Infant in critical condition after being mauled by a dog in Corpus Christi

[Goodheart]

Guess the breed.

https://www.kiiitv.com/article/news/local/child-bit-by-a-pitbull-in-corpus-christi/503-6880999e-3337-4abd-b402-d405e524c554?fbclid=IwAR2PWItoLWi8LT04f-HMNTAb4_JvoTAkvw5mC6dETRWkg0nPxRacJTNFR1E

Oops... story is a few days old now.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

1. The article says pitbull mix. So even mixes are bad now?

Any dog can lose its shit at any time. A baby comes to visit, the dogs should be sent out of the room if they're not familiar with them.

[Goodheart]

2. "Any dog can lose its shit at any time." is simply not true.

Yes, pitbull mixes are bad.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. How much of a mix is bad?

[Goodheart]

4. Any.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

5. A one-drop rule, eh?

So should dog owners get their dogs tested to see if there's any pitbull blood in them?

[Hortensis]

44. Pitts and Rotts are killers of half the small children and babies

killed by dogs in this nation. Virtually every one of these tragedities occured with an adult or adults right there who were unable to save them, though many were injured desperately trying to save their babies.

Sensible parents and family remove tablecloths and heavy objects that can be pulled down on little bodies, they pad furniture, put up gates, lock cabinets, and cover outlets, and they do many other things to make their children safe, even though individually they're unlikely to kill. And they choose family dogs that aren't on the short list of most likely to kill.

Btw, I actually knew someone whose dog got out of the yard and attacked and killed a woman out for her morning walk. One guess what breed.

[Hekate]

63. Thanks, Hortensis

[davsand]

11. What part of leaving a kid unsupervised with a strange dog is the dog's fault?

Peeves me greatly to see anybody blaming a specific breed of dog for dumbass owners.






Laura

[Goodheart]

13. All adults who were present were certainly at fault, but that doesn't mean a pit bull is not

excessively dangerous in society.

[MoonRiver]

40. It's a pattern.

[hlthe2b]

17. +++ The same attitude towards certain dog breeds while ignoring parental irresponsibility

reminds me of the ridiculous NRA propaganda about "guns not killing" as though the guns in the hands of irresponsible or murderous HUMANS don't kill an unmatched number of humans in this country compared to the rest of the world.

[Mariana]

41. The story doesn't say the kid and the dog were unsupervised. nt.

[Marrah_Goodman]

48. Yes, they can

My bfs family had their dog from the time she was a tiny puppy. I remember the day she came home. She was well trained and very loved. The child was 18 months old sitting at her dad's feet. The dog flipped a switch, bounded over and took a chunk out of her neck. She almost died, literally.

[Treefrog]

9. Yep. Wasn't there a recent story about a chihuahua biting someone in the face?

It caused damage to an adult and I would imagine could hurt a baby quite badly. I wouldn’t leave a baby in potential danger like that with any animal.

Meanwhile, there’s a pit sitting beside me on the couch, curled up beside his two terrier friends. He’s a big sweet cuddle baby, scared of his own shadow.

[Marrah_Goodman]

47. Even if the dog is familiar with the baby it only takes a second.

[LexVegas]

6. Ban the breed, like many other civilized countries have already. nt

[vercetti2021]

12. So what happens with pits that are already owned by people?

Do they round them up in camps and kill them?

[PTWB]

15. Make it mandatory that they're all spayed or neutered

And in a few years start imposing heavy fines for pit Bull ownership.

[vercetti2021]

20. So fine me for owning one?

Yeah I wouldn't pay jack and shit to anyone for my furbaby.

[Goodheart]

22. Yes.

[vercetti2021]

27. Yes to what?

I wouldn't pay anyone for owning a fucking dog.

[PTWB]

29. If the breed is banned you won't have much choice

[vercetti2021]

30. I would

Not pay it.

[PTWB]

35. I doubt that course of action would go well for you or your pup

[Xoan]

38. Why?

[vercetti2021]

7. Its sad indeed

But why is the breed always brought up? And normally when its brought up. It's a pitbull. Any dog given the wrong envirnoment can go nuclear. A rot, dalmatian, or shepard. I feel bringing up the breed is a always a deterrent.

[marie999]

8. My husband and I have rescued 2 APBT among the 20+ dogs we have rescued in the last 26 years.

They were as loving as any dogs we have had. We know that they can't be trusted with people or other animals so they were kept in separate locked enclosures but we would spend time with them every day. We also had a Chiweenie that had his separate locked enclosure for the same reason.

[Dream Girl]

25. Cheewinie? That's a new one. Gonna have to look tat one up.

[leftyladyfrommo]

10. The truth is there are a lot of really sweet pits out there.

And there's a possibility that it's the mixes may be more dangerous depending on what they are mixed with. Sometimes pits are mixed with other dangerous breeds because people want a vicious guard dog. They mix pits and presa de canarios or something like that.



People should never leave babies with dogs. There was a case where a pomeranian killed an infant. Dogs can't read babies.

I would trust a pit over an American bulldog anyday.

I won't let my border collies anywhere near little kids. They've never been around kids. And kids do dumb things. They stick their faces right down into dog's faces.

There are clues that dogs are getting too aggressive and a lot of owners ignore it. And they shouldn't. The time to be really observant is when the dog hits puberty. That's when the aggression starts to show. If they aren't people aggressive they can become very dog aggressive.

[Goodheart]

14. I've witnessed a "sweet pit bull" turn against its own human family

when the toddler got too close to its food bowl.

They snap.

I wonder why so many people think it's mere coincidence that almost all these horror mauling stories involve pit bulls?

[leftyladyfrommo]

16. I wouldn't have a pitbull. Why? There are so many breeds

to choose from.

The problem is that if your dog did attack someone you would lose everything. You would be sued for everything you own. You would lose your job. You would spend time in jail and have to pay a huge fine.

And you would have to live with awful guilt for the rest of your life.

Not worth the risk.

[leftyladyfrommo]

19. Lots of dogs are funny over their food bowls.

You really have to watch that. Even small dogs can do a lot of damage.

My dogs eat in their crates.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

21. Good lord, why on earth would you or anyone watch as a toddler got close to a dog's food bowl?

Setting a dog up to fail is a great way to see it fail.

[Dream Girl]

23. So now you blame the owners for "setting up the sweet little pit tie to fail"

Listen to yourself.No thoughts for concern for the kid.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

28. I do indeed. The highest responsibility of a dog owner is to ensure the dog doesn't fail. Putting it

in situations that have a high failure rate no matter the training of the dog or familiarity with the kid -- such as a toddler near a food bowl -- is irresponsible. It's never a surprise when bad parenting goes hand in hand with bad pet ownership, as well.

[vercetti2021]

33. See you get it

I hate when people put all the blame on the dog than the fucking dumbass owners. My pitty is a two year old sweetie that was trained for dog fighting. She was 20 pounds when they rescued her. She is now 80 pounds and is extremely loving and a huge baby. She's been around kids and normally she is scared of them. But eventually she'll go and lay next to them for pets with our supervision. But the kids know to not do anything to hurt her or else should could react. But people love to put pits all into one category as bad and needs to die off. And it triggers me to death when people suggest that they need to be banned. If that were the case, then all breeds would be banned because breed doesn't mean shit when the dog is put into a position like that. Doesn't matter at all.

But fuck if everyone jumps onto the dog and blames the dog. I'm sad for the child of course, but blame the fucking stupid parents where the blame should be lied.

[leftyladyfrommo]

51. You really have to watch babies.

I see these vudeos on YouTube where people are letting toddlers maul their dogs and they think it's so cute and I just cringe.

[davsand]

31. ANY breed can bite. It usually doesn't get reported 'cause it's not a sexy headline.

Some of the most bite prone dogs I've ever known personally were dachshunds and Chihuahuas. I've known a couple animal shelter managers as well as animal control officers and kennel folks, and oddly enough it's not the pitties they talk about when it comes to biting. Responsible pet ownership is the root of the issue, not the specific breed.

Here's a couple thoughts for anybody that wants to clutch their pearls over specific breeds:

1. Is the dog running loose and unsupervised? That is probably not the dog of a responsible pet owner. STAY AWAY.
2. Does the dog have a prior record of biting? I refer you back to #1.

The issue is not the dog breed it's irresponsible owners with an uncontrolled animal. My dad used to make the comment that if you wanted to train an animal you needed to be smarter than the animal. Dad was right.


Laura

[Goodheart]

54. Sure, other breeds bite but few of those breeds carry through to fatal attacks.

The issue IS the dog breed.

What's funny here is that your argument could be extended to ownership of tigers and bears.

[DenaliDemocrat]

69. It's definitely part of the breed

Houndsmen, birddoggers, ranchers, and police officers all recognize that certain breeds are genetically inclined to temperament and tasks. It’s why walkers don’t tree slick very often, English pointers find quail, farm collies herd cattle, and Malinois stop the bad guys.

Pit bull owners live in fairy fucking land. I would love to hear a owner say, yep - I have a powerful dog with very high prey drives and low thresholds. I understand it and I manage the dog accordingly. See, THAT is called responsible dog ownership

[Mariana]

42. The story doesn't say that the baby was left alone with the dog. nt.

[MissB]

49. I'd never really paid much attention

to American Bulldogs until I found out my lab mix puppy had a fair amount of American bulldog in him.

