Prey Drive In Pet Dogs

[Maddy]

I think laws (council or otherwise) do play some role in the discussion though. Trouble is they are different everywhere. But it's relevant when we are considering whether a dog that WILL kill out of prey drive is ok whereas a dog that WILL kill out of dog aggression isn't.

It's tricky, because to me it seems like Maddy has done pretty much everything she can to prevent a small dog getting into her yard, although it is not fail safe. However if someone had a dog that they knew would kill another dog, regardless of size, out of dog aggression would we expect them to do more than that and say it was their fault if their dog killed a similar size dog in their own yard?

ETA posting at the same time Maddy so wrote this without seeing your most recent comment.

It is a very interesting ethical question and we went through the same thing with neighbouring cats. Because neighbours have overhanging trees, the only way we could prevent cat access to be to literally rig up some sort of huge net across our entire property- which is obviously pretty absurd. But legally, a wandering cat killed on our property would be an offense under the Dog Control Act, despite all reasonable measures being taken. Which leads to the obvious question.. how far does a person have to go to secure their property before they could argue that they'd done enough?

This isn't just about small dogs, either. In Tasmania, it is an offense (unless the dog meets certain requirements) for a dog to kill any animal, even if it is absolutely a prey species, such as a feral rabbit.

I have to admit the wandering cat issue really peeves me because not only do I not want my dogs taken from me and destroyed, but I like cats and it'd be horrific to see my dogs doing one harm. But if people would just safely contain their own animals and take some responsibility, this discussion wouldn't even be necessary :/

[BarbedWire]

Sorry too anxious

Edited August 25, 2016 by sarspididious

[persephone]

In Tasmania, it is an offense (unless the dog meets certain requirements) for a dog to kill any animal, even if it is absolutely a prey species, such as a feral rabbit.

huh???? How on earth is that policed?

[Simply Grand]

Sorry too anxious

All good, thanks for reading Sars :)

[The Spotted Devil]

Think I answered my own question by the way - a Springer focusses on scent much more than sight so that's also going to be a factor in discriminating species.

[corvus]

It's tricky, because to me it seems like Maddy has done pretty much everything she can to prevent a small dog getting into her yard, although it is not fail safe. However if someone had a dog that they knew would kill another dog, regardless of size, out of dog aggression would we expect them to do more than that and say it was their fault if their dog killed a similar size dog in their own yard?

I think it's individual to a large extent. Could I personally live with the risk that my dog would kill someone else's dog if the opportunity presented itself? No. I would feel responsible. I do not want to be responsible for someone losing a pet, however tenuously. All risk assessments are a matter of balancing the likelihood of things going wrong with the impact if they did. People are going to judge this differently, and some people might be able to live with a low level of risk that is still unacceptable to me. On the other side is measures to reduce risk. I could reduce the risk of my dogs being hit by a car, but it would limit their freedom and impact on their quality of life. So it becomes a matter of when are the risks of them being hit by a car overshadowed by the unlikeliness of that occurring and the benefits of not taking every precaution? There will be miscalculations and that undoubtedly results in dogs being killed by other dogs. I would never forgive myself if that was my miscalculation, so the impact of something going wrong is extremely high for me personally. If I can't reduce that to my satisfaction without an unacceptable impact on my dogs' freedom and quality of life, then it's an untenable situation for me. This is sometimes the reason why people euthanise dangerous dogs. They can't reduce the risk to their satisfaction without an unacceptable impact on their dog. My heart breaks for people that have made that decision. I pray I will never have to myself.

[melzawelza]

Wow, all of the councils I have lived in, if your dog kills another animal and you're reported, you are in deep doggie do do...... There are no excuses, even if it is in it's own yard.

Anyone who thinks it's ok, should check their local council rules on dog attacks. None of the rules I have read separate attacks, and consequences, on the reason for attack ie prey drive, aggression, fear etc.

Not in NSW. If an animal trespasses on to your property and your dog attacks it, you're in the clear. As you should be.

[Maddy]

In Tasmania, it is an offense (unless the dog meets certain requirements) for a dog to kill any animal, even if it is absolutely a prey species, such as a feral rabbit.

huh???? How on earth is that policed?

