Dangerous Dogs ban (new thread)

Our man in Havana

peasant wrote:

Just one last point:

The risk to the public does not consist of someone owning a "listed" dog. The risk is what that owner does (or rather doesn't) do with that dog, i.e. keep it properly and keep it under control.

The risk that such an irresponsible owner poses to the public will not change by one iota just because that owner now has a different dog.

I agree with you! The risks happen with ANY DOG! A bad owner is a bad owner & is a risk to everyone!

Look at the statistics more dogs not on the list attack than those on the list! You hear of 2-3 attacks & then nothing for a year - but the proposed blanket ban is a knee jerk reaction. We need to enforce the current laws! As Anvil says "Don't ban these dogs, enforce the laws"

Maybe we do need to bring in better licences etc etc.

nesf

peasant wrote:

That list is totally arbitrary

Take the German Shepherd for example. In the whole world, the GSD is THE most common breed with the highest number of individual dogs out there.

These dogs all have diverse "jobs". From simple family pet, to sniffer dog, to guide dog, to helper dog, to therapy dog, to police/army dog.

The same breed that can be trained to kill on command (army sentry dogs) can be trained to assist a handicapped person, lead a blind person, give comfort to patients in long term care or to just bring joy to a family.

And you're (or rather DCC are) trying to convince us that all GSD's are "dangerous" ??

Absolute rubbish !

By the same argument can take every other breed of that list as well, as there are plenty of examples of dogs of those breed doing absolutely peaceful jobs every day.

German Shepards are intelligent, strong dogs that are easy enough to train. I would completely agree that it's unreasonable to ban them. Pitbulls on the other hand aren't easy to train, can be very aggressive by nature (I'm not saying all of them are just that the breed is inclined that way) and really require someone who actually knows something about dogs in order to have an obedient, calm animal instead of a potentially dangerous one. Dogs like people aren't blank slates some of their qualities and temperament comes from genetics and some breeds are more aggressive and more difficult to train than others and they really (imho) need to be limited in ownership to people who can handle them.


That and the DCC as landlords are entitled to do what they want in regard to animals though this is a mess by any standard. I also cannot see a national ban getting through.

nesf

Bond-007 wrote:

Maybe we do need to bring in better licences etc etc.

Yes, but how exactly do you do that without discriminating against people unfairly? Just because someone's never owned a dog should preclude them from ever owning one but conversely just because you've owned, trained and raised Labradors doesn't mean you could successfully raise a Pitbull and be able to control it and train it.

golden

nesf wrote:

German Shepards are intelligent, strong dogs that are easy enough to train. I would completely agree that it's unreasonable to ban them. Pitbulls on the other hand aren't easy to train, can be very aggressive by nature (I'm not saying all of them are just that the breed is inclined that way) and really require someone who actually knows something about dogs in order to have an obedient, calm animal instead of a potentially dangerous one. Dogs like people aren't blank slates some of their qualities and temperament comes from genetics and some breeds are more aggressive and more difficult to train than others and they really (imho) need to be limited in ownership to people who can handle them.


That and the DCC as landlords are entitled to do what they want in regard to animals though this is a mess by any standard. I also cannot see a national ban getting through.

Take a look at Bond-007 hyperlink about american pit bull its worth a look.

peasant

nesf wrote:

just because you've owned, trained and raised Labradors doesn't mean you could successfully raise a Pitbull and be able to control it and train it.

Why not?

Please explain ...

(and without the clichees this time, please )

nesf

golden wrote:

Take a look at Bond-007 hyperlink about american pit bull its worth a look.

Are you trying to tell me that pitbulls are easy to train and not an aggressive breed (and note I didn't specify aggressive maneating breed just aggressive)?


