BRITAIN'S UNWANTED PETS - PANORAMA-BBC One, Monday 2nd August, 8.30 pm

z1985m

simontheiceman wrote: »

!!!!!! it; I have my weekly trip to the Borough kennels tomorrow. I may well get away without having to euthanase a single resident, and recently there have been fewer to kill. The problem lies with the complete lack of responsibility shown by a large number of dog owners. I'd love to say it was a very few, but with the kind of people I work with its commonplace. I see vast numbers of "serial puppy owners" who never manage to get a dog past a year of age. Once the "cute" has worn off they want a new one, sign the older dog over to the kennels and go and get one. What gets me is that these people are all on benifits (misspelling deliberate) and can manage to find £300 for a new Staffie cross but not enough love to keep it for more than a year. A good number go on to perhaps keep a !!!!! a bit longer to see if they can make some money from breeding, but as I am sure you are all aware there is sod all profit in dog breeding and a lot of graft (they work this out a bit late; unfortunately). Since when did a Staffie cross puppy cost more than £50 anyway? We need full traceability and soon. I know the responsible will hate it but thats just tough - we have to do somehting mroe than we are doing right now. The Dangerous dogs act needs action and that WILL happen so lets get this sorted as well.

my brother in law is a serial dog/puppy owner. (german shepards)

first dog from the shelter, it was a year old, they got it neutered and said it 'changed' then got it put down.

they'd got another puppy(dog number 2) while the 1st one was still alive.

they bought us a puppy for my fiance christmas, despite the fact they never asked us and my fiance was going to iraq for 6 months! i was livid, no sane person would do that! we wanted a dog, but i didn't want a german shepard, no offence to them just not my sort of dog so we had to keep it for a week or two till we found it a new home - a very nice home and it's someone my fiance has known for a long time, already has a couple and is very wealthy so we know the dog will have a good life - but that situation should never have occurred! (still makes me angry thinking bout it)

he had another dog for a while, no idea where he got it from cos he can't seem to tell the truth, he decided to breed his dog with this random dog. his !!!!! had pups, sold them off, kept one for a while, got rid of it. (purely for money, think it was more his gf, think all she could see were £££, pretty sure he had to sell them off much cheaper than they had planned, he also tried to say they were kennel club n tried to forge certificate, but we talked him out of it and told him it was most probably fraud or so to do that)

had another random puppy for a while, dunno where that went.

Lost his house, moved into temp house not supposed to have animals,still has dog number 2, having problems with his fiance, buys another pup with money ment for soething else. they break up, she's had enough (they have a baby and he's more interested in his dogs) he gets rid of the pup.

still has dog number 2.

all of this within about 3 years

i'm sure there will be another puppy soon. theres no telling him though. no idea whats going through his head. we're having other problems with him lately, but thats for another topic!

oh, and we did get our own dog, a sheltie and got another one as a companion 6 months later. i feel now that we got them a bit too close together cos they drove us mad as puppys! (still do now!) they seem to be like little kids egging each other on to do badness! their slowly calming down and we love them so much, could never ever give them up, it would kill me if we ever had to (can't think of any reason why we would have to)

Ninasmum

That show was heartbreaking. I was so upset I barely slept. Poor little dogs. I gave my girlies a big hug today. My older girl is 7 and the pup just 5 months. They are both GSDs and have been very carefully raised. Both attend doggie training class, and are excellent in strange situations and with other dogs. It takes work and costs money- probably about as much as many people pay for their dog in the first place, but I believe it is an essential investment.

Good breeders should stay in touch with the dogs they breed and be willing to assist in the rehoming of them in future should that be necessary. I am in regularly contact with the breeder of my girls, she is always there to give help and advice, and I genuinely believe that if I were completely unable to care for them any longer, she would be able to help me rehome them.

I can't believe anyone could give up a dog easily. The thought of losing my two is unbearable. They are like furry children and unless something terrible and unforseen happens to me and my family they will be here with me until the day they die.

The guy with Brandy did say he could feel him growling through the lead and the other dog certainly seemed to back off a bit. It's very sad and he looked such a sweet dog with people, but I have some sympathy for Battersea- with so many dogs, if they rehomed one that killed another or injured someone the public outcry could be really damaging to the prospects of the ones they are still caring for.

buddys_mum

nikki702 wrote: »

http://www.battersea.org.uk/about_us/whats_new/panorama_programme.html

"In the case of Brandy, the Staffordshire Bull Terrier shown on tonight’s Panorama programme, Battersea’s team of behavourists carried out extensive assessment, behavioural work and reassessment of the dog over a period of time. The programme shows only a snapshot of this work done to help this dog and does not detail any of the more obvious signs of real and consistent aggression shown by Brandy towards other dogs"

I agree, this was only a snapshot of the dog, also as they stated they are responsible for the dog. If he were to be rehomed and then bit someone or something who would the public be looking to blame?

hethmar

CFC wrote: »

hethmar, why not the neutering of females instead of males? It's the girls that have the babies!

