Marty
06-22-2005, 09:39 PM
Hamilton, MT -- by GREG LEMON - Ravalli Republic
Rocky sits on command, speaks, rolls over, and loves to lick.
"He's part of our family," said Rocky's owner, Mike Conway of Darby. "He's one of the kids."
Conway lives in Darby with his fiancée, Rene Bradford and their four children. Rocky is one of Conway's three pit bulls. The couple also owns a chow.
But the pit bulls' existence in Darby could be in jeopardy.
Last week, the Darby Town Council passed the first reading of an ordinance that would ban pit bulls from the city limits.
The ordinance was requested by Darby Marshall Larry Rose in response to what he sees as a growing public safety problem. The number of complaints about pit bulls is on the rise, he said.
"We've got a liability situation," Rose said. "We need to do something."
Last month, he sent a letter to the town council outlining four incidents he's documented since January involving pit bulls.
The fourth incident happened in May when three pit bulls and a chow broke into a neighbor's fenced yard and attacked and killed a Jack Russell Terrier, according to Rose's letter.
The pit bulls accused of the crime are Conway's and the Jack Russell Terrier belonged to Chris Lewis, who also owns a pit bull, Maggie.
Lewis didn't file charges or call the police over the incident, but still Rose cited Conway with three vicious dog citations and served Lewis with a search warrant to exhume her buried terrier. Rose needed pictures for evidence. The vicious dog citations are being processed through justice court.
In the past, any problem with pit bulls in Darby has been taken care of promptly by the dog's owner, Conway said.
"I just don't think it's fair to pick on pit bulls because of their reputation," Lewis said.
Nationally other communities, like Denver, and even entire states, like Ohio, have passed ordinances banning pit bulls and other dogs.
Such laws are called breed specific legislation and are extremely controversial.
Adrien Zubrin, an animal behavior specialist in Washington, D.C. feels the responsibility needs to be placed on the pet owners and dog breeders, not the breeds themselves.
"Dogs are the most messed with species of any on the planet," she said.
Pit bulls are descended from Staffordshire Bull Terriers, which originated in Britain, Zubrin said.
These dogs come from cross breeding bull dogs with various terriers. The Staffordshire Bull Terriers were initially bred for bull-baiting, a long-since outlawed sport which pitted a dog versus a bull staked to the ground.
When bull baiting was outlawed, the Staffordshire Bull Terrier made its way to America, where breeders worked to increase its size and eventually developed a new breed, the American Staffordshire Terrier, she said.
"They didn't breed them for killing," Zubrin said.
But that changed when dog fighting became popular. The strong, courageous, and loyal breed was selectively bred for pit fighting, she said. Breeders would pair up the aggressive animals and weed out the gentle dogs. The result was the American Pit Bull, Zubrin said.
"You can select out the nice sweet dogs and breed only dogs that should never be bred and then do nothing to socialize them," she said. "That's what has happened with the so-called pit bull."
She describes both breeds of Staffordshire terriers as wonderful, proud and athletic.
"This is a dog that is not inherently dangerous," Zubrin said.
The same now holds true with the American Pit Bull, because responsible breeders have been working to breed the aggression back out of the dogs, she said.
"This dog is not hard-wired to kill," Zubrin said. "It was, but it is no longer."
A dog's disposition is a combination of nature and nurture, she said.
Combining a breed with the genetic disposition to be protective and aggressive with an ignorant or violent owner will likely result in a vicious dog, she said.
But if you take that same dog and give it to an owner who socializes it properly by exposing it from a young age to a wide range of experiences, people and other dogs, you would have a dog that displays all the best traits of the breed, Zubrin said.
And it's the same with any kind of dog.
If you chained up a golden retriever, paid no attention to it and didn't expose it to any other people or dogs, you would have a vicious dog, she said.
The problem is the pit bull breed has been so manipulated over the years, that people often don't know what characteristics are in the dog's blood lines.
"That's the unknown factor and that's why this poor breed is so maligned," Zubrin said.
Conway's dog, Rocky has champions in his bloodline.
