "love you so much" is because they were stolen from their actual mother, and handed to a primate before they were old enough to remmeber their actual parent.
The entire phenomenon of pet ownership is basically infant kidnapping...