Dog Community

Pitt Bull dog aggression

Posted : 6/13/2006 7:18:04 PM

I am thinking about possible adopting a Pitt Bull puppy from someone that I know, and I have a question for all of you. This puppy is around 5 months old, possibly a mix but we dont know for sure, he lives out on a tie out all day and sleeps inside at night. I have been around this puppy a lot and he is VERY loving and affectionate, if given the choice he will chose to be with me over any toy or treat I've offered him yet. He does play really rough with the other puppy this owner has, and he seems to be protective of his bones. I'm not at all worried about him being human aggresive because for one I know that Pitts are actually one of the friendliest dogs with humans, and I've also observed him with multiple people and he loves everyone. My big question is his possible dog aggression. I dont know the parents of this dog, although basing off from who his owner is and the area that he lives in, I can say I'm 99.99999% sure the parents of this puppy are typical back yard pitt bulls (I dont know if they are fighting pitts or not). I tend to pick up strays of all kinds (dogs, cats, birds...) and I'm worried that I might run into some dog aggression with this puppy. Basing off from all of you guys' experience (I know we have a couple very savy pitt bull/AmStaff people here), what are my chances with this dogs questionable genetics coupled with a bad upbringing (not abusive, just not given a lot of attention) that I'll be able to still train him to be good around other animals and other dogs in particular?

cyclefiend2000

Posted : 6/13/2006 8:29:05 PM

i did some research for my brother a while back about pit bulls. he and his wife had taken in a pit that was left for dead in a ditch near their house and nursed it back to health. they had the dog for about a year when it first started showing signs of dog aggression. this is one of the web sites that has pretty good info about pits in general...

[linkhttp://www.pbrc.net/breedinfo.html]http://www.pbrc.net/breedinfo.html[/link]

there are some others too. and i will see if i can find those. if i remember correctly no matter what the breeding of a pit bull is there is the potential for it to show dog aggression especially after it is 1.5 or 2 yrs old (i cant remeber exactly), and it may never show any aggression up to that point. i will say that from the research that i did, the worst thing you can do for a pit is to leave them on a tie out for any length of time as it promotes aggression in them.

good luck with the pit. they can be very wonderful dogs. our amelia has some percentage of pit in her. how much we dont know, but she a very sweet and loving dog.

edit: this is one of the other sites with some good apbt info...
http://www.badrap.org/rescue/index.cfm

Elizabeth

Posted : 6/13/2006 8:47:20 PM

That is exactly the situation that I'm worried about. I've heard of Pit Bulls being great until a certain point, and then all of a sudden being very dog-aggresive. If this dog was a well bred Pit Bull I wouldn't be worrying about this, but because I dont know his parentage there are so many questions. If I adopt this dog it's going to be for life, but I'm really worried that I'm going to have a dog that is fine and then turns dog-aggresive, which would be really uncondusive to my lifestyle. I'm more than willing to put in the socialization time and training that this puppy needs, but I'm wondering if that will be enough to overcome bad breeding and 5+ months of learned behaviour at a very impressionable age.

cyclefiend2000

Posted : 6/13/2006 9:05:20 PM

getting him neutered (if he isnt already) will help curb some aggressive tendencies. you say "...he seems to be protective of his bones". is he aggressively protective? or does he just try to hide his bones?

another thing you may want to consider is... do you have a dog now? if not, do you think you would want to have more than one dog? if you only plan on having just one dog, dog aggression may not ever be an issue for you. if you do have/plan on having more than one dog, keep the dogs separated when you cant supervise them (ie: crating), and possilby wait until after the puppy is at least one year old. this way you can see how he interacts with other dogs.

i wouldnt be too concerned about overcoming any behaviors he has learned at this point; unless he has been abused or neglected. when/if you decide to adopt this puppy, keep him as an indoor companion. i wouldnt leave him unattended outside (either tied out or just roaming in a fenced yard). there are too many things that could happen, and as a responsible apbt owner you wouldnt want to add to the bad rap that these dogs already get.

i would also get this puppy into a positive reinforcement training program when you get him. look into clicker training, but i would really avoid -R training (ie: training that uses choke chains or something similar).

probe1957

Posted : 6/14/2006 9:19:44 AM

I certainly wouldn't want to discourage you from adopting the dog but, if you do, dog aggression is something you need to be prepared to deal with. There are a lot of resources available to you, on the internet and in books. Study up on the breed characteristics then make an informed decision.

Personally, I love pits and have owned two but, if dog aggression was a real concern for me, I wouldn't own one.

cyclefiend2000

Posted : 6/14/2006 9:48:23 AM

well put billy.

amstaffy

Posted : 6/14/2006 10:10:14 AM

As you know I have/live with several, APBT's and Am Satffs (dual registered)

I have had two animal aggressive dogs through my years, one who was a rescued pit fighter(our first) and the other from a well known breeder so the answer to the breeding really doesn't always play into it.

Animal aggression can be handled to an extent. If you are up to the responsibility I say take him on. Males generally, in my experience have been the more laid back regarding animal aggression. My experiences have been with the bitches. Neutering will help along with a firm hand/attitude. He MUST know what you will not accept, this breed takes cues easily and learns your voice, body language and demeanor enough to know when you are not happy. Since the breed only lives to please you positive training is a great place to start and limited corrections will probably be all you need since this boy sounds like a lover.

I'm here if you need me

Elizabeth

Posted : 6/16/2006 6:44:02 PM

Well, the owner of this puppy decided to just bring him to a shelter instead of trying to find him a good home[:@]. This shelter is one of the only ones in our area, and happens to be a kill shelter. The good news is that they've decided to put Lou (that's the puppy's name) into a foster home, instead of putting him to sleep!!!! I'm supposed to start renting a house in a couple weeks, so if he's not adopted by then I've decided to get him[

]. The good thing about adopting him from the shelter is that I'll know he's UTD on shots and they will have already checked him over to make sure he's healthy and worm free. So, keep your fingers crossed!!!! If I end up adopting him I'll be sure to let ya'll know. I'll post some pics of him that I got from the shelter's website.