For one thing, a warden could see immediately if neutering had been complied with in a male. Secondly males tend to be the sex of choice for the underclass, who wouldnt want one with no balls, And thirdly, it costs a lot less and is a less dangerous operation.

twinklie

Kimberley wrote: »

There should be compulsary neuturing of all Pups and Kittens by 6 months of age unless the pups/kittens are born at proper registered breeders who want to keep the pups/kittens as future breeders.

The problem with that is you could cause a lot of damage to a large breed dog neutering so young. For instance my DDB b1tch will not be spayed until she's has her first season because the lack of hormones caused by doing it so young can cause damage. Don't get me wrong, we will NOT be breeding from her and she shall be spayed at the earliest opportunity after her first season.

hethmar

TBH, in retrospect, I think Battersea had a lot of guts allowing Panorama in and I do applaud them. No good pretending that every little mutt is found a good home for life - they did tell it how it is.

hethmar

twinklie wrote: »

The problem with that is you could cause a lot of damage to a large breed dog neutering so young. For instance my DDB b1tch will not be spayed until she's has her first season because the lack of hormones caused by doing it so young can cause damage. Don't get me wrong, we will NOT be breeding from her and she shall be spayed at the earliest opportunity after her first season.

Twinks appreciate this BUT on balance, I still think the best idea so far is to not allow any dogs to be bred unless a registered and approved breeder has paid a hefty amount for a yearly licence which can be revoked and that pays for random inspections to be made on their premises.

Youdontseeme

It was a rather heartbreaking watch, I am not a huge fan of staffies, although I do not have that much experience of them, I know there are people who love them.

It was shame to see this program seemed to only concentrate on the "fighting" breeds as the amount of other dogs in rescue is huge, I guess in the end these breeds are harder to re-home. I'm not sure if they mentioned it last night but I would be interested in finding out how many of those dogs killed are staffie types.

I have no idea what the solution is, I think there is might be a way of linking chipping with licensing, although I am not sure how it would work!

In my head it’s something along the lines of all puppies being chipped, then every year or 2 years, the chip/license is renewed for free unless there are any changes (if you have the same dog to 10 years and live in the same place = no fee), this would have to confirm the present owners name and address.

Then police / dog wardens etc could have a scanner ( I am presuming it’s possible to get a hand held one? chips weren't really a big issue when I had my last dog) and stop any dog for any reason, if a dog is found to be unchipped or have out of date information then I am afraid the dog would be put down:(

Owners of staffie / staffie type dogs (there is a whole other problem there!) unless registered breeders would have to get them neutered, this information should also be on the chip.

Again owners not complying would have their dogs PTS.
I am sure there are flaws in this system and please feel free to point them out!

Personally I would rather put the bad owners to sleep but I think we will need serious legislation for that!

evilmonkeychops

I have been training dogs for more than 30 years, both on a one to one basis and in a group setting. In recent years there has been no breed of dog to rival the Staffordshier Bull Terrier for dog aggression in my experience.
They problem with staffies is that they can change from friendly to aggressive in a split second and before you know it they have got hold of another dog-and they dont like letting go.
They do not give the normal warning that most other dogs give-there is usually just a slight stiffeneing of their body. All three of my dogs (lab and 2 springers) have ben attacked by staffies and one was very seriously hurt and had many stitches.
There have also been incidents at training classes that we run and we have had 2 different dogs badly bitten by staffs.
We are now extremely careful about taking on staffs into group work due to their unpredictability.
I dont know what it is that makes staffs like this-maybe their fighting past? (as they were developed as a fighting breed) While i do think that they are generally ok with people, they are an absolute liability around other dogs.
Please bear in mind that my comments are based on experience gained over many years -they are not just based on a few random incidents. My main job involves working with dogs and i do training part time.

cyberbob

twinklie wrote: »

The problem with that is you could cause a lot of damage to a large breed dog neutering so young. For instance my DDB b1tch will not be spayed until she's has her first season because the lack of hormones caused by doing it so young can cause damage. Don't get me wrong, we will NOT be breeding from her and she shall be spayed at the earliest opportunity after her first season.

I'm afraid there is quite a bit of debate about if that is correct or not. It all depends on which vet you talk to. So it's better to speak to more than one qualified source before you make up your mind to wait his long

Lack of hormones can't cause damage. They can stop the Vulva forming correctly. Personally I have always had my !b1tcheses spayed about 9 - 10 months with no problems.

The risk of Mammary Tumours is higher in b1tches who wait until after their first season to be spayed

It's better though to consult more than one vet or professional before making the decision.