He’s about 30% lab, 30% American bulldog and equally split the rest of his DNA between mastiff, Weimaraner and German shepherd.

He’s a big dog. 90 lbs of pure muscle. We worked one on one with a trainer for over a year to train us to understand him and his limitations. (We adopted him as an 8-week old puppy.)

I trust him with us. I trust him with my brother and spouse and their dogs. I trust him with a couple of friends and their dogs. Everyone else gets a careful introduction, and close supervision. He’s protective but not aggressive. However his potential to cause harm is big, just by his size not his personality. His training is meant to make him a good canine citizen but he’s not a lab.

[Hekate]

64. Sounds like our rescue pup, who was described as a "Lab mix" & turned out to be a Dobie mix...

She had a screw loose. Her life was incredibly restricted — very much as your dog’s is. She was trained. She was watched. She was loved — and she loved me back. But she was not trustworthy. During the year that we ended up with 4 little dogs in the house at the same time she was in residence, I watched her like a hawk and at the least sign of stress she was escorted to the gated side yard. Whenever we had visitors, she was in the gated side yard. Visitors who came to the front door were greeted with a ferocious attempt to claw the door down. I won’t go on — you obviously know how it is. She was not a Lab.

[MissB]

66. He's actually a big lovey dog

But he’s so big that he actually scares a lot of people that come over. He does have the run of the house as well as some of the yard but we are super careful when there are others here with the exception of the aforementioned people. He just has such a deep woofy bark.

He has a goofy younger brother pup (much smaller, topping out at 45 lbs). They wrestle together inside and out and sit on the back lawn chewing bones together. We have a cat that rules them both, and he doesn’t bother our dozen hens (the other pup is a bird dog, so I’m more worried about younger brother pup with the hens). I can take him to parks and coffee shops, because that’s not our yard and he’s not at all protective. He does great with the off leash unfenced dog park and goes up and happily greets everyone.

We are currently fencing much of the half acre so they have full run of the property. It requires a lot of gates and a lot of beware of dogs signs but it’s worth it to give them both more room to run and play.

He’d defend it though. We’ve seen his protective side when a drunk tried to open our locked doors at 2 am.

He fears raised platforms over water, and the woods are scary to him at night. I can’t say “hey” to my husband because that sounds too much like “hi” and he thinks someone made it through the door without him noticing and he’ll start barking. He goes right to his platform bed when told and woofs quietly until we release him.

We’ve had contractors around here for about 6 weeks now, and he woofs at them when they arrive and then ignores their presence for the day. The next morning he has to check them out again and then is quiet, even when they come to the door. We tell him each morning that it’s fine, we know they’re here, and he quiets right down.

He’s so big that I worry that he won’t be around as long as I want him to be.

[Hekate]

67. Zima had her positive points. We got her for my son when he was 15 & she thought he was God. ...

On that basis, if no other, she always had a home with me — kind of like Robert Frost’s Hired Man: “home is where when you go there, they have to take you in.”

As I read the newspaper at the kitchen table, Zima would walk by and kiss my elbow, every time.

One of our little dogs at the time was my daughter’s Jack Russell/Pomeranian mix, who was all of 5 pounds and pure Alpha Dog. Watching those two dogs interact was hilarious. 💕

[Sneederbunk]

18. Pitbulls have earned their reputation.

[Goodheart]

24. And, sadly, that's exactly why a large percentage of their owners have them.

Badassery by proxy.

[PortTack]

26. Yes they have. Should just let the breed die out. There's nothing inhumane or cruel about that

[Hoyt]

32. Had a large cat that I would never leave with a child. The cat would warn them to stay back, but

the kids wouldn't heed the warning.

The cat took one particularly aggravating 4 year old down from behind as he ran away at the last moment. Fortunately, the cat didn't otherwise maul them.

[haele]

34. All working dogs can nip.

We had a yellow lab/Aussie Shepherd mix and when she would get excited or the herding instinct kicked in, she might nip. Not bite, nip.
And because she was a medium sized dog that was cream and tan and barrel chested, people automatically assumed she was a pit bull mix, even though her head and jaw line was classic yellow lab.
She was not very smart, and she was a sweet girl, but again, she had the instinct to nip at inappropriate times, like when people came to the front door, or she just got off leash at the dog park and wanted to herd the small dogs.

All working dogs have a developed nip instinct or a bite instinct depending on what they were bred to do. Even "gentle" breeds like retrievers or St. Bernards, who were bred to find and "mouth" their prey clear of obstacles in good shape for their handlers are capable of biting when triggered.
And if they're in a pack, they're even more dangerous. Our family St. Bernard's sire had to be put down after he got out and ran with a small pack of neighbor dogs one night -mauling several smaller dogs and a child before they got caught. None of the other dogs were considered aggressive breeds, either, but they were all put down.