In practice, it relies on someone reporting it. Which itself leads to an even trickier ethical question.. if my dogs killed a cat in the yard and it had a name tag on, would I return the cat (or maybe just its collar, depending on the condition of its body) to the owners and be honest about what had happened, risking prosecution and all the implications of that, or do I just bury cat and leave the collar somewhere like hanging from a neighbour's fence? Personally, I'd be devastated if I lost a pet and never found out what had become of it so I think for that reason alone, probably option one. But it makes me wonder about what choice other people would make in the same situation. Plenty of dogs will kill cats given the chance and judging from the amount of cats listed as missing on local Lost and Found pet pages, even if only a small fraction were killed by dogs, that'd still be quite a few cats.

And that is part of the problem with the existing laws- if your dog kills a neighbour's cat, there are many practical reasons to keep your mouth shut and really only moral reasons to report it.

Another part of the problem is that many people refuse to accept that dogs are predatory animals, not living teddy bears. All dogs are dangerous to some degree. I share my home with four large (and one smallish) carnivores, they sleep on my bed, they wear cutesie coats and have silly names and all of them would happily chase and kill cats. As my chem tutor once said.. "Labs (the facilities, not the dogs) are inherently dangerous places. But if risks are assessed and managed, they are one of the safest places to work" and the same is true for dogs. I had my hand down Idiot Dog's throat this evening and while poking around in there, it occurred to me that I was not at all worried about where my hand was- halfway up to my forearm in very large teeth and totally complacent about it. We expect these predators to cuddle with bunnies, take adorable photos with our newborn babies, play perfectly with every other dog and when they don't, we are horrified. Risks often aren't mitigated because to accept there are risks means to accept dogs for what they are and it seems not many people are comfortable with that idea. The end result of that being more people and other animals being hurt by dogs in preventable accidents.

I've harped on this particular issue a lot with greyhounds and the people who refuse to muzzle them or believe they are capable of harm but I honestly believe things would be better for everyone if we were just a bit more realistic in our expectations.

My dogs are predators, I recognise this and do whatever is practical to prevent them hurting other animals. If I wouldn't live with the amount of risk involved, I'd probably just own rabbits and be done with it (although one of my rabbits kills birds so.. can't win there, either).

[karen15]

Maddy, I've seen a horse use a bunny as a football. Started out cute, horse discovered bunny in paddock, stomped, bunny ran, horse ran. Bunny stopped, horse stomped again, both ran. Soon bunny stopped running when horse stomped so it got poked with a horse nose - goodie, bunny running again. Soon that stopped working, so horse kicks it like a football and runs after it. I wasn't expecting that! Wasn't my horse. Mine was just weeeeeeed we're running here and here and here. Wwwwwweeeeeeeee! I was only new to owning horses and never thought to see one play bunny football. I removed the deceased bunny when they started to sniff around, thinking knowing my luck they'd try to eat the darn thing. Don't get me wrong, I know horses kill dogs etc, but horse just seemed to be playing chasey, like they do with other horses, and certainly didn't strike at the bunny.

Eta that is an interesting dichotomy really. If a horse, being a prey animal, kills a wandering dog, it's the dogs fault for not being contained and harassing stock. But if a dog kills something, there are issues.

Edited August 26, 2016 by karen15

[melzawelza]

Wow, all of the councils I have lived in, if your dog kills another animal and you're reported, you are in deep doggie do do...... There are no excuses, even if it is in it's own yard.

Anyone who thinks it's ok, should check their local council rules on dog attacks. None of the rules I have read separate attacks, and consequences, on the reason for attack ie prey drive, aggression, fear etc.

Not in NSW. If an animal trespasses on to your property and your dog attacks it, you're in the clear. As you should be.

Further to this, now that I'm on a computer, here is the legislation (in part... there's other stuff about dangerous and menacing dogs etc in it, but this is relevant stuff):

16 Offences where dog attacks person or animal

(1) If a dog rushes at, attacks, bites, harasses or chases any person or animal (other than vermin), whether or not any injury is caused to the person or animal:

(a) the owner of the dog, or

(b) if the owner is not present at the time of the offence and another person who is of or above the age of 16 years is in charge of the dog at that time—that other person,

is guilty of an offence.