I am well aware that deaths due to pitbull attacks, and dog attacks in general are rare. That doesn't mean that certain breeds aren't problematic and potentially dangerous. Attacks versus livestock, other pets and people (not necessarily fatalities, a bite from many breeds is not a trivial things) are issues especially with breeds that aren't easy to train when people who don't know what they are doing, or deliberately mistreat an animal have them. Pitbulls aren't inherently evil or anything, they are just not simple, straightforward animals to have as a pet. People have trouble controlling Labs (iirc they are almost always towards the top of reported dog attacks by breed though a lot of this could be down to popularity combined with poor training) which are not a difficult breed to train and control compared to most others.

nesf

peasant wrote:

Why not?

Please explain ...

Just from experience, I've seen people go from being used to owning a reasonably tractable breed to a breed that is more difficult to manage and having a lot of trouble with it. With a strong/aggressive dog this can be a safety issue.

Would you agree that some breeds tend to be more forgiving than others with a lax (not abusive) owner who never set proper boundaries etc? Individual dogs do vary and I'm not trying to say that every pitbull is difficult to train or every Lab is born knowing what sit means. Breeds do tend to produce animals of a certain temperament and intelligence in fairness, you get exceptions but that's to be expected.

peasant wrote:

(and without the clichees this time, please )

Our man in Havana

Nesf have a look at my link - in ASPCA tests pit bulls get a better score than sheep dogs (lassie) etc. To say they are hard to train shows you have never dealt with a bull breed before - bullies are soffties & are bred to love humans. My rottie does as he is told where as my westie needs to be told 3 or 4 times to do as I say.

Out of my 10 dogs the one that starts a fight is my small terrier Sandy never ever my rottie - Cassie will not be involved in fights either he prefers the comfy easy life.

& I ment a licence to own any dogs - maybe if a test was needed dogs would be treated better.

peasant

nesf wrote:

Would you agree that some breeds tend to be more forgiving than others with a lax (not abusive) owner who never set proper boundaries etc?

Err ...no, I wouldn't.

It has been proven that character and behaviour of idividual dogs can vary more within the same breed than it would vary between breeds. In other words, if you were to do a graph of behaviour variations between dogs of one breed, the graph would differ so widely that the graph for the breed average becomes a fairly meaningless straight-ish line. Thus if you compare the behaviour graphs for different breeds, they differ very little.
Sadly I have mislaid the link to that scientific study and can't find it again ...

Individual dogs do vary and I'm not trying to say that every pitbull is difficult to train or every Lab is born knowing what sit means. Breeds do tend to produce animals of a certain temperament and intelligence in fairness, you get exceptions but that's to be expected.

"Breed" does not equate "intelligence". All that breed specifies is shape and colour.

You do have a bit of a point though ...but that's not really breed related, but type related.

For centuries dogs have been bred for certain tasks, but without breed standards as we know them, they are a recent invention.

So traditionally you had the hunters (either by sight or by nose), the herders, the flock guardians, the pullers, the house guardians and the fighters.

The two types that are most diametrically opposed to each other (and incidentically most people confuse with each other) would be the herders and the flock guardians.

Herders were selected for their trainability, as in order to work the flock they had to be the "long arm" of the herdsman. Therefore herders are traditionally quick to pick up commands and willing to obey them.
Flock guardians on the other hand had to stay out with the flock and defend it against anything without anybody guiding them, pretty much as they thought best. Therefore guardians are very aloof, with strong instincts and not very "mallable".

All the other types would fall somewhere inbetween when it comes to trainability.

At the end of the day though, all dogs have been bred for centuries to co-operate with man in some form or another.

nesf

To Bond:

Pit bulls were also bred to fight other animals no? When I say aggressive I'm talking about general aggression, including aggression towards other dogs and animals. I've known people who've kept them and have handled a few of them and I don't disagree that when trained well they can be lovely pets and easy to control but the people who owned and trained them agreed that they weren't easy to train not to get into fights and that it took a fair amount of time and effort to achieve that versus other breeds where it was less of an issue, they never showed aggression towards humans though.

Individual dogs will vary hugely and I fully appreciate that, the most aggressive dogs we've had at home were a collie, a jack russell and a golden retriever. The Kerry Blue was a quiet thing that wouldn't even look sideways at another animal/

Gillie

This will be discussed on Questions and Answers tonite.

