Pitbulls. Do they have a bad rep?

[GlennB]

Perhaps just on dogs with a short muzzle? I'm not aware of them having any unique jaw geometry, although they do seem to have more pointy teeth, if that makes and sense.

Still seems like a training aid to me. Presenting it as a "must have" item for all Pitbull owners seems indicative of the problem: people are training their dogs to bite and hold. It's no different then those retriever rolls (it's like a stuffed sock on a rope) people use to training duck dogs. It's just that they train the dogs to be gentle.

It doesn't seem that way. If you put +"break stick" +pit into google you'll get many hits from PB-fancier websites and discussion forums. You'll find that many/most of them recommend possession of this device, and I serously doubt many of those people are actively training their dogs to bite+hold.

 

[GlennB]

You get the laughing dog because your claim of "specialised" is so damned funny. The picture you posted is a greyhound-sized version of a sighthound collar-- again not a "specialised" item as you keep trying to assert.

So it's a specialised shape for sighthounds.

And it's a special size for greyhounds, within that group.

But it's not "specialised" ?

mmmmmkay ... <steps slowly backwards, while avoiding eye contact> .....

 

[Furcifer]

It doesn't seem that way. If you put +"break stick" +pit into google you'll get many hits from PB-fancier websites and discussion forums. You'll find that many/most of them recommend possession of this device, and I serously doubt many of those people are actively training their dogs to bite+hold.

Yah, something else entirely. What I was thinking of was longer and more like a whip.

Still, after reading a few pages they seem like a responsible thing to own. I don't think they have anything to do with aggression, they have to do with the fact that Pitbulls don't try to get a better hold once they bite, they "lock" on. Usually dogs will try to get a better grip and that's when you break them off.

That's just part of their breeding.

 

[GreNME]

At this point I'm going to conclude you're just arguing to argue. I pointed out your mistake and you continue to make it (fractions). You also asked for a citation that's been made 2 or 3 times in this thread already. You continue to argue the conclusions of a 5 (3?) year study on animal behavior by reputable veterinary college with absolutely nothing but a lot of hand waving. I mean you don't have any study that refutes the fact that roaming was reduced by up to 90% in fixed animals. Just a bunch of "Yahbut's". You know as well as anyone this is universally accepted by vets and owners alike and the onus is on you to prove otherwise.
Oh and it isn't "hit or miss" even if it was 50% (it's 66%).

Read this then we'll talk

Oh, the irony. You accuse me of responding with "yahbuts" and other qualifiers-- which wasn't what I was doing, but we'll get to that-- but you post an argument that pretty much epitomizes "yahbuts" when dealing with the number of studies out there showing greater risk in early sterilization, dismissing them as not covering everything without once offering a rebuttal study that does meet such criteria.

To be perfectly honest, you're now just playing the same game political partisans do when criticizing an opponent's policy for not being perfect while offering no perfect policy of their own.

 

[GreNME]

So it's a specialised shape for sighthounds.

And it's a special size for greyhounds, within that group.

But it's not "specialised" ?

mmmmmkay ... <steps slowly backwards, while avoiding eye contact> .....

There's nothing "specialised" about them. You cite them as if they were, like these break sticks you mention, specialized for the breed. It's simply not so. They're wider collars that are commonly found all over, nothing special about them.

You're so focused on trying to establish some sort of inherent quality to these things you're pointing out that you're getting lost in the pedantry. I can see you're trying to find some kind of "gotcha" point to somehow bring back around for support of your claim that pit bulls are inherently more dangerous, but all you're doing is building a continually circular argument and (ignorantly) demanding I play along.

 

[GreNME]

Yah, something else entirely. What I was thinking of was longer and more like a whip.

Still, after reading a few pages they seem like a responsible thing to own. I don't think they have anything to do with aggression, they have to do with the fact that Pitbulls don't try to get a better hold once they bite, they "lock" on. Usually dogs will try to get a better grip and that's when you break them off.

That's just part of their breeding.

Um, pit bulls do try to get a better hold when they bite. Holy hell I don't know how many times I have to explain this, but the process of breaking a pit bull bite hold is qualitatively and procedurally no different than breaking other dogs' bite holds. I've stated over and over that there are no different steps to break a pit bull than the steps from other dogs, and the continued assertion otherwise is both wantonly ignorant and staggeringly ridiculous.

