melzawelza

A lot of dogs shown, even at Westminster, are shown fat at the minimum, and extremely overweight in some breeds. I think the GSP looks okay though. A pet weight, not a working weight. I'd personally keep him leaner but he's within a healthy range.

There are still some councils who are super overzealous with it (at Team Dog we are helping people through the process fairly regularly still) but a lot of them know it is a waste of time and don't put too much time in to it.

I actually think you can probably find the dog you want in rescue or at shelters. The key is to go for a 1yr old dog + so you know what you're getting. Puppies, even when purebred, are largely an unknown. No need to cross bull breeds off your list if you like the look of them. 99% in the shelters with that look are mixed breeds anyway and there's huge variance in behaviour. Some high energy and high demands, some not. My medium sized blockhead-y dog from the pound: - Is low shedding and doesn't smell (bath her once every few months) - Never chews anything that isn't her own toys (and even then they last ages) - Is by herself from 7am - 6.15pm nine days per fortnight - Is a lazy turd and while she enjoys a walk, couldn't care less if we don't go for a few days - When we do go for a walk she's up for anything and quite athletic - Can be left inside with confidence that she won't destroy anything (and was from day dot) - Lived for three months in an apartment when I first got her, no problems. - Is medium sized at 26kg and is a great couch companion. She is not: - A guard dog. Doesn't even bark when people come to the door. The point I'm making is you can definitely find what you want in rescue, but you'll just likely have to search for it. I personally wouldn't be getting a puppy in your situation. Too much work and too much of an unknown. Attached a photo of my girl with one of my cats, as I figured you'd probably like the look of her, too :) ETA: Just saw the suggestion of fostering - excellent idea.

I don't think you're being unreasonable, maybe just remind her that you offered to help if anything untoward happened - such as going on to hospital or some other unforseen issue. Holdays aren't part of that and you aren't able to take the dog. I think just putting your foot down at this point is all you can do. Maybe recommend some in-house pet sitting services if she's worried about kennels.

Pet Resorts Australia.

:thumbsup: It's a sad day when those in welfare get so defensive and angry over legitimate questions being asked. All that was needed was for the questions to be answered and the reasons for the situation explained. If they *can't* be explained to a satisfactory level then that needs to be explored. DAS do a lot of good but they still have plenty they can improve on - this is evidenced by the fact that healthy and treatable animals are still being killed at this facility. Where this is still happening anywhere, there are improvements to be made. Even where this isn't happening, we still need to be concerned about things like length of stay, appropriate enrichment etc etc for those animals. A screaming witch hunt is obviously never the answer but nothing of the sort happened in this thread. Legitimate questions were asked, nothing more.

It's always healthy to questions the practices of pounds and shelters, even if they are generally good, as long as it's done constructively, which I think Sars has done. I guess the problem is likely that she has shown aggression to other dogs - there may not be many rescues with placements that are able to take her and her pup on safely.

I worked at an enormous kennel (much bigger than FD's and a higher number of dogs) that had major issues IMO for nearly three years. No escapes.

...yes, but the driver behind banning those breeds listed above in Germany was also to 'disarm' the gangs. I guess the police believed that once it is was illegal to own such a breed they (the police) would get more leverage to fight those gangs. To my knowledge you still can own e.g. pitbulls etc. in Germany (wrt breeding I'm not so sure), but it is linked to very strict requirements (age, certificate of good conduct, no police records etc.) and might involve special fees. Yeah, it's been tried before elsewhere too. It's useless. Deal with the gangs not the dogs. Ban Pits and they just go and get Rotts, Shepherds, Mals.. any number of dogs above knee height. There couldn't be more evidence of how useless BSL is.