Our man in Havana

Thanks for the info Gillie - I will watch it with interest.

cotton

Anvil are going to issue two posters on the subject. Can I ask you to have a look at them & distribute them wherever you can.

nesf

peasant wrote:

Err ...no, I wouldn't.

It has been proven that character and behaviour of idividual dogs can vary more within the same breed than it would vary between breeds. In other words, if you were to do a graph of behaviour variations between dogs of one breed, the graph would differ so widely that the graph for the breed average becomes a fairly meaningless straight-ish line. Thus if you compare the behaviour graphs for different breeds, they differ very little.
Sadly I have mislaid the link to that scientific study and can't find it again ...

No, I have read stuff along those lines so I accept the point (at least on behaviour). The issues/questions are (for me):

a) Breeds bred for a particular purpose or a particular set of tendencies were at least at some point actively culled (in a sense) to achieve this. For most, at some point this stopped and they were bred for other purposes (generally as pets). Pitbulls are a good example of this, as are staffies, bulldogs etc. How effective certain traits were bred out of the line depended completely on the competence of the breeders. If you get a pitbull or a staffie or whatever from a responsible, competent breeder the odds are very much in the favour of getting a good animal for being a pet. This is fine so long as you’re going through good breeder channels but a lot of people don’t and here is where some of the problems start coming in (next point). If I took a selection of well bred pitbulls I’d have a selection of (most likely) good animals with a good temperament. But that selection is not going to be representative of what’s being kept on Dublin City Council property or the country in general in terms of breeding and quite possibly in temperament. Taking purebreds or responsibly bred animals and using them as examples to draw inferences about animals kept in council estates is not a strong basis to draw reasonable inferences and that should be indisputable.

b) Crossbreds and mongrels of mostly indiscernible lineage. Here we’ve a different problem. Some dogs are actively bred with aggressive dogs by idiots who want to produce hard-man dogs. It’s not common but it does exist. My granduncle took in a pitbull that had been used a fighting dog, and it had been both abused and used almost like a stud. It had been horribly abused (kept in an attic and “fixed up” after fights with superglue) and this was a lot of it but the fact that it was being used as a breeding animal was also a bad thing. This guy and others had been actively breeding dogs for the “sport”. If you do this, it will produce very nasty and dangerous dogs, you can as easily breed in violent traits as breed them out of a line. The fact that some breeds are looked at as “hardman dogs” can encourage this, and while reasonable owners will look for dogs with a good temperament some idiots will look for aggressive animals and other idiots will breed them for them if they think they can make enough money out of it.

c) From a scientific point of view, one study doesn’t prove anything and an average is never meaningless only not very useful for a lot of purposes. It’s extremely easy to bias a study the way you want, unfortunately (I’m not saying this is the case, only to be cautious). It depends on what animals (from above) you’re using.

peasant wrote:

"Breed" does not equate "intelligence". All that breed specifies is shape and colour.

You do have a bit of a point though ...but that's not really breed related, but type related.

For centuries dogs have been bred for certain tasks, but without breed standards as we know them, they are a recent invention.

So traditionally you had the hunters (either by sight or by nose), the herders, the flock guardians, the pullers, the house guardians and the fighters.

The two types that are most diametrically opposed to each other (and incidentally most people confuse with each other) would be the herders and the flock guardians.

Herders were selected for their trainability, as in order to work the flock they had to be the "long arm" of the herdsman. Therefore herders are traditionally quick to pick up commands and willing to obey them.
Flock guardians on the other hand had to stay out with the flock and defend it against anything without anybody guiding them, pretty much as they thought best. Therefore guardians are very aloof, with strong instincts and not very "malleable".

All the other types would fall somewhere in-between when it comes to trainability.

At the end of the day though, all dogs have been bred for centuries to co-operate with man in some form or another.

