Breeding out DA

I think to an extent, the pit bull breed has been watered down to the point where in most you wont see any DA. I mean, the amount of BYBers in this breed is way more than a good majority of the other breeds out there. Many people breed for pet quality and I have to admit, most of the pit bulls I have meet in my life were all very dog friendly. Take Kai for example. He loves being around dogs, just loves them. He doesn't have that typical pit bull fire though. That intensity and confidence that is typical of this breed that gives them that "I can do everything" air. Dogs with that fire tend to be less forgiving of dogs as well as way more challenging towards them.

I highly doubt anyone would have success in putting together a pack of game line APBTs.

Hopefully your luck continues!

My very same sex dog aggressive dog was extremely well trained, well socialized and an all around wonderful dog. She went to doggy daycare with me every day for years, shows, trials, pet expos, friend's houses, etc, etc, etc. She still wanted to kill other girls she lived with, it was just her temperament and had very little to do with her relationship with me.

QFT!!! Excellent post.

This. Don't mess around with a breed just because it has a trait you don't like!!

I do agree that BYB "lines" are probably less DA than true working lines, at least as far as my breed goes. People who have a pack of happy-go-lucky dogs aren't breeding top-notch animals. Its how all those "oops" breedings happen. I remember going on the Muggleston site (ugly, massive blue beasts) and seeing a pic of their dogs in a tie while other dogs ran all around them. That's a selling point for some people, that they don't have to give any thought to their dogs, just throw them all together. I like a challenge. My dogs challenge me and I challenge them right back.

If you don't like drive, if you can't handle that spark, I sincerely hope you aren't breeding my breed.

DA is not the problem here. The biggest problem with pit bulls is their numbers. That is what makes them different from any other DA breed. Everyone and their brother have a pit bull. Everyone and their brother can afford a pit bull. It isn't hard to look through the newspaper and find $100-$200 dollar pit bull pupppies, and that is sad. Unlike other complicated breeds whose breeders have a firm hand on their puppies and breed for consistent traits, most pit bull breeders are BYBers who give puppies to anyone with money in their pockets, and breed for pets, guard dogs, fighting dogs, etc. Can you imagine if Akitas, Filas, or Malinois was as mishandled as APBTS are. There would be a state wide ban, no question about that! Atleast pit bulls are generally a human friendly breed, thank god for that.

I mean, what is the most damaging to the breed isn't being DA, it is how they fight. How they typically grab on and can hold on no matter what is being done to them. A dog attacking your dog is scary. A pit bull attacking your dog is horrifying. The grab and hold method causes much more damage than a normal bite and slash that dogs typically do. Just the other day I was reading how a person 4 month old golden retriever puppy had one of its leg broken in a pit bull attack that last in what seems like seconds. Nowadays, something like a dog-on-dog attack is enough to bring BSL knocking on the county door. And it is not like pit bulls are the only ones attacking other dogs. Unforunatly, they are the only breed that brings up the question "shouldn't those dogs be banned?"

Pit Bulls don't attack more people than other breeds. If you look at bite statistics by breed, pit bulls usually aren't on the list. It is how they hold on when they are attacking people, is why more people are killed or seriously injured in their attacks, and that means more publicity. Does that mean people must now try to breed pit bulls that don't bite and hold. Of course not. That would be impossible or the breed would have to be seriously mixed up before that could happen. The breed wouldn't be the same. So what then. There must be some kind of regulation place on the breed. Oh that horrrible dreaded word. Regulation is what no dog owner want to hear, but sometimes that is the only option. Regulation on breeding, regulation on ownership, I don't know, but something MUST be done. As much as I wish it wasn't true, something must done to get the number of pit bulls being breed down. Something must be done to stop these dogs from getting into the wrong hands. If not, more places will continue to ban pit bulls. If you don't want to change the breed, than you must change the people.

How they hold is a terrier thing. Its not specific to pitbulls. Now most terriers are much smaller. And its easier to choke a dog off when its small. BUT I just wanted to point out its not like they are special or unique in their fighting style.

And to me the damage isn't done in the bite and hold. Its the bite hold/shake cycle that does real damage.

Yes, they aren't the only breed to do the bite and hold method. Forunatly for the other breeds who do display that trait, they are not as irresponsbly owned as pit bulls. And most terriers are small so most don't see them as a threat. When I say bite and hold method, I say it as a label. The bite hold/shake is including in there. One thing is for sure is that most dog owners wouldn't know what to do if their dog is being attack like that. Some people would try to pull their dogs lose, increasing the damage.

While I agree in many areas pitties have it bad. But as a JRT owner and someone who works in rescue I have to say its pretty bad with JRTs too. Yes they are small, but if the other animal is a cat, or other small dog the results can be devastating. I know people who have lost ends of fingers due to JRT fights.

DA is a serious issue when uninformed owners get a DA dog regardless of breed. JRTs have a horrible rep. Sure they aren't child eating pit bulls, but they ARE actually up there on the bite stats for biting people. So in some ways its worse.

JRTs may be up there in the bite statistics, you don't see places banning them left and right because of it. I'm not saying JRTs can't be dangerous, just compared to the size and strength of a pit bull, there is no comparison. Someone shared a sitaution where during a horse show a loose pit bull latch itself to a horse leg. The horse, of course, tried its best to shake the dog off but could not. People tried using high power water hose to shake this dog off, but again, it didn't work. It took a veterinarian coming in to put the dog alseep, then they were able to pry the dog off. The horse lost so much blood and the leg was so damage that the horse had to be put to sleep. Imagine what those horse people were thinking when they left that show.

