Today...just today, 18 out of 37 dogs available at our local kill shelter are bully breeds, if I go by the breed list considered "bully" provided by All Dogs Welcome (alldogswelcome.com) I'd need to add a few more.
When I scroll through Craig's List I can pick up 10 bully dogs for free or for a minimal fee ON THE FIRST PAGE. It's interesting to note almost 2/3 of the lost and missing dogs posted on CL are also bully kinda dogs. Sure, there are other puppies on CL, you know, yorkies, chihuahua's, your designer breeds, aussie/heeler/BC mixes and GSD's But, if you add them all together you have maybe half the amount of the CL bully breeds. The majority of these bullies are advertised as Pit Bulls or Pit Bull mixes.
The ads say things like "Good homes only," or my favorite "looking for forever homes."
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| Yay! Pit Puppies! |
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| More pit puppies! |
How about this... Pit Bulls and Pit Bull mixes average about 33% of shelter intakes nationally, but in large cities the numbers are as high as 40%-65%.
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| So let's breed some more! |
It is said only 1 in 600 pit bulls that end up in shelters ever find a home, is that true? I don't know, I learned it on the 'net. I'm not talking a "forever home," I'm talking ANY home. Is that true? I don't know, but my source at our local kill shelter said only about 3% of the stray pits brought in are adopted. They adopt out over 70% of their stray dogs, so you do the math.
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| What the heck, let's breed some more! |
Studies estimate that up to 1 million Pits are euthanized per year, or 2,800 per day. Some estimates are up to double that number. In the Los Angeles area alone, 200 per day are put to sleep.
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| But that's OK! We'll just get another one! |
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| Here ya go, a change in color...these were called "Red Nosed Pits. |
We can't blame this on dog fight promoters, they don't advertise on CL. We can't blame this on breed bans or prejudice. I am starting to think this is a breed of dog owned by stupid people. People who breed crappy puppies as part of their income, people too young, broke, uneducated or all three to afford to neuter their dogs. You know, idiots.
STOP BREEDING PIT BULLS YOU IDIOTS!!! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!
When I fostered dogs for our local shelter (about 15 years ago) it was all Rottweilers all the time. Purebred rotts, rott crosses, and pits that looked like rotts. The owner surrenders were all rotts (2-4 years old and untrained, unneutered, unvaccinated, of course), the strays were rotss and rott crosses, the pups were rott crosses (except there was one unneutered Ridgeback on H Street Road...we never saw the dog, just his dozens of offspring).
ReplyDeleteJust as I was leaving the foster program, bichons became the dog to have. I probably cried for joy. I can rehome an elderly blind incontinent bichon in about an hour. 2 year old rotts, not so much.
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ReplyDeleteMy neighbors moved - WOOHOO!
ReplyDeleteThey took their 1 year old male pitbull, 2 year old female pitbull, and 5 pitbull puppies with them.
They had homes for two of the puppies, were going to keep one of the puppies, and only needed homes for two more.
I saw them advertised recently on Craigslist - nine week old 3/4 pitbull, 1/4 boxer, and only a $250 "rehoming fee"!
I bet the problem could be solved if we could figure out a way to make them have litters of 1-2 puppies, instead of 9-10 at a time.
Also, it'd be nice if people could figure out that they're a high maintenance breed. Pitbulls are lovely, lovely dogs..... if you're an experienced dog owner who does LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of work...
But nope. I rarely see knowledgeable people with pits.It's usually the dog owner equivalent of a some person who has never-had-a-single-lesson buying a two year old Egyptian Arabian. Two year old arabs are great horses... just not for greenhorns, unless there's a lot of luck involved.
Sigh. Do you think I'm having an ADD moment? I really did intend for that last comment to flow a little more, but it's missing a few crucial sentences. Oh well - hopefully you can understand it.
ReplyDeleteWhere I live, the people who own PBs and other tough breeds anthropomorphise their dogs and believe wholeheartedly that if their precious testicles are removed they will pine away with sorrow.
ReplyDeleteI adopted a 5 year old, already neutered male from a foster. He's now 12, requires meds and a special diet, but he's only had 2 homes in his life and never seen a shelter.
ReplyDeleteAmen Sister! You are preaching to the Choir.
ReplyDeleteI don't know why anyone would want to deal with squirmy, smelly, yucky puppies...Oh yeah...they are cute and can make them a couple of bucks...especially if they don't vaccinate, worm, or otherwise give a rat's ass about caring for the little balls of fur, or what their future will look like past 8weeks of age.
Besides it isn't "their" dog/bitch that keeps reproducing. "I don't know where those puppies came from! They weren't here yesterday!!"
There were six more ads showing just one puppy - but advertising litters.It's absolutely crazy.
ReplyDeleteI don't like to set off the chromosome wars, but, in the case of pit bulls, the problem really does seem to be mostly the fault of men. They get them to look macho, and then can't bear to cut off their testicles because they think it's immoral (never mind what happens to all those pups, or the two year old stud dog who is now too much to handle) or that it somehow deflates their own machismo to have a neutered dog (don't believe me? Look up Neuticles - a product designed with the socially conscious dumba** in mind).
ReplyDeleteUgh. I agree. So many unwanted dogs. :(
ReplyDeleteIt's also sad that many cities have free or low cost spay/neuter for bully breeds. I have a spayed female, she was bred in the past but not by me. I looked for a long time before picking her, off craigslist of all places. She came to us spayed, microchipped and fabulous with all other animals...and she was free! In the working pitbull world she is considered a cur, she just doesn't have the drive needed for weight pull or obedience and she is really low energy unless she is out somewhere she can run. She is a great dog but if she had come to me intact I sure wouldn't have bred her. There are some great pitbull breeders out there that breed for the drive needed for hog hunting, schutzhund, obedience and police work but you will never find those dogs on craigslist and they are bred specifically and with certain bloodlines in mind. 99% of the dogs on craigslist are mixed breed and I get so sick of the red/blue nose label it has nothing to do with the quality of the dog and don't get me started on American bullies, they are the halter horse of the dog world.
ReplyDeleteSelfish, egotistical, greedy people are drawn to breed pits and it is just totally ruining the breed.
We took in a very sweet stray pit a few years ago, unneutered of course. My husband was embarrassed to walk him before we got him fixed, he didn't want to be looked at as one of those people who don't fix their dog due to their own masculinity issues or to look like a byb.
I guess I don't get the not snipping thing. I took in my son's black lab as he couldn't keep him anymore (I get my dogs as handmedowns from my kids :( ) First week at my house he got brain surgery. My son came to visit and exclaimed "you ruined my dog!" I simply replied "I made him a better dog". Its the first rule at my house. I now have the 2nd dog from him. And he knew up front it was going to get snipped because he cant do it to his animals.
ReplyDeleteNot so much, but I do see a disturbing trend in my area for jerks to claim that the parents of pit bull puppies is a "service dog."
ReplyDeleteMy husband is a mechanic, and often looks the part (big, dirty and needs to be tough to manage the group of cocky young mechanics that work for him). He is often asked what kind of dog he has... And he always asks them to guess... Their first guess is rotti or pit, and he always loves looking at them and showing them a picture of our pair of standard poodles :) he didn't like the idea at first either, but that is my breed of choice, and now the only breed we will own.... There is an a$$ for every seat. Too many young men decide their first dog needs to be a big macho breed, and don't realize how much work goes into making those breeds into good canine citizens... And are really not suitable for apartment life.
ReplyDeleteOn the "it's not right to take away their balls" side - I would bet that the men (women, too, for that matter) who think that way also think pregnancy is all the woman's fault.
ReplyDeleteIt's ignorance all around...
ReplyDeleteWell-meaning people want to adopt the poor little pibbles because they're just soooooo misunderstood. Not realizing (as Becky pointed out) that Pitbulls are NOT easy dogs. Then the dog ends up in a shelter (or back in a shelter).
These same people 'adopt' from shelters and rescues, but also buy from CL ads because they're just sure they're 'saving' the cute little pup. So even the crappy breeders are finding someone who will buy the pups...or think they can because "hey, everyone loves Pitbulls, right?"
Love Becky's comment comparing two year old Egyptian Arabians to pits! I used to work at an Arabian farm in exchange for lessons; my first horse was a 19 year old crack horse who needed to be ridden 2 hours a day minimum. His stall opened onto his field so he could trot in and out all day. He would have been a loon with limited turnout and riding.
ReplyDeleteA couple down the street have a beautiful pit that they take RUNNING for miles every day. They call her their personal trainer. :)
We have the same in England except now that pitbulls are a banned breed the shelters are full up with Staffordshire Bull Terriers, or staffie crosses. Yet still people are breeding them. I really don't understand why as I don't see how they can sell them when so many are begging for homes, but somehow they do!
ReplyDeletePretty simple!
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