I don’t disagree per se but breeds were bred for “intelligence” and I know how contentious that is among dog people and I’d define it more narrowly as “speed of leaning/malleability of training”, I know this is completely at odds to some people’s ideas but I was raised to think of a responsive dog as an intelligent dog and I apologise to those who find this offensive/annoying but I grew up around working dogs (gundogs) as well as dogs as pets so that’s coloured my thinking a fair bit.

As you say some types (handier to talk about I agree) were more instinct driven and some were bred to be more dependent on commands essentially. Some types (fighting dogs) were bred to be highly aggressive to other animals but docile to humans and to fight well instinctively (as well as more particularly in a specific style, not all dogs fight alike and some groups are better at attacking big animals and some other dogs etc).

How “strong” that breeding is at staying in a line is actually variable, some traits are harder to breed out than others (down simply to how genetics work). Part of the problem is that breeds are “thinner” now and dogs are more pets than working animals and it has become more difficult to talk specifically about breeds and I do acknowledge this.


Apologies for the lateness of the reply, got distracted by cooking and Q&A.

golden

http://www.pbrc.net/breedinfo.html

They have also been used for police narcotic detection police dogs, search and rescue, hearing dogs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Pit_Bull_Terrier

This would mean that these dogs can be trained and do respond to training well in the right hands.

Media have alot to answer for hyping up things trying to make a story.

nesf

golden wrote:

Media have alot to answer for hyping up things trying to make a story.

I think it's called journalism nowadays.

Our man in Havana

Cotton I love the posters but do not think they are obvious enough!

The cute puppy is just that "cute" An obvious breed should have been use an adult rottie, dobbie, pit bull or shepard would have been better.

peasant

nesf wrote:

Taking purebreds or responsibly bred animals and using them as examples to draw inferences about animals kept in council estates is not a strong basis to draw reasonable inferences and that should be indisputable.

b) Crossbreds and mongrels of mostly indiscernible lineage. Here we’ve a different problem. Some dogs are actively bred with aggressive dogs by idiots who want to produce hard-man dogs. It’s not common but it does exist. My granduncle took in a pitbull that had been used a fighting dog, and it had been both abused and used almost like a stud. It had been horribly abused (kept in an attic and “fixed up” after fights with superglue) and this was a lot of it but the fact that it was being used as a breeding animal was also a bad thing. This guy and others had been actively breeding dogs for the “sport”. If you do this, it will produce very nasty and dangerous dogs, you can as easily breed in violent traits as breed them out of a line. The fact that some breeds are looked at as “hardman dogs” can encourage this, and while reasonable owners will look for dogs with a good temperament some idiots will look for aggressive animals and other idiots will breed them for them if they think they can make enough money out of it.

excellent points ...but you kinda shot yourself in the foot there if your intention was to defend a "blanket ban"

Because what these "hard men" are breeding there are not dogs that fit ito a breed standard (you could possibly get them under the "mixes thereof" heading ...but so could be half the dog population in Ireland) hence it is wrong to ban certain breeds.
The only animals that are clearly identifiable as belonging to the "listed" breeds are most likely those that have been well bred, taken well care of and are not the actual target of this ban.

The other point is ...laws are being blatantly ignored and circumvented already ...you don't honestly belive that these "hard men" won't find ways and means to undermine any ban as well ?

These undesirable people and their undesirable dogs should be taken care of under the animal rights legislation (legislating breeding and general welfare) that we don't have and not via a ban that hits all the wrong dogs and people.



But as long as we have a government that not only indulges but actively sponsors the animal cruelty abomination that is the "Greyhound industry", I'd say we can wait a loooooong time before anybody official does anything about animal rights.

nesf

peasant wrote:

excellent points ...but you kinda shot yourself in the foot there if your intention was to defend a "blanket ban"

I'm against the blanket ban because I think it's an inefficient way of doing things. It's just that the DCC as the landlord can ban whatever they want to unfortunately.

I just don't have a lot of time for pitbulls as a crossbreed in the hands of just anybody. Simply because they've been bred as "hardman dogs" for so long and a lot of them are not dogs that should be in just anybody's hands. I should have specified that I wasn't talking about just purebred pitbulls originally (again a fault of growing up around dogs that weren't bred along "Kennel Club lines" but for tasks.