 

[Furcifer]

Um, pit bulls do try to get a better hold when they bite. Holy hell I don't know how many times I have to explain this, but the process of breaking a pit bull bite hold is qualitatively and procedurally no different than breaking other dogs' bite holds. I've stated over and over that there are no different steps to break a pit bull than the steps from other dogs, and the continued assertion otherwise is both wantonly ignorant and staggeringly ridiculous.

Well this conflicts with several websites dedicated to the breed and personal experience, I have seen Pitbulls maintain a grip, not on another dog but a toy. It also goes a long way to explaining the myth of "lock jaws".

The mountain of evidence is not in your favor. Again, a lot of hand waving but nothing to support your position. Did I miss a link?

 

[GlennB]

The picture you posted is a greyhound-sized version of a sighthound collar

There's nothing "specialised" about them.

no text

 

[Furcifer]

Oh, the irony. You accuse me of responding with "yahbuts" and other qualifiers-- which wasn't what I was doing, but we'll get to that-- but you post an argument that pretty much epitomizes "yahbuts" when dealing with the number of studies out there showing greater risk in early sterilization, dismissing them as not covering everything without once offering a rebuttal study that does meet such criteria.

To be perfectly honest, you're now just playing the same game political partisans do when criticizing an opponent's policy for not being perfect while offering no perfect policy of their own.

Incorrect, you have nothing to support your position. All you did is demand ridiculous evidence for the effect of testosterone in male animals, as if you didn't know it is responsible for sex drive and the behaviour associated with seeking out a mate. Criticize the sample population, which is more than enough to establish a correlation, and question the effects in female dogs.

You also dodged the veterinarian report which unequivocally refutes your position.

You're floundering.

 

[Emet]

<snip>

You also dodged the veterinarian report which unequivocally refutes your position.

You're floundering.

It's funny, because my link was dismissed, even though it made the same points and was written by a specialist:
http://www.columbusdogconnection.com/Documents/PedRebuttal .pdf

I'm not sure how much of a rebuttal that was, as it seemed more a matter of semantics and replying to something I didn't post. I did leave out a few breed-specific studies (mostly to do with Irish wolfhounds or similar breeds) because 1) not all of them are complete and 2) my significant other knows a couple of folks involved in them, but I don't think the rebuttal actually rebuts what I've said about the risks of early spaying/neutering, it's responding to the use of studies in some other essay.

It directly rebuts this:

<snip>which actually creates health problems for large and giant breeds of dog (like risk of osteosarcoma and heart problems).

At this point I'm going to conclude you're just arguing to argue.

Ya think?

You do know that every vet was taught about barbiturate anesthesia in regards to sighthounds, mostly Greyhounds. In practical terms, that is the only anesthetic that required a different dose-- and due to availability and other issues, many vets have moved onward and upward to safer, better anesthetics. The "sighthound sensitivity" has been blown way out of proportion, and now has made its way to other breeds that have no specific anesthetic sensitivities. As one veterinary anesthesiologist responded on VIN: "well, of course breed X is sensitive to anesthesia--if they weren't, it wouldn't work."

All due respect, but much like the response essay you linked you're diverting. It's not about sensitivity, it's about not giving too much to a deerhound because they're deceptively large (but slight in body), which can result in a dead deerhound in the worst case and a dog that spends a day and a half in a daze in other cases. Most importantly, though, is when we have to have bloodwork done on our sighthounds, because the bloodwork isn't going to look like a Labrador's or a Chow's (lower white blood cell count, for example). This isn't necessarily a huge deal with vets that are mostly seeing Labs and terriers and maybe a few herding breeds, but for those of us with less-common breeds having a vet who knows going into it the differences makes the difference as to whether I'll spend my money with them or find someone else who is better suited. The vets I've had the best experience have plenty of time with various livestock as well as household pets, because when dealing with giant breeds they're already used to approaching health issues in a different manner than with Fluffy the Scottish terrier.

Now I could have replied, well, we actually studied hematology, anesthesia, and pharmacology (lean body mass) in vet school. And while mg/m2 is probably the best way to calculate drug doses, from a practical point of view, only chemo drugs are.
Injectable anesthetics are calculated on a mg/kg basis, then given to effect. I've never even seen a deerhound, but I've anesthetized loads of Greyhounds and quite a few IWs. Most small animal vets have experienced the full range of sizes and breed types in dogs, and experience with livestock will not be a determinant factor, as a giant breed dog is still a dog--it's not a horse or cow.

But I decided not to.

 

[GreNME]

Well this conflicts with several websites dedicated to the breed and personal experience, I have seen Pitbulls maintain a grip, not on another dog but a toy. It also goes a long way to explaining the myth of "lock jaws".

