Have you ever noticed that the folks who have been fighting dogs for 20 years or more are focused on breeding lines, while the folks who just got their first Pit Bull are quite sure it's all in how you raise them?
Richard F. Stratton wrote pit bull columns for the UKC’s “Bloodlines” magazine. Thanks to Heather H. for posting the excerpt from this book.
4 comments:
Sure, and all Irish are alcoholics, all Poles are stupid and all French are cowards....... I have a Pit that I rescued back in 2011 and she is no more inclined to fight than the average dog. As a matter of fact, several small terrier types have snapped at her and she does not react to them at all. She did go after a German Shepard that tried to attack me when I was walking through my neighborhood (I was walking on the opposite side of the street where the dog lived) and defended herself when an different GS ran out of it’s yard and tried to attack her several years later. She gets along very well with some dogs and others maybe not as well, just like people act. Unlike others’ opinions on Pit Bulls, I am not prejudiced against certain breeds knowing that dogs are individual and some are very fine animals while others can be short tempered and nasty. Some dogs breeds certainly tend to be defensive or overly protective and many people view Jacks as snappish and nasty. I tend not to judge an entire breed or people based on only one or even twenty individuals.
It's always amusing to see folks generalize from their one dog while ignoring statistics, breed experts, breed history, and hundreds of years of genetic selection.
With N large, there are almost always a few exceptions to the rule. Unfortunately, the 'nice' pits are not sought out for breeding, and American Staffordshire terriers, which are supposed to be 'nicefied' pits are often very dog aggressive.
Vicki Hearne used to say that ''the really good ones [american pitbull terriers] simply don't want a 'scrap with any old dog'; the good ones will only respond and fight when presented with a worthy opponent.'' and that if trained [well], that ''deep gameness could be channelled into great work''. [that has certainly been my own personal experience too with this breed, or any motivated breed, over the past 28+ years].
she went on further to say that this stability has been ruined and bred out/diluted for the most part in this breed.
-(personal communication, 1991)
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