I'll respond to the rest once I've rocked my son to sleep.

peasant

oh ...one last point before I go to bed ...

In my opinion some of the awful "produce" of puppy farms, cutsey-wootsey fashionable "family dogs", bred and raised with the worst character defects imaginable, are ten times more dangerous than the handful of "hard-man" dogs.

Panic-biters, people aggressive dogs, dog aggressive dogs, mentally handicapped dogs ...these mills churn them out by the hundreds into the hands of unsuspecting families.

At least with the "hard-man" dogs you will recognise them by their owners ..and there aren't as many of them either.

aare

Just an idle thought or two, but it seems to me that the "discrimination" element, in terms of the status of tenants has some, (though perhaps not enough) merit in terms of squashing this.

I don't think, ultimately, it will be possible to prevent this ban, but I DO think there is a realistic chance of getting the council to compromise on registering the existance of these breeds in their properties and allowing them to remain, for their lifetimes, on condition of neutering, proper control, and realistic numbers, while banning new dogs of these breeds from coming into their properties.

That would save a lot of dogs, and a lot of heartbreak.

arybvtcw0eolkf

First, this is extremly graphic but show's some sad 'facts or myths' re. American pit bulls. Although not all the dogs in this clip are Pits, half way through the clip it turns to happier things.

http://www.filecabi.net/video/Pit_Bull_Myths.html

Like we keep saying, punish the bad owner's not the breeds.

rugger

Mairt wrote:

First, this is extremly graphic but show's some sad 'facts or myths' re. American pit bulls. Although not all the dogs in this clip are Pits, half way through the clip it turns to happier things.

http://www.filecabi.net/video/Pit_Bull_Myths.html

Like we keep saying, punish the bad owner's not the breeds.

Mairt- thank you sooooo much. Cant remember when was the last time I had a lump in my throat or even tears welling in my eyes:p

I think the key word in all of this is EDUCATION!!!!!

JeanK

Hi Everyone,

I'm new here but am a member of other dog sites. You all know by now whats going with Dublin City Council, if you disgree with the ban as most I think do please start writting letters to Mr. Humphries and Mr. Gormley. We have to be heard now so we need to shout loud to stop this going any further.

If anyone needs any help or advice please hollar.

One thing and its advice coming from Anvil who I am working with on this, people in council areas, dont panic just yet and please oh please dont give up your dogs just yet. SIT TIGHT. If you are really worried and need advice post your contact details or email me on here, or contact you local citizens advice bureau, they will help you.

Thanks

rugger

JeanK wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I'm new here but am a member of other dog sites. You all know by now whats going with Dublin City Council, if you disgree with the ban as most I think do please start writting letters to Mr. Humphries and Mr. Gormley. We have to be heard now so we need to shout loud to stop this going any further.

If anyone needs any help or advice please hollar.

One thing and its advice coming from Anvil who I am working with on this, people in council areas, dont panic just yet and please oh please dont give up your dogs just yet. SIT TIGHT. If you are really worried and need advice post your contact details or email me on jean_ktng@yahoo.com, or contact you local citizens advice bureau, they will help you.

Thanks

Welcome JeanK;)

nesf

Mairt wrote:

First, this is extremly graphic but show's some sad 'facts or myths' re. American pit bulls. Although not all the dogs in this clip are Pits, half way through the clip it turns to happier things.

http://www.filecabi.net/video/Pit_Bull_Myths.html

Like we keep saying, punish the bad owner's not the breeds.

Yes but it conveniently avoids the nasty fact that some of the dogs in this breed do need to be put down because of the way they were bred, trained and treated. That and showing a show winner is almost meaningless when you're talking about dogs on the street. Kennel bred dogs and mongrel/cross breeds/puppy farm produced dogs are very different kettles of fish.

nesf

aare wrote:

I don't think, ultimately, it will be possible to prevent this ban, but I DO think there is a realistic chance of getting the council to compromise on registering the existance of these breeds in their properties and allowing them to remain, for their lifetimes, on condition of neutering, proper control, and realistic numbers, while banning new dogs of these breeds from coming into their properties.

