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sweetana, I agree with you. There are now consequences to bear, too. When I was getting a new homeowners' insurance policy earlier this year, I was asked for the first time ever about my pets. They wanted to know the breed and age of my dogs AND they sent an insurance inspector to my home, not only to see the property but to verify that I wasn't lying about my dogs. I don't know what would have happened if I owned pit bulls but I suspect they either wouldn't have covered my property OR the premiums would have been much higher.
riveree,
The 4-foot fence in the front is perfectly fine for my and my dogs' needs. Why should I have to fortify my home, why should everyone in our neighborhood have to alter their homes and lifestyles, because pitbulls have been moved in?
But I resent the fact that because pitbulls are living nearby, I now have to go out and look around before letting my dogs out to potty. I resent that my dogs can't play in their own yard without the worry of helldogs trying to storm my gate at some point. And I worry about the children a few homes down the street who are often outside playing with their puppy. Why should EVERYONE ELSE have to adjust?!
"Helldogs"...weren't those Rottweilers in the Damien films? Weren't people scared to death of Rotts back then, and all the looser thugs had one?
It's not "everyone else" who has to adjust, it includes me, you, as well as the responsible pit bull owner. What if you owned and loved a well-trained, well-socialized pit, who was treated as a piraya.
That's not fair either, and mixed with an ever-growing hyseria, that makes me afraid for the breed. (Sorry, pitbullmommie, just using the generalization that's been used here).
Teatime, if I may....a 4-foot fence is for decoration, and nothing else. What is it perfectly fine for? It may fit your needs, but not your dogs'. A decorative fence will neither keep your dogs in, nor keep other dogs out. It is also called 'fence charging', when your dogs bark at things through the fence, and other dogs bark and snarl at things inside the fence. It's all too natural.
As much as I love and honor dogs, they are instinctively wild animals. They must be trained. Even cute little adorable ones like mine.
Personally, I would NEVER leave my dog outside alone - ever. Not because of some marauding band of wild wolves or dogs, but simply because it is not safe. It is not safe from any number of creatures, badgers, coyotes (yes, we do have them here in the city), and useless human beings who through garbage and poison over the fence.
You are rightfully afraid of your neighbor's dogs. But your neighbors made them that way. If you worry about the neighborhood children, so advise their parents.
Until the police or animal control respond accordingly, keep flooding them with (valid) complaints about the dogs running wild, or being beaten. Keep a log about when you called and to whom you spoke. Action will get you a response from the authorities. Complain - again, with validation - so that no one will want their name associated with a report of not doing anything, if one of the loose dogs hurts or kills something. That's what works with City Hall.
And teatime, you should be very ticked off, but you have to adjust to urban living, just like we all do. I walk my dog. A few doors down from me lives a man with two pit bulls. I always look for them out of caution. When he sees me coming, he puts his dogs in the house. The dogs have never barked at my dog, nor made any movement towards him. To me, the young man is adjusting, and being a responsible pet owner - he is not willing to take any kind of chance. And his dogs obey him. (They are NEVER alone in their yard, either).
Direct your frustration at your neighbors, not the dogs. I know the dogs will end up paying the price, of course. How close are your neighbors? If you live in an incororated area, you have much more power to do something than you think.
It's a sad state of affairs. There's never been a problem with a healthy dog, that couldn't be traced right back to the "owner."
[quote=LingLing;4002909][quote=SeeBee;4002485]
Direct your frustration at your neighbors, not the dogs.
Quote:
How? I am lucky that I don't have this kind of neighbors. If I do, I will feel the same way as Teatime.
Hi, LingLing, I too am lucky I that I don't have that kind of neighbor. But the fault still lies with the owners, not the breed.
I had neighbors like teatime's when I lived in an apartment building. Police were always coming to their door, about their dogs (two) lunging at other dogs, and the young lady barely being able to hold them back. And you'd better believe I called the police, too.
I think I do understand why teatime is frustrated, and never meant to imply that I felt differently that she.
In the eigth or so (yeah, I know it's long) paragraph I tried to explain what might work for her.
Sorry, but I thought it was pretty self-explanatory.
SeeBee, My 4-foot fence in the front HAS contained my dogs -- and one of them is a large Weimaraner. The only part that didn't last was the wooden picket gate and I replaced it with a chain link gate. But, why should I incur the expense of getting a taller fence AND reduce my own quality of life, having to be all walled in because of other people's dogs?! Especially when I take care that my dogs don't in any way infringe on my neighbors' rights and enjoyment of their property?