Conway, who has bred pit bulls for several years, said Rocky is nearly three and is a prize winning dog. Conway's taken the precautions Zubrin recommends and Rocky's bloodlines are documented and papered by the United Kennel Club, Conway said.
"I breed my dogs to better the breed," he said. "I'll actually screen people before I sell them a puppy."
His other two pit bulls are females and one is currently pregnant with her first litter.
Conway has sold about 100 pit bull puppies over the years, and he's frustrated with the stereotyping that follows the entire breed. They simply are not mean dogs naturally, he said. They really aren't any different than Labrador retrievers or any other popular dog.
"The biggest thing I don't like about the whole thing is my dogs have never bit anybody," Conway said.
And that's the problem with breed specific legislation, said Stephanie Shain, director of outreach for the Humane Society of the United States. It doesn't account for animals that have been properly raised.
"What we see are that pit bulls tend to make the news more often than other breeds of dogs," Shain said.
When a dog of a specific breed creates a problem, they can become the focus of legislation in the name of public safety.
"There's this knee-jerk response by the community to say let's ban that kind of dog," she said.
But given time, the communities she's worked with realize they have nothing against a breed, they simply don't like mean dogs. Breed specific legislation might alleviate some mean dogs, but it never gets them all.
"They just give you a false sense of security," Shain said.
What she sees nationally are trends in dog ownership - people who keep dogs for the wrong reason. These people keep a pit bull or rottweiler or German shepherd to appear tough.
"They don't have a dog to be their companion or their pet," she said. "You can ban pit bulls, but you're not going to stop these people who keep dogs for the wrong reasons."
Laws really need to focus on responsible pet ownership, Shain said.
For Cherie Graves, president of Responsible Dog Owners of the Western States, putting the burden of animal behavior on the dog owner is the only way to address the public safety issue.
Graves' organization campaigns against breed specific legislation around the county.
"We fight for people's rights to own their dogs responsibly," she said.
The right to own a pet - just like the right to own property - is protected by the U.S. Constitution, Graves said.
"Our rights come with the equal burden of responsibility," she said. "The dog owner must bare the liability across the board."
Rocky sits on command, speaks, rolls over, and loves to lick.
"He's part of our family," said Rocky's owner, Mike Conway of Darby. "He's one of the kids."
Conway lives in Darby with his fiancée, Rene Bradford and their four children. Rocky is one of Conway's three pit bulls. The couple also owns a chow.
But the pit bulls' existence in Darby could be in jeopardy.
Last week, the Darby Town Council passed the first reading of an ordinance that would ban pit bulls from the city limits.
The ordinance was requested by Darby Marshall Larry Rose in response to what he sees as a growing public safety problem. The number of complaints about pit bulls is on the rise, he said.
"We've got a liability situation," Rose said. "We need to do something."
Last month, he sent a letter to the town council outlining four incidents he's documented since January involving pit bulls.
The fourth incident happened in May when three pit bulls and a chow broke into a neighbor's fenced yard and attacked and killed a Jack Russell Terrier, according to Rose's letter.
The pit bulls accused of the crime are Conway's and the Jack Russell Terrier belonged to Chris Lewis, who also owns a pit bull, Maggie.
Lewis didn't file charges or call the police over the incident, but still Rose cited Conway with three vicious dog citations and served Lewis with a search warrant to exhume her buried terrier. Rose needed pictures for evidence. The vicious dog citations are being processed through justice court.
In the past, any problem with pit bulls in Darby has been taken care of promptly by the dog's owner, Conway said.
"I just don't think it's fair to pick on pit bulls because of their reputation," Lewis said.
Nationally other communities, like Denver, and even entire states, like Ohio, have passed ordinances banning pit bulls and other dogs.
Such laws are called breed specific legislation and are extremely controversial.
Adrien Zubrin, an animal behavior specialist in Washington, D.C. feels the responsibility needs to be placed on the pet owners and dog breeders, not the breeds themselves.
"Dogs are the most messed with species of any on the planet," she said.
Pit bulls are descended from Staffordshire Bull Terriers, which originated in Britain, Zubrin said.