The mountain of evidence is not in your favor. Again, a lot of hand waving but nothing to support your position. Did I miss a link?

A link for what? You want a scientific study on how pit bulls differ from other dogs in their bite? Really, what kind of link are you looking for?

If you want to talk about personal experience, I've swung schutzhund-trained Dobermans around from a sleeve and pulled a pit bull off another dog that it had attacked, and I can say that there is qualitatively no difference between the two. I've had to pull larger dogs with much stronger jaws than pit bulls have and done so just as successfully.

But you want links? Okay: link 1, link 2, link 3, the latter of which points to this study that is also cited in the first link, though both also cover other subject matter beyond that study.

Essentially, arguing that pit bulls have some form of inherently different bite because they hold on is completely based in hysteria because they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing. The reality is that the pit bull does not bite stronger than the average for dogs its size, that any dog can hold on just as strongly as a pit bull, and even a pit bull will try to get a better bite hold for the same reason any other dog would. The reality is that the pit bull is a dog and unless someone can show otherwise there is no logical reason for me to address ridiculous accusations about supposed outlying prowess that the pit bull has that somehow is less or not present in other dogs. As Carl Sagan said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and the only ones here claiming something extraordinary are those attributing to pit bulls qualities above and beyond other dog breeds.

Incorrect, you have nothing to support your position. All you did is demand ridiculous evidence for the effect of testosterone in male animals, as if you didn't know it is responsible for sex drive and the behaviour associated with seeking out a mate. Criticize the sample population, which is more than enough to establish a correlation, and question the effects in female dogs.

You also dodged the veterinarian report which unequivocally refutes your position.

You're floundering.

No, you're demanding I sit here and go point-by-point with the person who wrote that essay, who isn't here themselves and who you're using as a diversion to avoid addressing the points I've already brought up. The vet in your link hand-waves away studies on health risks, points out that there are some reproductive system related diseases that can be prevented with sterilization, and makes a few more appeals to disregard arguments citing studies that disagree with his conclusion but to heed studies that agree with his conclusion-- essentially asking the reader to engage in selection bias.

So how about you go ahead and try to make your own argument instead of demanding I engage someone who isn't here?

 

[GreNME]

It's funny, because my link was dismissed, even though it made the same points and was written by a specialist:
http://www.columbusdogconnection.com/Documents/PedRebuttal .pdf



It directly rebuts this:

No it doesn't, it hand-waves away numbers and accuses some other essay of using inflated numbers.

Now I could have replied, well, we actually studied hematology, anesthesia, and pharmacology (lean body mass) in vet school. And while mg/m2 is probably the best way to calculate drug doses, from a practical point of view, only chemo drugs are.
Injectable anesthetics are calculated on a mg/kg basis, then given to effect. I've never even seen a deerhound, but I've anesthetized loads of Greyhounds and quite a few IWs. Most small animal vets have experienced the full range of sizes and breed types in dogs, and experience with livestock will not be a determinant factor, as a giant breed dog is still a dog--it's not a horse or cow.

But I decided not to.

Maybe my vet was right.

 

[Furcifer]

Essentially, arguing that pit bulls have some form of inherently different bite because they hold on is completely based in hysteria because they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing. The reality is that the pit bull does not bite stronger than the average for dogs its size, that any dog can hold on just as strongly as a pit bull, and even a pit bull will try to get a better bite hold for the same reason any other dog would.

Did you even read my post? I don't think so, you linked to articles on bite force, which has nothing to do with Pitbulls "holding" and the need for a break stick.

I suggest you google what GlenB suggested and read the articles instead of rehashing the tired old bit force argument, which I covered in my first or second post in this thread.

 

[GreNME]

Did you even read my post? I don't think so, you linked to articles on bite force, which has nothing to do with Pitbulls "holding" and the need for a break stick.

I suggest you google what GlenB suggested and read the articles instead of rehashing the tired old bit force argument, which I covered in my first or second post in this thread.

You obviously didn't read the links I gave, because two of them brought up the "hold on" myth.

Listen, 3bodyproblem, the point is that claiming pit bulls somehow hold on in some qualitative manner that is unlike other dogs is an extraordinary claim, and doing google searches for comments on a boutique item does not prove that claim, it simply provides a recursive confirmation to it. I've never claimed that pit bulls don't hold on-- they're a bully breed, it's one of more than a half-dozen dog breeds that hold on, not to mention different breeds of dogs with high prey drives and possessiveness who do also-- what I've been repeating is that pit bulls are not remarkably different from other dogs in how they bite. Neither you nor GlennB has provided a shred of evidence to the contrary, despite GlennB having been the one who brought this claim to bear.