This has been repealed in at least the Lower Saxony area following a study in to 'dangerousness' of the prescribed breeds vs a control group of Golden Retrievers. Link Edit: here's the study: Study

I agree that it's not set in stone - some shelters may be at more like 85%, some more at 95%, and in a small shelter, on an occasional month it might be much worse if they get a couple of dangerous dogs in. But generally, that's what the 90% accounts for - that about 10% give or take of the animals are not going to be suitable for rehoming either due to untreatable medical or behavioural issues. But, if a shelter is trying to argue that 40% of the animals in their care aren't suitable for rehoming and they're killing them, then they're not doing a good job of assessing and/or treating medical and behaviour problems. I agree to an extent but with a note of caution that this aim towards high rehoming rates is driving poor decision making - people at all levels who mean well but don't understand the consequences. This is happening now. Yes, I agree that *how* those rehoming rates are achieved is critical - taking in to account length of stay, behavioural programs and many, many other factors. I just didn't go in to that in detail here because that part of it isn't relevant to the point I was making in the thread re 'irresponsible owners'. There's plenty of ways to do it without making poor decisions. It's not an either/or. I highly recommend ASPCA Pro for anyone wanting to research these programs, and also if anyone is working in a shelter, G2Z are looking at bringing out Trish Loehr and Cindy Karsten again in 2016 to do consults at individual shelters to help them develop the supportive programs needed for increasing live release rates without negative outcomes - they are amazing and I highly recommend every shelter possible getting on board by contacting Getting 2 Zero.

I agree that it's not set in stone - some shelters may be at more like 85%, some more at 95%, and in a small shelter, on an occasional month it might be much worse if they get a couple of dangerous dogs in. But generally, that's what the 90% accounts for - that about 10% give or take of the animals are not going to be suitable for rehoming either due to untreatable medical or behavioural issues. But, if a shelter is trying to argue that 40% of the animals in their care aren't suitable for rehoming and they're killing them, then they're not doing a good job of assessing and/or treating medical and behaviour problems.

All of those in shelters aren't killed, a good percentage are rehomed. Of course any healthy or treatable pet being killed isn't okay but there isn't an epidemic of terrible irresponsible people. 96-98% of people keep their pets out of the system each year, and a large amount of those who don't are suffering poverty, lack of access to resources or crisis. With a helping hand they'd keep their pets. We know that achieving a live release rate of over 90% is possible through innovative and supportive programs. If shelters aren't achieving that (or at least actively working towards achieving that), the problem lies with the shelter.

There is SO much said in this thread about irresponsible pet owners, irresponsible breeders, people who don't give a shit, who callously 'dump' their dogs. I'd ask everyone who is saying these things to start seriously thinking about whether that tired old rhetoric is accurate. NSW stats show us that somewhere between about 2-6% of pets in the community enter the pound system every year. Most of those are reclaimed - only about 2-4% of the owned pet population need to find new homes (or are killed) through the pound system every year. So, overwhelmingly and absolutely pet owners are doing the right thing, loving their pets, keeping them or if they can't keep them finding them a home through avenues other than the pound. Now, further to that 2%, there's plenty of groups nowadays in existence in the US (and one or two here in Aus) who are helping with 'pound intervention' type programs - i,e programs that are aimed at keeping pets in their home. Downtown Dog Rescue in LA found that by simply offering assistance to pet owners attending the shelter to surrender their pets, they prevented over 2,000 pets from being surrendered in their first year. Similar programs elsewhere in the USA are seeing surrenders being reduced by at least a third when non-judgey assistance is offered. Not to mention the huge prices charged by pounds and shelters that prevent a huge amount of pets from being reclaimed by families that love them (Team Dog got nearly 100 pets home in NSW this year through our pound intervention and pet owner support programs). In many Sydney pounds pet owners that haven't desexed or registered their pets (which are usually the pet owners who are already struggling financially) are up for at least $300 to bring their pet home on the same day it was impounded. This goes up by between $20-$45 per day depending on the pound, quickly spiralling out of reach. Almost every single pet owner we helped it was the first time the dog had ever been impounded - an accident, not an ongoing problem. So really, if we focussed more on resources for pet owners in poverty and assistance for pet owners in crisis, we could get that number of pets needing homes easily much lower than the already low 2%. Overwhelmingly pet owners are good, and overwhelmingly the killing that goes on in shelters is due to outdated, unhelpful and frankly unacceptable in this day and age practices. Yes accidental litters are a problem and a huge part of the picture is desexing (and the way to achieve that is to make it free and easily accessible for those on a low income, and work with pet owners to help them see why it benefits them and their pets), but to focus solely on 'backyard breeders' and 'irresponsible pet owners' as some kind of massive problem is myopic at best.