These dogs come from cross breeding bull dogs with various terriers. The Staffordshire Bull Terriers were initially bred for bull-baiting, a long-since outlawed sport which pitted a dog versus a bull staked to the ground.
When bull baiting was outlawed, the Staffordshire Bull Terrier made its way to America, where breeders worked to increase its size and eventually developed a new breed, the American Staffordshire Terrier, she said.
"They didn't breed them for killing," Zubrin said.
But that changed when dog fighting became popular. The strong, courageous, and loyal breed was selectively bred for pit fighting, she said. Breeders would pair up the aggressive animals and weed out the gentle dogs. The result was the American Pit Bull, Zubrin said.
"You can select out the nice sweet dogs and breed only dogs that should never be bred and then do nothing to socialize them," she said. "That's what has happened with the so-called pit bull."
She describes both breeds of Staffordshire terriers as wonderful, proud and athletic.
"This is a dog that is not inherently dangerous," Zubrin said.
The same now holds true with the American Pit Bull, because responsible breeders have been working to breed the aggression back out of the dogs, she said.
"This dog is not hard-wired to kill," Zubrin said. "It was, but it is no longer."
A dog's disposition is a combination of nature and nurture, she said.
Combining a breed with the genetic disposition to be protective and aggressive with an ignorant or violent owner will likely result in a vicious dog, she said.
But if you take that same dog and give it to an owner who socializes it properly by exposing it from a young age to a wide range of experiences, people and other dogs, you would have a dog that displays all the best traits of the breed, Zubrin said.
And it's the same with any kind of dog.
If you chained up a golden retriever, paid no attention to it and didn't expose it to any other people or dogs, you would have a vicious dog, she said.
The problem is the pit bull breed has been so manipulated over the years, that people often don't know what characteristics are in the dog's blood lines.
"That's the unknown factor and that's why this poor breed is so maligned," Zubrin said.
Conway's dog, Rocky has champions in his bloodline.
Conway, who has bred pit bulls for several years, said Rocky is nearly three and is a prize winning dog. Conway's taken the precautions Zubrin recommends and Rocky's bloodlines are documented and papered by the United Kennel Club, Conway said.
"I breed my dogs to better the breed," he said. "I'll actually screen people before I sell them a puppy."
His other two pit bulls are females and one is currently pregnant with her first litter.
Conway has sold about 100 pit bull puppies over the years, and he's frustrated with the stereotyping that follows the entire breed. They simply are not mean dogs naturally, he said. They really aren't any different than Labrador retrievers or any other popular dog.
"The biggest thing I don't like about the whole thing is my dogs have never bit anybody," Conway said.
And that's the problem with breed specific legislation, said Stephanie Shain, director of outreach for the Humane Society of the United States. It doesn't account for animals that have been properly raised.
"What we see are that pit bulls tend to make the news more often than other breeds of dogs," Shain said.
When a dog of a specific breed creates a problem, they can become the focus of legislation in the name of public safety.
"There's this knee-jerk response by the community to say let's ban that kind of dog," she said.
But given time, the communities she's worked with realize they have nothing against a breed, they simply don't like mean dogs. Breed specific legislation might alleviate some mean dogs, but it never gets them all.
"They just give you a false sense of security," Shain said.
What she sees nationally are trends in dog ownership - people who keep dogs for the wrong reason. These people keep a pit bull or rottweiler or German shepherd to appear tough.
"They don't have a dog to be their companion or their pet," she said. "You can ban pit bulls, but you're not going to stop these people who keep dogs for the wrong reasons."
Laws really need to focus on responsible pet ownership, Shain said.
For Cherie Graves, president of Responsible Dog Owners of the Western States, putting the burden of animal behavior on the dog owner is the only way to address the public safety issue.
Graves' organization campaigns against breed specific legislation around the county.
"We fight for people's rights to own their dogs responsibly," she said.
The right to own a pet - just like the right to own property - is protected by the U.S. Constitution, Graves said.
"Our rights come with the equal burden of responsibility," she said. "The dog owner must bare the liability across the board."