These posts in praise of pitbulls basically say the same thing -- that neighbors have to change their lifestyles to accommodate the presence and temperament of other people's pitbulls. Oh, no, I don't think so! What's next -- telling me that I can't use my four-point cane to walk in my own driveway anymore because the precious pitbulls would rightly see the cane in my hand as a threat to them?
On a good note, the dogs haven't been loose for two days now so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Perhaps animal control did have a chat with the owners after all. Four pitbulls killed a little boy in our area a few weeks ago and sentiments are running strong. I'll bet animal control is taking all reports of pitbulls running amok very seriously and I'm probably not the only neighbor who complained.
I wouldn't own a dog that would maul other animals at the first opportunity, especially in this age of lawsuits.
Just want to clarify this.. are you saying you wouldn't own a pit bull or rottie only because they're "more likely to maul other animals?"
I worked in a kennel last summer and have to say the most aggressive breeds I encountered were an american eskimo dog (standard size) and a sheltie. No one could explain with any sort of logic why they were allowed to board there... but whatever. The dog trainer had to get reconstructive surgery after the american eskimo dog attacked her. And the sheltie had essentially bitten or tried to bite almost all the staff at some point including myself (I did nothing but walk past as a coworker was out walking him).
There's no way you should HAVE to change the way you're living to shield yourself from other people's dogs but if you have neighbors that terrible, it might be in your best interest. It is the owners' fault and you have every right to be pissed.. I LOVE pitts and rotties (mine's half rottie but you could never tell by looking at him!), they are as wonderful as dogs can be, and I'm sorry you have to experience a couple with a grossly irresponsible owner. People like that disgust me. Not just anyone should be allowed to own dogs.
SeeBee, My 4-foot fence in the front HAS contained my dogs -- and one of them is a large Weimaraner. The only part that didn't last was the wooden picket gate and I replaced it with a chain link gate. But, why should I incur the expense of getting a taller fence AND reduce my own quality of life, having to be all walled in because of other people's dogs?! Especially when I take care that my dogs don't in any way infringe on my neighbors' rights and enjoyment of their property?
These posts in praise of pitbulls basically say the same thing -- that neighbors have to change their lifestyles to accommodate the presence and temperament of other people's pitbulls. Oh, no, I don't think so! What's next -- telling me that I can't use my four-point cane to walk in my own driveway anymore because the precious pitbulls would rightly see the cane in my hand as a threat to them?
On a good note, the dogs haven't been loose for two days now so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Perhaps animal control did have a chat with the owners after all. Four pitbulls killed a little boy in our area a few weeks ago and sentiments are running strong. I'll bet animal control is taking all reports of pitbulls running amok very seriously and I'm probably not the only neighbor who complained.
Why should you adjust? Simple, better safe than sorry, even if it does offend you. I wouldn't want any of my dogs to be a test subject, just so I could prove a point - I'm right and the pit owners are wrong. Why be in the right, and have an injured dog, or worse on yours hands.
Your 4-ft fence may've 'contained' your Weimeraner because he stays in the yard. But I'm quite certain your Weimeraner has an easy ability to clear a small fence like that. That's not containment. And what will it keep out?
Didn't you say previously that you were afraid the "pit bulls" would/might jump over your 4-ft fence?
If you choose not to make any reasonable adjustments, so be it. You have hooligans for neighbors, and they've aready shown you they are abusive towards their animals..that spells enough trouble for me.
Unless there's more to the story, I simply don't understand the kind of intractability where one refuses to make any compromises for their animal's safety.
If what you are reading in posts, that people are defending "pit bull" temperaments, I think you are missing a lot of what people are saying.
I am not a big proponent of bully dogs because of their misuse. But I have seen ones that are very highly trained, have earned their CGC awards and even met one who is a certified therapy dog in a children's terminal cancer ward. Beat that for good breeding, and good training.
Bully breeds are a horrible menace in the hands of fools. That simply does not make the breed itself inherently dangerous. That requires selective breeding and abusive handling and training. That's been proven and said again and again.
Why should you adjust? Simple, better safe than sorry, even if it does offend you. I wouldn't want any of my dogs to be a test subject, just so I could prove a point - I'm right and the pit owners are wrong. Why be in the right, and have an injured dog, or worse on yours hands.
Your 4-ft fence may've 'contained' your Weimeraner because he stays in the yard. But I'm quite certain your Weimeraner has an easy ability to clear a small fence like that. That's not containment. And what will it keep out?
Didn't you say previously that you were afraid the "pit bulls" would/might jump over your 4-ft fence?
If you choose not to make any reasonable adjustments, so be it. You have hooligans for neighbors, and they've aready shown you they are abusive towards their animals..that spells enough trouble for me.