Yes, DA is a serious problem for most people. Yes, other breeds attack other dogs. But like I said in my longer post, the APBT is one of the only breeds where, whenever a attack occur no matter if it is a person or a dog, the question of "shouldn't those dogs be banned" comes up. That is what makes the APBT different and their sitaution uncomparable to other similar breeds.

Its not just the banning, its the killing. And it has been mentioned before that they should be banned.

Once again its not just pitties. I was at a barn where a stray rottie (stray anything is pretty rare) attached itself to a horses nose and didn't let go (till it got hurt.. a nose is a dumb thing to grab on a horse)

I never said it wasn't bad for pit bulls. Cause it is, you can't even own one here. But its not like they are the only persecuted breed. They are not the only ones with a bad rap. Sometimes it seems like only pitties have it bad. And it over shadows things that other breeds have to deal with.

Like the whole biting and holding. New JRT owners are often shocked as they tend to think thats a pit bull (or vicious dog) thing, when in fact its a terrier thing. They then tend to look at their dogs like they are bad or something, get rid of them or put them down. So when you said that is peculiar to pit bulls I didn't want that stereotype to continue. JRTs do it too (as do other terriers) and there is nothing wrong or defective about terriers who do this.

In fact Clean Run had an article on tugging a while back that discussed how terriers bite and hold the tug toy really well. Its known in dog circles, but less in the pet ones.

I never said pit bulls were the only dogs who bite and hold, and if my post came off like that, then it wasn't intentional. It is more of a bull and terrier thing, since bulldogs had to hold on to the nose of the bull back in the days. Many breeds are also threaten by BSL, there is no denying that. I believe pit bulls have it worse in the United States at this time, followed by rottweilers.

My experience, personally, has been that after pit bull breeds, it's usually Chows. I'm sure it's different for various people, but I have met more people that are terrified of Chows than Rottweilers or Dobermans, etc.

Again, just an issue of, from what I can tell, people not understanding the breed and hearing stories they don't understand. Too many people relying on Chow looks to make a family dog, rather than temperament.
It seems to almost always come down to people being, well, stupid. And too lazy to do any research.

I've always felt that people should not dull down a breed because of something like DA. There are tons of dogs that even properly bred are wash outs and if someone wants a less intense pit bull type the shelters are full of them (and obviously intense ones too). You need to get educated on the breed you are bringing into your life and sharing it with and learn how to handle these dogs. There is nothing wrong about them. They just require a different kind of understanding than a non DA dog... and I suppose a different kind of commitment.

LOL So, who is this breeder? I know of very...very few APBT breeders whom I would consider "amazing" by any stretch of the imagination. I know even fewer who give a flying quart of hydrogenated wombat snot as to whether their dogs are going to be/stay friendly toward every other dog they meet, much less going so far as to legitimately believe that DA is a fault in the breed.

To answer the question posed in the OP, no, I don't think DA needs to be bred out of the APBT. Personally, I don't breed for it, but I certainly won't throw the proverbial baby out with the bath water because an APBT is DA. Even as a SHOW breeder, I expect owners of my puppies to understand and respect the history of the breed they own, and be prepared for the issue to come up at any time in their APBT's life. ANY time; our 13 year old bitch, Trouble, just decided one day within the past year or so that she hates Paige (who also happens to be her daughter, though of course that has zero to do with whether or not dogs are going to get along). The two can no longer be crated within so much as eye shot of each other.

I used to feel that way... before I had a lot of experience with truly, intensely DA dogs. It is unhealthy, imho. Dogs who will harm themselves trying to get at other dogs. They will wear their nails down to their quicks trying to dig out, break teeth trying to chew out, defy all restraints, to get to other dogs. It is dangerous in our society and requires immense care & responsibility that most dog owners can't live up to. I can't say I will ever want a dog like that and I'm a pretty dang responsible dog owner. I'm not implying that those dogs don't deserve to live, they can still be awesome loving pets. But if I were a breeder I would NEVER breed a dog who was dog aggressive. I know it can still pop up, but I do not feel that DA dogs need to be bred when there's plenty of dog friendly dogs who are just as drivey and amazing. Dog selective is not the same as dog aggressive.

I don't see how that is related at all to prey drive. That's like comparing dog aggression to human aggression.

But it doesn't need to be bred to that extent. I dont' think ANYONE is saying breed dogs that are so uncomfortable in the presence of other dogs they can't function. No that is not healthy.

DA is a sliding scale. Breeding extremes in these breeds is not good. And I don't think anyone is breeding FOR DA. Just that if it pops up in lines its a by product of breeding tenacious dogs with loads of drive.

That level of dog aggression is such an extreme rarity that I'm not even sure why it's being used as an argument for breeders to make a concentrated effort to breed out DA.

I completely agree.

I prefer a less aggressive apbt. I like a dog that can coexist with other dogs peacefully supervised. I want a dog that can perform in a sport/work without being overly distracted by other dogs.

I however plan to adult elder pet pit bull rescues so I have nothing to do with the breeding of the breed.

As for my malinois I won't breed a dog with overt DA, I need a dog to function well around other dogs, no matter the source or origin of the DA.