Good girl, Poppy.

Pretty horrendous, particularly considering one of the dogs had killed the neighbours dog, as well.

Looks like the family can't take her anymore, and she's up for adoption. Link I can't imagine losing my home, being injured, and on top of that losing my dog

Link (includes video) A pit bull who stood by her injured owner while their house was on fire is now losing her home -- not to the fire itself, but to a law prohibiting pit bulls from living in the county. The fire, which happened early on Wednesday, was at a house in Landover Hills, Maryland. That's in Prince George's County, which has a longstanding, much-reviled ban on blocky-headed dogs. Firefighters told a local NBC affiliate that the dog stayed calm even after a a fire extinguisher was thrown at her, to get her out of the way so that the owner could be retrieved from the burning house. Outside, the dog still hung close -- until being taken away by animal control, along with a rat terrier and a pit bull puppy. Two people -- a woman and her father whose names haven't been revealed -- were hurt. Both are expected to recover, according to NBC. And once they have, the rat terrier will be able to go home. Because of PG County's breed ban, however, the two pit bulls must "be taken outside the county," Rodney Taylor, Prince George's County's animal services facility association director, told The Huffington Post. Pit bull bans -- otherwise known as breed specific legislation, or BSL -- have been denounced by the American Veterinary Medical Association, the American Bar Association, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and even the White House. These bans, usually enacted at the city or county level, are damned as bad for families, problematic for civil liberties, and expensive to enforce, without increasing public safety And so for good reason, BSL is on the wane. In January, Utah became the 19th state to prohibit localities from enacting or enforcing breed specific legislation. Cities around the country have also been doing away with their pit bull ordinances -- most recently, South Hutchinson, Kansas, and Youngstown, Ohio. Back in May, Michigan's Hazel Park lifted its pit bull ban in the wake of public outcry, after a dog credited with saving her owner from domestic violence was subsequently thrown out of town. Adrianne Lefkowitz, executive director of the Maryland Dog Federation, tells HuffPost she and others in the dog advocacy community hope that this family's terrible loss may spur the end of Prince George's County's pit bull ban, as well. "Our hearts are broken for this family because these dogs cannot be returned to the people they know and love and who love them back," she said. "This shouldn't be happening in America." UPDATE: A Prince George's County spokesperson tells The Huffington Post the dogs will be going to live with family, outside of the county, in an area without breed specific legislation.

Or do you mean negative impact on health :) I think Melzawelza had tongue firmly planted in cheek :laugh: Yep :laugh:

Because limiting already limited gene pools further is only going to have a positive impact on health...

If the dog did attack her and cause this injury it is absolutely horrendous and unacceptable. There seems to be questions as to whether it was the dog at all, though. https://au.news.yahoo.com/video/watch/30383573/bizarre-twist-in-dog-attack-story/#page1

The RSPCA is simply getting with the times and acting based on the numerous studies that show that low cost or free adoptions do not impact negatively on the outcomes of those pets, or their worth to their owners. Studies have also shown that pets given as gifts are less likely to be given up compared to animals purchased from breeders, pet shops or animal shelters. Time to throw out the crappy old rhetoric and get pets out the front door, rather than out the back in a body bag. Nothing like killing them to 'protect' them from the 'irresponsible public'! http://www.teamdog.com.au/need-talk-free/ “Dogs who came from an animal shelter, friend, or pet shop or who had been a stray were at increased risk of relinquishment compared with dogs who entered households as gifts”. http://www.savingpets.com.au/wp-content/uploads/Characteristics-of-Shelter-Relinquished-Animals-and-Their-Owners-Compared-With-Animals-and-Their-Owners-in-U.S.-Pet-Owning-Households.pdf

What a gorgeous dog.

Such a sensible post!

Just read this whole thread, Hobbes is amazing. Hoping he's still going well on his (second) new lease on life.