Unless there's more to the story, I simply don't understand the kind of intractability where one refuses to make any compromises for their animal's safety.
If what you are reading in posts, that people are defending "pit bull" temperaments, I think you are missing a lot of what people are saying.
SeeBee, great post .
We ALL adjust, that is what society is. We constantly make adjustments for the sake of civility.
The house I just moved from had a pomeranian next door. Sweet dog, I liked her when I was with her one-on-one, but she had some behaviors that drove me up the wall!
Every time I would step outside my house into the front yard (to garden, for example), that pom would be yipping and yapping from inside her house. It didn't matter if I was out front for 5 minutes or 2 hours, she's be yipping the entire time non-stop...who wants to listen to that while they're gardening?
Oh, I should add, they knew this about their pom, yet they switched out their front door to a glass door...I guess so she could see better?
She also instigated issues with my dogs. I had a 6 foot privacy fence (controlling the line of sight of my own dogs ). My dogs would go outside and as soon as they did, the neighbor would put his pom outside. THE POM was the one racing up and down the other side of the fence, barking and creating a scene. It would eventually catch my dogs' attention and rile them up. It was not my dogs starting it - it was the pom. Where we live now, we have a dog on the other side of the fence and she does not do this and my dogs act as if there's no dog there at all - that's how they've always been - except in the case of this pom.
The owners think it's "cute" and "funny" that their dog behaves this way, so what am I to do? I adjusted. If he let his dog out, I brought mine inside until his pom was finished outside. I stopped gardening on that side of the house.
Where we are now, we deal with loose cats. I don't want my dogs to tangle with the cats, so now I make noise as I let them outside so the cats run off if they've come in the yard....I adjust.....because we all have to live together.
SeeBee,
It's not INTRACTABILITY, it's AFFORDABILITY. I resent your assertions that I'm putting MY dogs at risk just because I can't AFFORD to run out and hire contractors to build a fortress around my property since pit bulls entered the neighborhood. NO, my dogs do NOT get out via the front fence (the back fence is 6 foot.) I have thorny rosebushes along my 4 foot fence. I am disabled and on a fixed income. I can afford to take care of myself and mine but I CANNOT afford to react to neighbors' stupidity and their vicious dogs.
When I went out to dump trash in the trash toter in the street this evening, out ran the pitbulls barking and growling at me. Thank God a neighbor came out to help me and he yelled at the owner, too, who was outside the whole time. I was going to go over and speak with the owner but the dogs were still loose. He still didn't contain the dogs -- all he did was yell and swear at them. NO WAY was I going to risk getting bitten. Animal control will get another call from me tomorrow.
Now I suppose you'll suggest that everyone else in the neighborhood should get enclosed "popemobiles" to accommodate the pitbulls when we need to take out the trash.
You can defend pitbulls all you want, but when you try to make me out to be some sort of neglectful pet owner, my eyes glaze over. THE POINT IS that dogs like this should NOT be allowed in a residential neighborhood. If people want to own them, they need to move out where no one will be at risk if their precious pits get out.
SeeBee,
It's not INTRACTABILITY, it's AFFORDABILITY. I resent your assertions that I'm putting MY dogs at risk just because I can't AFFORD to run out and hire contractors to build a fortress around my property since pit bulls entered the neighborhood. NO, my dogs do NOT get out via the front fence (the back fence is 6 foot.) I have thorny rosebushes along my 4 foot fence. I am disabled and on a fixed income. I can afford to take care of myself and mine but I CANNOT afford to react to neighbors' stupidity and their vicious dogs.
If there's no way your Weimie can get out of your 4 foot fence because your rosebushes grow up above the fence, then there should be no way for the pit bulls to get in.
I was picturing a plain chainlink fence and had suggested some inexpensive reed fencing ($40 or less for a roll that would cover a very large fence line). The reed fencing would prevent the dogs from seeing each other and that often cuts down on the intensity. It's not foolproof, and the added height will not be anything more than a visual deterrent, but it's something quick, easy, cheap and attractive that you could do.
But if your rosebushes reinforce your perimeter, then you may not need anything additional.
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) paragraph I tried to explain what might work for her. 
.
). My dogs would go outside and as soon as they did, the neighbor would put his pom outside. THE POM was the one racing up and down the other side of the fence, barking and creating a scene. It would eventually catch my dogs' attention and rile them up. It was not my dogs starting it - it was the pom. Where we live now, we have a dog on the other side of the fence and she does not do this and my dogs act as if there's no dog there at all - that's how they've always been - except in the case of this pom.