I have had to break up a few very serious dog fights.

The first was at a dog kennel. I was a young teenager that was doing weekend cleaning/feeding/exercising on a day the place was closed, so I was the only one there. This place had a policy that if two or three dogs came from the same home, and the owner specifically requested it, the dogs could be housed in a larger run (10x15). In this case it was a Pit and a Lab. The owner later admitted that they occasionally got in fights at home, but never a really big deal. In a kennel situation though the emotions and stimulations were higher.

The Lab was barking at a crazy BC that was barking at her from across the way. The Pit decided that there was too much excitement going on (if you have ever been to or worked at a kennel when everybody is getting fed or exercised, you will know what I am talking about when I say excitement&hellip. She jumped on the Lab and it was on! I was 20 feet away when it happened and was slow to react since a)they would most likely stop in a second, b)they were big, strong dogs and I was alone, and c)I didn’t know them very well at all and whether they would likely redirect. Well they didn’t stop, and now there was blood everywhere. I had to do something… I made sure all other dogs were locked up first, and then grabbed the hose. Spraying them had zero effect and from outside a chain link fence I could not get a very good shot.

I ran in to the office and got the can of pepper spray. Even shooting it in their eyes and mouth didn’t work… I called the kennel owner who told me to call the police (I did) and to NOT go in the run under any circumstances! But as a 16 year old animal lover, I couldn’t wait and watch the dogs kill each other in front of me… I opened the gate and grabbed the first leg I could reach without going all the way in and pulled it as far out of the kennel door as I could. I squeezed the dog out of the partially closed gate and when I was at the point where the dogs were attached, I slammed the gate over them while spraying the water straight into the nose of the dog in the kennel. I got them separated and locked the gate. Luckily the dog was more interested in the one still in the kennel and I was able to snare (with a pole) the dog and start to drag it to the exercise run. The cops showed up and one took the Lab to the vet and another took the Pit, to a different vet. The pit lost an eye and the Lab had to have a tube to breathe from all the swelling to the neck…

A second fight was in my living room, again with me alone. I had a foster Malamute in a crate and my 18 month old Rott. They were always separated and rotated out of the crates. It was the Rott’s turn out and he was playing with a rope bone by tossing it around and up in the air. He tossed it up and over towards the crate of the Mal that was really behaving quite relaxed. When the pup went to get his toy, he stopped to sniff the Mal. They had sniffed through the crate a bunch of times and I was even thinking of introducing them in the next week. In a half a second the Mal was up and grabbed the pups lip through the crate wires and wouldn’t let go. They were pulling in opposite directions and I thought I was going to watch my pups lip get pulled off. I couldn’t pull the Rott, and couldn’t reach the Mal to do anything.

I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a gallon of milk (the only large amount of any liquid I had) and dumped it on their faces, but it did nothing. All of a sudden, the Mal moved in just the right way that the crate flipped onto it’s side, the door pins dropped down and the door fell open. The Mal was out and on the pup in a heartbeat! He didn’t have a collar on since he had been in the crate, so it was impossible to grab him or do anything. I was not physically strong enough to anything with 230lbs of fighting dog anyway… Again the pepper spray did nothing to these dogs, and if my gun had been loaded you bet your ass I would have grabbed it and shot the Mal in a heartbeat. I ended up doing what was successful before. I dragged both dogs to the bathroom and shoved the Mal inside. I closed the door on them and gouged the Mal in the eye until it released my pup and got a arm full of teeth for it. I grabbed the pup’s collar and yanked him out and slammed the door. I could do nothing more than collapse on the couch for a good five minutes. I had two fingers sliced up, compression bruises on my arm and was close to having a heart attack. Both dogs were beat up, and my pup had all the hair scraped off his upper lip on his left side. It eventually grew back, but there were always a bunch of white hairs that reminded me of that day.

One more happened with the same Rott (three years later) and a Lab. We had gone for a seven mile run and were walking home. While on the sidewalk in front of the house next door, the lad broke through a screen door and just attacked. No bark, no growl, nothing… Quinn kept pinning the dog and trying to walk away, but the Lab would just come back for more, over and over. Eventually my yelling got the owner to come out and we tried the wheel barrel technique, but as we were pulling them apart, the Lab grabbed Quinn’s leash, Attached to a prong, and would not let go. Poor Quinn was being pronged/choked and the other owner was too tired to keep pulling. She let go and the Lab was on him again! Finally I had a neighbor that came out grab Quinn’s collar, and the Lab’s owner grab her dog’s collar and told Quinn to out. He did (poor guy was already exhausted&hellip and while the Lab was holding his neck, I put the hose down his throat and sprayed. It all happened pretty simultaneously and it worked! The Lab was dragged away still trying to get back at Quinn and Quinn was just sitting there getting loved on by my neighbor and drinking it all in. He had an ear hematoma and multiple punctures and the Lab had to have 20 stitches on his head and neck. The Lab’s owner had to have 15 stitches on her arm from her dog redirecting on her and I had two punctures on my right hand.

Again, I would have had zero qualms about shooting that Lab in a heartbeat had I been armed at the time. Fortunately I owned that house and the Lab’s owner was my tenant… The dog was no longer an issue within 30 days…

There have been others, and Rob has a few to share as well as a police officer, but I think we have taken up enough board space on this thread

Off topic: I really feel bad for most the dogs that were involved in dog fights. Like Jessica's pup, was he ok post? I know one of mine that was involved in a fight is over the top anxious around dogs he doesn't know now. His body language is now so 'abnormal' that it seems to draw unwanted dog attention to him. And then the situation becomes more complicated. I'm probably not explaining this well, but that is really hard if not impossible to undo.

Back on topic: if there are other dogs in the vicinity get them out or the pile may grow.