It's foolish to think just a handful of dog breeds are dangerous. All dogs have the capability of being dangerous.

Haele

[Doremus]

68. Agree. This chart shows the futility of trying to determine breeds without a DNA test.

[ms liberty]

36. The breed involved is less important than the fact that we do a terrible job of

Monitoring our pet and child interactions. Most of our population has little to no idea how to train or handle their dogs, and even less about how to teach their children how to behave and handle their pets. They get the dog for the wrong reasons, they pick the wrong breed, and the wrong size, they train it badly or not at all, and then they blame it on the dog. Not all breeds should be owned by anyone. I've always had GSD's; they're in the top five on the list of biters, and it's well earned.
I have always felt every kindergarten or preschool should teach kids how to handle all animals, but particularly dogs, both those they know and those they don't know.

[Xoan]

39. Like racists ...

they blame the breed.

[Phoenix61]

43. Seriously? So your saying being punched by a black or brown

person is deadlier than being punched by a white person? Pits were bred to have a strong prey drive and to bite once and hang on. That’s the nature of the breed. A dachshund couldn’t do the same level of damage if it wanted to.

[Disaffected]

45. That's the main problem with

pit/bull dogs IMO - they have very strong jaws and as a result, if they attack, can do a lot more damage than other breeds. The hanging on also seems to be a characteristic more prevalent in such breeds. There used to be an old saying "sticks like a bulldog to a root".

Listened to a veterinarian once upon a time (from Alabama IIRC) who had made a study of dog inflicted injuries throughout the US. His conclusion was that the pit bull breeds are indeed much more likely to attack and injure humans. Whether that is mostly due to nature or nurture however is another question I guess but the stats remain.

[DenaliDemocrat]

56. Problem is their drives

They cannot contain their prey drive. It leaks and when paired with a powerful dog, it’s devastating

[LexVegas]

50. ...

[Goodheart]

59. WTF

[Marrah_Goodman]

46. People need to stop having their dogs around babies

Babies are fragile. It only takes a second for a switch to flip in that dogs head....no matter how long you have had the dog or how good you think they are. Only takes a second.

[leftyladyfrommo]

52. Here are some statistics.

Between 2005 and 2017

Pitbulls. 284 deaths
Rottweilers. 45 deaths
German Shepherds. 20 deaths
American bulldogs. 15 deaths
Mastiff. 14 deaths
Husky. 13 deaths




#1 breed for biting was the Labrador Retriever.
4.7 million dog bites a year for all breeds
75 to 85 % are free range

Meanest dogs:

Chihuahuas
Daschunds
Chows
Doberman
Dalmations
Rottweilers
German Shepherds
Pittbulls
Huskies

This information is from Dogbites and Canine Companion

The moral of the story is dog owners need to take responsibility for their dogs and keep them away from situations where they might bite.

[Goodheart]

53. So, pitbulls 6x as many deaths as the nearest breed

Even though they're far from the most popular breed.

They're not preferred by their owners because "they're sweet", because almost all dogs are. They're liked precisely because they're dangerous and others fear them.

[leftyladyfrommo]

55. You have to keep in mind that there are 4.5 million

Pittbulls in the US. They are 5.8% of the canine population.

Your chances of getting killed by one are pretty slim.

But you are right. A lot of people get them because they want a macho dog and then they have no idea how to train and handle a dog like that. Those dogs can pull 1500 pounds. So even if they are on a leash they are just about impossible to hold back. And they react really fast and once they go into aggression mode you can't stop them.

I work with dogs all the time and I won't touch any of the bully breeds except the little ones and Old English. I am not big enough or strong enough to handle them.

I read that the fastest growing breed is the Presa Canario which is a pittbull on speed. No one but an experienced handler should have one of those dogs but macho guys want them.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

58. Dogbites is a biased unscientific site.

[ismnotwasm]

57. I have a German Shepard.

Also considered “aggressive”

[leftyladyfrommo]

60. The trouble with GSD statistics is that so many

do jobs where they need to bite. Like guard dogs and police dogs. But GSD can be really protective. Sometimes overly so.

[DVRacer]

61. Am I the only one?

The excuses from people wanting to own pit bulls and when they attack are the same as AR-15 people. Read the comments above and substitute one for the other.
I’m not saying nobody should own either but it’s extraordinary how similar the debate is.

[Goodheart]

65. Not only that, their same arguments could be used to harbor tigers and bears and what not.

[mnhtnbb]

62. This happened the night of the 4th of July

The article says nothing about whether fireworks were being set off in the neighborhood, where the baby was, how the dog was able to get to it.

Adults presumably should have been supervising both the baby and the dog. Had they been drinking? Were they setting off fireworks?

The article is missing a lot of information needed to determine why this poor child was attacked.