Hello list members, I am emptying my mind (this won't take long! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> ) on a subject that troubles me deeply. I am new to the list, so I hope this topic is appropriate,, I'm sure a version of this has been discussed before. Am not sure if you have heard about the incident where a male, intact rottie attacked and killed the granddaughter of the dog owner (female) while walking in Northern Calif. The female owner had two dogs with her, both finished AKC champions, with obedience training, no titles that I could see. The male is a stud dog, also has only changed hands once, from breeder, to owner. Dog is 7 years old. The owner and her two grandchildren were walking, the dogs were off leash. A large lizard ran over the younger girl's foot, she bagan screaming and jumping up and down. The male attacked immediately, the owner could not get the dog off, she evidently is physically compromised with prior back surgeries. This is info I've received second hand, am not sure of the facts here. Supposedly there is no prior history, but rumor has it that the female owner has been bitten by this dog before, nothing serious. I know it is perhaps not appropriate to discusss this without the facts. What I would like to discuss is dealing with intact males, especially breeding males, and prey drive. I am an Animal Control officer and supervisor for a city of 80000 in Southern California. I have to decide which dog needs potentially dangerous restrictions and which don't. I don't have that much of a problem with that, there usually is a pre history of problems, and an inabilty to deal with those problems, causing inappropriate behavior in a dog, which, if someone else's hands, could be a decent member of dog society! That said,,,, let me say I also have three rotts of my own, have minor accomplishments in obedience, herding, and cart driving. This latest attack is from a dog supposedly well socialized, some obedience training, and interacting in public routinely, appearing to be under control. What happened here? My gut feeling is that these people have failed to deal with control an intense prey drive response. I would be willing to bet that it had been triggered before and couldn't be stopped. I have great respect for the information available on this list. I can tell you that if I want my dogs to cease alerting, or attempting to chase anything, cats or otherwise, they had better stop or I will cause them "great bodily harm." My dogs live with a cat, and grouchy chihuahua, no blood spilled here. No one is cordoned off. What are other people doing/or not doing that opens the door for this? I think if you aren't willing to get into physical correction to stop a dog from this, you have too much dog for your personality. Am I barking up the wrong tree ( had to put that in!!) ? Also I don't understand the difference in the difficulty of training an intact dog, vs neutered. All mine have been neutered. So have not had hands on experience with intact dogs. I feel they are most responsible for the serious attacks, and having to impound intact males, loose, guarding a female in heat, is a little more demanding, than if that male was loose at home!!! Sorry this is so long. Susan

I believe I read somewhere once that the majority of reported bite incidents are from intact males between the ages of 1 and 5. Am I correct?

Of course many are probably irresponsible owners who minimally supervise their dog's interaction with people, particularly children. Children are most often bitten.

Any dog can bite though. I myself have been bitten by a fearful, nervous, neutered rott and a kamikaze spayed dominatrix type toy poodle bitch. You just never know.

P.S. That toy poodle was one dog to be reckoned with. She used to terrorize the neighbourhood kids when we were on our way to elementary school and the idiot boy who lived in the house used to "sic" her on all the girls.

I dont have an answer for you and I am not sure on the statistics of neuter/intact bites or anything- my only input is that if you are not physically strong enough to restrain and regain control of your dog then you have no business owning that breed. You would not let a 7 yo take an adult GSD on a walk by themselves no matter how well trained, becuase if, the unthinkable occurs that childs would not be able to stop that dog. And that is sort of what happened in this horrible case- the owner was unable to stop the dog, be it by pulling the dog off, kicking, punching whatever had to be done to get that dog off, she could not do it, but had that woman been physically able to stop that dog, that child may still be alive. And thats a crime.

My dog has never attacked anyone, outside of training, but if she did I would be able to get her off, if it means picking her up, or pulling her ears or whatever it took. As harsh as it may sound, I would kill my dog before allowing her to kill a child, if it means taking a rock and breaking her head open. And if you cant do that, get a goldfish.

Wow I did not now I felt so strongly about this. I guess I am just sick of the dog getting blamed. Yeah some of it is the dog, but more often than not it is an irresposible owner. Okay I am done now-

Welcome to the board.

GSDSAR wrote:

My dog has never attacked anyone, outside of training, but if she did I would be able to get her off, if it means
picking her up, or pulling her ears or whatever it took. As harsh as it may sound, I would kill my dog before
allowing her to kill a child, if it means taking a rock and breaking her head open. And if you cant do that, get a
goldfish.

Wow I did not now I felt so strongly about this

I agree, the lack of physical ability of the owner allowed this to continue, but what about calling off the attack? Shouldn't some sort of prey trigger be set up as part of routine training, then try to keen the dog up, then call it off, so you know you can stop it when it begins. I do something similar to this in cart drive training and something similar in sheep herding. There is no chasing cats, or other loose dogs allowed (especially small vocal ones), even when we are being pursued!!! They may alert, but then a verbal correction is inserted firmly, with the ability to immediately follow up with physical correction if needed, and yes, that includes whatever needed to get the dog to stop and listen to me. Are we just a different personality that we can square off with a dog and be determined to win? Where have these other owners gone wrong that they can't stop their dogs?

Irresponsible, or perhaps well-meaning but uninformed people getting the wrong breed of dog for their personality, lifestlye, or physical capabilities.

Happens all the time. But many people will never change.

Nice post Vancamp.

GSDSAR wrote:
And the
fact the at least my dog knows the difference between a screaming kid and a furry chasable thing.

That's the other thing I wonder about,,, I can't picture my dogs doing something like this, but that inablilty to do so opens the door for disaster, right? I hope my dogs know the difference, but how do I know? Did these people have any signs in advance that this dog would go into serious attack mode based on this child's activity? I know when my dog is alerting on something, showing an interest to chase, that may result in biting. After all, I had to cat "break" my dogs. But I have not had the chance to set up a scenario with a child screaming and with a lizard running up her leg! I want to try to understand why this male dog thought he had to seriously attack in this situation. I think that perhaps he had gotten away with attacking smaller things before, and wasn't stopped. I have desensitized my dogs to children on skateboards, but have not had alerts on any other situations involving children. Could this dog have shown no previous alert on children and acted like this? Is it the male intact dog that is more prone to reacting so aggressively in related situations? Susan

Greetings all, I have to respond by saying nothing like that should of NEVER happened in the first place. My rottie is a intact male is 12mo. old, big boned 100lb.in great phyiscal shape. I have a 15mo. old little girl that my male is around all the time. Let me say i know this dog like i do myself but, every-time he is around my daughter he could care less but he is on leash everytime! Even at this age he will protect her with his life. Its not that i dont trust my dog, i just dont want anything to happen. People must have there dogs off leash which i do not agree because lots of things can trigger there prey drives. I must agree that if you cannot or not willing to control a rottie you have no buisness owning the breed. I have a countless hours training my boy correctly and having him a well socialiced behaved dog that will work himself till he drops for you. It makes all of us look bad because of happings like this. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />