These are the most popular breeds and types of dogs that appear in classified ads in the U.S. based on an evaluation of 783,645 total classified ads, excluding duplicates, to represent approximately 783,645 individual dogs offered for sale or adoption.
Pit bulls, by all names combined, were just 4.9% of the dogs advertised.
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3 comments:
A number of factual errors, but still sort of interesting:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/terriers-were-once-the-greatest-dogs-in-the-world-westminster-dog-show/
Sorry I don't trust the accuracy of any of the unscientific blatantly biased reports from Merritt Clifton.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/douglas-anthony-cooper/merritt-clifton-pit-bulls_b_5866176.html
His report does not explain how/if mixed breed dogs were accounted for. Were they excluded altogether? If included in the 'others' category, is it believable that the prevalence of mixed-breed dogs is less than 14% ? What do you think?
--Paul Stewart
You don't have to salute Merritt Clifton. That said, I have actually emailed back and forth with him, and I've been looking at dog data for over 20 years, unlike the sources name in the piece you cite, one of which is a fantasist pit bull advocate who shot his credibility on this blog some years ago.
Here's what I recommend you do: Go to the Sunday newspapers of 20 large city papers, 10 medium city newspapers, and 5 small towns newspapers and count the dog ads and report out what you find. I have done that kind of thing with Merritt Clifton's work on dog shelters, and done enough of it with newspapers ads that I do not doubt his data. But don't trust me; do the work and let us know what you find.
I have a degree in statistics, and I do not look down my nose at people who do not. This stuff is really not that hard, provided you are willing to do the work. So far, what I have found, is that pit bull apologists are too often fact twisters and fantasists.
This is not to say that there are not some problems in Merritt Clifton's methodology. The number of people advertising dogs in newspapers is very likely down due to competition from Craig's List. The "Craig's List pitbull," of course, is such a common story of mayhem that it is worthy of its own meme, like the child with a broken arm and a black eye and a head bandage advertising a horse that is a "good trail prospect."
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