(2) It is not an offence under this section if the incident occurred:

(a) as a result of the dog being teased, mistreated, attacked or otherwise provoked, or

(b) as a result of the person or animal trespassing on the property on which the dog was being kept, or

© as a result of the dog acting in reasonable defence of a person or property, or

(d) in the course of lawful hunting, or

(e) in the course of the working of stock by the dog or the training of the dog in the working of stock.

To be honest I'm pretty horrified that some other states don't have the same provisions/protections.

[Two Best Dogs!]

Victoria has similar guidelines (vaguely recall reading this last year to determine if I am liable if T kills the neighbours cat or any of the ferals in our yard. I have warned them. I cannot be there 24/7.)

DOMESTIC ANIMALS ACT 1994 - SECT 29

http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/daa1994163/s29.html

Offences and liability relating to dog attacks

S. 29(6) amended by No. 55/2011 s. 4(2).

(9) In any proceeding for an offence under this section, it is a defence to that offence if the incident occurred because—

(a) the dog was being teased, abused or assaulted; or

(b) a person was trespassing on the premises on which the dog was kept; or

© another animal was on the premises on which the dog was kept; or

(d) a person known to the dog was being attacked in front of the dog.

(10) In any proceeding for an offence under subsection (3), (4), (5), (6), (7) or (8), it is a defence to that offence if the incident occurred as part of a hunt in which the dog was taking part and which was conducted in accordance with the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1986 .

When I lived in Tassie, one of my chooks hopped the fence into the neighbours yard and their dog got it. Didn't even occur to me that they could get in trouble for it - it was my faulty fencing that let the chook out and they're just dogs. Sad and upsetting, but I couldn't blame them.

Now the collared cat that broke into my rabbit pen and killed my lop. I would have been out for blood if I could identify the owners. Big cat destroyed the night time lock up door.

Edited August 26, 2016 by Thistle the dog

[~Lisa~]

Thanks for posting that legislation melzawelza, I'll have to look into whether it is the same for ACT. I am shocked it isn't the same Australia wide, it is absurd to me that a dog could be held at fault for harming a cat/rabbit that trespasses on it's property.

The last cat that came into out yard ripped my poor greyhound to shreds, a couple of dozen stitches and 2 hour surgery at midnight on a Saturday wasn't cheap... I was too worried about my girl to think about who should be responsible for the finances at the time (and have no idea who the owner of that cat was anyway), but I wonder what the consequences are for a cat owner in that situation.

Edited August 26, 2016 by ~Lisa~

[Papillon Kisses]

Thanks for posting that legislation melzawelza, I'll have to look into whether it is the same for ACT. I am shocked it isn't the same Australia wide, it is absurd to me that a dog could be held at fault for harming a cat/rabbit that trespasses on it's property.

The last cat that came into out yard ripped my poor greyhound to shreds, a couple of dozen stitches and 2 hour surgery at midnight on a Saturday wasn't cheap... I was too worried about my girl to think about who should be responsible for the finances at the time (and have no idea who the owner of that cat was anyway), but I wonder what the consequences are for a cat owner in that situation.

In my NSW experience, councils won't give a damn. Cats are royalty in their eyes and can do no wrong.

Malcolm was attacked by a cat much larger than he is and council just spewed out the stock-standard "cats are allowed to roam under the NSW Companion Animals Act" spiel.

This cat had been stalking him for almost a year and I was always very careful but it sneaked up on both of us one day. Good thing he didn't fight back as I'm sure council would have cared in that instance!! Also thankful that neighbours were around to help.

I'm sorry your Grey was so brutally attacked.

[JulesP]

Interesting to see what my council would do in this situation as in my shire cats have to be contained to their own property 24/7.

[melzawelza]

Thanks for posting that legislation melzawelza, I'll have to look into whether it is the same for ACT. I am shocked it isn't the same Australia wide, it is absurd to me that a dog could be held at fault for harming a cat/rabbit that trespasses on it's property.