 

[George 152]

There's no bad dogs. Just bad owners

 

[Furcifer]

It's funny, because my link was dismissed, even though it made the same points and was written by a specialist:
http://www.columbusdogconnection.com/Documents/PedRebuttal .pdf

That's a well written rebuttal, and it seems to support much of what I thought was essentially "canon" when it comes to spay/neuter.

I'm not suggesting people be forced into sterilizing their animal, but they should know its not in the best interests of the animal by any means.

 

[GlennB]

Essentially, arguing that pit bulls have some form of inherently different bite because they hold on is completely based in hysteria because they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing.

We have established that, for their size, their bite is nothing remarkable. It's the holding tenacity that damages the way most dogs don't.

The reality is that the pit bull does not bite stronger than the average for dogs its size, that any dog can hold on just as strongly as a pit bull, ...

they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing (GreNME)

The reality is that the pit bull is a dog and unless someone can show otherwise there is no logical reason for me to address ridiculous accusations about supposed outlying prowess that the pit bull has that somehow is less or not present in other dogs.

they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing (GreNME)

Hoist by your own petard.

 

[Captain.Sassy]

if you want to talk about personal experience, i've swung schutzhund-trained dobermans around from a sleeve and pulled a pit bull off another dog that it had attacked, and i can say that there is qualitatively no difference between the two. I've had to pull larger dogs with much stronger jaws than pit bulls have and done so just as successfully.

crikey!

 

[GreNME]

We have established that, for their size, their bite is nothing remarkable. It's the holding tenacity that damages the way most dogs don't.

Which you have yet to produce evidence of that places it above other bully breeds, let alone other dogs in general.

they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing (GreNME)



they're a bully breed-- which is a breed of dogs bred to hold on to a bull's ring regardless of thrashing (GreNME)

Hoist by your own petard.

And you have yet to produce evidence of that places it above other bully breeds, let alone other dogs in general.

Really, it's getting tiresome repeating myself. Like I said, go to a schutzhund training session-- with any dogs present, it really doesn't matter-- and then come back and explain how the pit bull is somehow inherently capable of greater holding capacity. The only "evidence" you have to run with so far is that bully breeds history were used for bull baiting. That's your only evidence that you're using, and you can't provide anything more than senseless word games to support why that makes pit bulls remarkable today.

 

[Furcifer]

You obviously didn't read the links I gave, because two of them brought up the "hold on" myth.

Just the second one, and it confirmed it.

Listen, 3bodyproblem, the point is that claiming pit bulls somehow hold on in some qualitative manner that is unlike other dogs is an extraordinary claim, and doing google searches for comments on a boutique item does not prove that claim, it simply provides a recursive confirmation to it. I've never claimed that pit bulls don't hold on-- they're a bully breed, it's one of more than a half-dozen dog breeds that hold on, not to mention different breeds of dogs with high prey drives and possessiveness who do also-- what I've been repeating is that pit bulls are not remarkably different from other dogs in how they bite. Neither you nor GlennB has provided a shred of evidence to the contrary, despite GlennB having been the one who brought this claim to bear.

Nonsense, boxers continuously adjust their bite. You can't get a boxer to bite and hold anywhere near that of a Pitbull. You honestly think it's coincidence it's Pitbulls you see in videos holding themselves suspended for minutes?

"The majority of breeds will snap erratically at their opponent, biting and releasing repeatedly. As terriers, pit bulls will usually bite and hold. Contrary to popular myth, this is not some kind of special pit bull behavior; it is merely terrier behavior"

"They will work to get some sort of grip in a desired place then hold and shake"

"Pit Bulls simply have a tenacity to hold on, and the break stick gives the owner leverage to get a stubborn dog's jaws open."

"The breed was bred to hold on, at all costs."

"Keep in mind that most dogs fight differently than pit bulls. The pit bull will get a solid grip and then hold and shake"

"Despite the lack of a physiological "jaw locking" mechanism, pit bull-type dogs often exhibit "bite, hold, and shake" behavior and refuse to release when biting"

"Despite not having lock jaws, which is a complete myth, pit bulls are capable of powerful bites due to their extremely strong jaws and willingness to hold on"

These are all from Pitbull owner websites (and Wiki).

The owners don't refute the hold nature and admit it is specific to types of terriers.