The DCC were making noises last night about it being on a case by case basis so it mightn't be as bad as people think, though without proper policing of the entire situation makes it pretty pointless really.


The big question is whether to control dog breeding in general in this country imho. Responsible breeders produce good animals, a free-for-all approach won't do this.

nesf

peasant wrote:

Because what these "hard men" are breeding there are not dogs that fit ito a breed standard (you could possibly get them under the "mixes thereof" heading ...but so could be half the dog population in Ireland) hence it is wrong to ban certain breeds.

Agreed. Banning breeds is silly, controlling certain breeds, or all breeds, is a better option if still a very limiting option for people. If a dog licence was granted for people who had papers from a registered breeder it might help in some way, but this would be as open to abuse as anything else really.

peasant wrote:

The only animals that are clearly identifiable as belonging to the "listed" breeds are most likely those that have been well bred, taken well care of and are not the actual target of this ban.

Again agreed, and it is beyond clearly identifiable animals, a lot of people couldn’t tell a pitbull from a Kerry Blue nevermind identify a mongrel with any great accuracy. It is fairly well accepted that because of the media hype around pitbulls a lot of dangerous dogs are identified as pitbulls as almost a “default option” when in doubt.

peasant wrote:

The other point is ...laws are being blatantly ignored and circumvented already ...you don't honestly belive that these "hard men" won't find ways and means to undermine any ban as well ?

The law isn’t applied well with regard to dogs, this is a nationwide problem. Licensing simply isn’t enforced and dog wardens are few and far between.

aare

nesf wrote:

The DCC were making noises last night about it being on a case by case basis so it mightn't be as bad as people think, though without proper policing of the entire situation makes it pretty pointless really.

That tends to suggest that they would grab at this possibility then, as a chance to back down from an impossible stance and save face, while achieving a new degree of control:

me wrote:

I DO think there is a realistic chance of getting the council to compromise on registering the existance of these breeds in their properties and allowing them to remain, for their lifetimes, on condition of neutering, proper control, and realistic numbers, while banning new dogs of these breeds from coming into their properties.

Has anybody tried suggesting it to them?

I honestly see all sides of this issue.

My first and only friend in a lonely, abused childhood was the, badly disturbed, Staffie who was about the ONLY creature in that house who never harmed me.

I have turned out my freezer to bring "last meals" to dogs in the dog pound, and found the guts to talk to and pet them, who, in spite of being loving and good natured, in most ways, and even, once or twice, VERY well and responsibly owned, had obeyed a misfiring synapse in their instincts and attacked a person or killed an animal, and could not be allowed to live.

I have seen abused dogs who became too dangerous to live.

Whatever you feel about particuler breeds, the writing is on the wall, some kind of ban/control is certain to happen, right or wrong...the best anyone can hope to do is limit the damage and distress.

A lot of UK councils NEVER allowed any dogs in their properties.

Sonnenblumen

JeanK wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I'm new here but am a member of other dog sites. You all know by now whats going with Dublin City Council, if you disgree with the ban as most I think do please start writting letters to Mr. Humphries and Mr. Gormley. We have to be heard now so we need to shout loud to stop this going any further.

If anyone needs any help or advice please hollar.

One thing and its advice coming from Anvil who I am working with on this, people in council areas, dont panic just yet and please oh please dont give up your dogs just yet. SIT TIGHT. If you are really worried and need advice post your contact details or email me on here, or contact you local citizens advice bureau, they will help you.

Thanks

Are you suggesting that the local citizen advice bureaux are preparing to engage in this issue? Also are they also helping the victims of dangerous dogs etc?

Dog laws and dog wardens have failed the public good, it is time that the authorities took more appropriate measures to curb the growing and aggravating issues of bad owners and dangerous dogs.