The last cat that came into out yard ripped my poor greyhound to shreds, a couple of dozen stitches and 2 hour surgery at midnight on a Saturday wasn't cheap... I was too worried about my girl to think about who should be responsible for the finances at the time (and have no idea who the owner of that cat was anyway), but I wonder what the consequences are for a cat owner in that situation.

In my NSW experience, councils won't give a damn. Cats are royalty in their eyes and can do no wrong.

Malcolm was attacked by a cat much larger than he is and council just spewed out the stock-standard "cats are allowed to roam under the NSW Companion Animals Act" spiel.

This cat had been stalking him for almost a year and I was always very careful but it sneaked up on both of us one day. Good thing he didn't fight back as I'm sure council would have cared in that instance!! Also thankful that neighbours were around to help.

I'm sorry your Grey was so brutally attacked.

It's not necessarily that they don't care - the reality is under the legislation there is no such thing as a cat attack, so there's no action that can be taken.

If the cat does it more than once we can get it under nuisance legislation for 'repeatedly damaging property' (it's a bit shady, but I think I can make a reasonable argument that your dog is your property and if a cat leaves injury it has damaged it), but the word repeatedly means it has to happen at least twice.

Some councils are really unhelpful and don't even give you any sympathy or care though, so I can understand that that would be frustrating.

As far as the payment of bills that's always a civil matter rather than a council one but if you pursued the cat owner civilly in court and had enough evidence that it did it, I think you'd have a good case.

[Maddy]

Further to this, now that I'm on a computer, here is the legislation (in part... there's other stuff about dangerous and menacing dogs etc in it, but this is relevant stuff):

16 Offences where dog attacks person or animal

(1) If a dog rushes at, attacks, bites, harasses or chases any person or animal (other than vermin), whether or not any injury is caused to the person or animal:

(a) the owner of the dog, or

(b) if the owner is not present at the time of the offence and another person who is of or above the age of 16 years is in charge of the dog at that time—that other person,

is guilty of an offence.

(2) It is not an offence under this section if the incident occurred:

(a) as a result of the dog being teased, mistreated, attacked or otherwise provoked, or

(b) as a result of the person or animal trespassing on the property on which the dog was being kept, or

© as a result of the dog acting in reasonable defence of a person or property, or

(d) in the course of lawful hunting, or

(e) in the course of the working of stock by the dog or the training of the dog in the working of stock.

To be honest I'm pretty horrified that some other states don't have the same provisions/protections.

Our possible defenses are a bit different and don't include trespass, unless the dog is a guard dog- which, although not mentioned there, requires different licensing to a pet dog and cannot (as far as I can recall) be used to guard a residential property.

(7) It is a defence in proceedings for an offence under this section if the defendant establishes that –

(a) the dog was being used in the reasonable defence of any person or property; or

(b) the dog was being teased, abused or assaulted; or

© the dog was a working dog engaged in –

(i) working with police; or

(ii) droving or tending livestock; or

(d) the dog was a hunting dog engaged in hunting.

The trouble with a lot of our legislation here is that things aren't clearly defined. We have no provision for dogs attacking vermin (which I believe most other states have?) and an incident outside of the very narrow range of defenses is considered to be an "attack", with the risk of a destruction order attached, even if the case was clearly just a dog doing what most dogs would do, such as chasing cats or rabbits. A dog that chases rabbits is not necessarily a man-eating monster dog.

[~Lisa~]

I'm sorry your Grey was so brutally attacked.

Thanks PK, she is such a gentle girl, it broke my heart that she couldn't go for a toilet break in her own yard without being attacked.

Thanks melzawelza, that's interesting. I guess as more places are starting to ban roaming cats the legislation might change to keep up.

[melzawelza]

Further to this, now that I'm on a computer, here is the legislation (in part... there's other stuff about dangerous and menacing dogs etc in it, but this is relevant stuff):

16 Offences where dog attacks person or animal

(1) If a dog rushes at, attacks, bites, harasses or chases any person or animal (other than vermin), whether or not any injury is caused to the person or animal:

(a) the owner of the dog, or

(b) if the owner is not present at the time of the offence and another person who is of or above the age of 16 years is in charge of the dog at that time—that other person,

is guilty of an offence.

(2) It is not an offence under this section if the incident occurred:

(a) as a result of the dog being teased, mistreated, attacked or otherwise provoked, or

(b) as a result of the person or animal trespassing on the property on which the dog was being kept, or

© as a result of the dog acting in reasonable defence of a person or property, or

(d) in the course of lawful hunting, or

(e) in the course of the working of stock by the dog or the training of the dog in the working of stock.

To be honest I'm pretty horrified that some other states don't have the same provisions/protections.

Our possible defenses are a bit different and don't include trespass, unless the dog is a guard dog- which, although not mentioned there, requires different licensing to a pet dog and cannot (as far as I can recall) be used to guard a residential property.

(7) It is a defence in proceedings for an offence under this section if the defendant establishes that –

(a) the dog was being used in the reasonable defence of any person or property; or

(b) the dog was being teased, abused or assaulted; or

© the dog was a working dog engaged in –

(i) working with police; or

(ii) droving or tending livestock; or

(d) the dog was a hunting dog engaged in hunting.

The trouble with a lot of our legislation here is that things aren't clearly defined. We have no provision for dogs attacking vermin (which I believe most other states have?) and an incident outside of the very narrow range of defenses is considered to be an "attack", with the risk of a destruction order attached, even if the case was clearly just a dog doing what most dogs would do, such as chasing cats or rabbits. A dog that chases rabbits is not necessarily a man-eating monster dog.

Yikes, that's actually really frightening :/ I thought our legislation was bad enough when it comes to not taking in to account normal dog behaviour (an attack on a cat off the property is not differentiated from an attack on a person, for example), but you're exactly right that yours is barely defined and very open ended. If you had a good council then great, but plenty of councils are not good councils.

I'm sorry your Grey was so brutally attacked.

Thanks melzawelza, that's interesting. I guess as more places are starting to ban roaming cats the legislation might change to keep up.

I'd like to see an offence added associated with a cat that attacks which carries a similar penalty ($550), and maybe the ability to put a containment provision on an individual cat that has attacked. I'd never want to see across the board cat containment legislated though (and thankfully it doesn't seem to be on the cards here in NSW as we can't implement bylaws and it's unlikely that it would be legislated across the whole state in the Act).

[Maddy]

In my area, we have a pretty apathetic council who don't generally enforce laws unless they realllllly have to, so we're probably lucky (if that's the right word) in that respect. Our nearest neighbouring council is very proactive in enforcing the act though and for a while, there was talk of a shoot-on-sight policy for wandering dogs. Presumably until someone pointed out that it was illegal for them to just drive around, shooting dogs in a suburban area.

The legislation definitely leaves a lot of room for abuse though and that's the biggest issue. When it comes to reporting attacks on animals, you can dob in someone else's dog for an attack provided the victim is.. "any live vertebrate animal other than a human being". Srsly.

[melzawelza]

In my area, we have a pretty apathetic council who don't generally enforce laws unless they realllllly have to, so we're probably lucky (if that's the right word) in that respect. Our nearest neighbouring council is very proactive in enforcing the act though and for a while, there was talk of a shoot-on-sight policy for wandering dogs. Presumably until someone pointed out that it was illegal for them to just drive around, shooting dogs in a suburban area.

The legislation definitely leaves a lot of room for abuse though and that's the biggest issue. When it comes to reporting attacks on animals, you can dob in someone else's dog for an attack provided the victim is.. "any live vertebrate animal other than a human being". Srsly.

Shooting on sight in a suburban area?! What the?? It's one thing if the dog is attacking livestock and it's the only way you can protect them, but just wandering dogs?? I'm so glad it didn't come to fruition. And yeah, any legislation that leaves room for abuse is a huge problem, as unfortunately there are people in ranger type positions that enjoy having power over others and will use what they can in the legislation to do it. Hell, I've spoken to plenty of people here in NSW with rangers doing things that the legislation doesn't permit them to do!