Ethical Questions in Breed Rescue

The local shelter here deceptively labels scary-breed dogs, and I think it infantalizes prospective owners. 

Isn't the whole point of dog ownership responsibility and a long-term relationship? Pits are great dogs, but they aren't for everybody. No dog is for everybody. Owners should be walking out of shelters thinking about the entire life of the dog, and that is much more difficult when you are being sold a dog you may not want, or may not be able to have.

It's totally counterproductive.

The area that frustrates me is their naming of the herding dogs. They'll often just call something a "shepherd/lab mix" simply because it has short hair and somewhat of a black saddle. They've also mislabelled Aussie mixes as spaniels, for the longer hair I suppose. I guess I notice it more because herding dogs are my thing, terriers aren't.

I'm with you on this one, too.  I am amazed at some of the short-haired dogs (I'm talking houndy dense coat here) with no Aussie characteristics at all - zero, zip, nada, that end up in my classes.  Or, the endless "Shepherd mixes" that turn out to be Kelpies, ACD's, or hound mixes.
There really aren't many good ways to learn breed mix identification except experience, though - and some people are learning from shelter managers who know less than nothing about it.  Sue Sternberg tried to do something about that with her tape on breed mix ID, but I'm not aware of anyone else who has done that.  If any of you know, I'd like the information, though.  I'd get some tapes and donate to the local shelters...

We try our best at our shelter to ID dogs correctly by breed. The problem is that what one person sees as a pit mix, another person sees as a lab mix, so it depends on who is doing the IDing as to what the dog is called. [] That said, we joke that everything that comes in the door (given where we are located at) is either a shep x, a lab/lab x, or a beagle. Of course that's not true, but it's not far off either. We don't intentionally mislabel dogs, especially the bully breed dogs, but we will stress that this particular dog who is a pit mix also has a lot of lab, shep, border collie, etc. in him if we feel that the other breed characteristics are more dominant.

We have had a couple that surprised us though. I remember this cute little puppy, very wiry hair, cut like a schnauzer, but a big pup, around 4 months old (came in as a stray). Stubborn and dominant like a schnauzer. We labeled her as a giant schnauzer/irish wolfhound (I was on board with the schnau part but the wolfhound seemed a bit of a stretch!). Well, now that pup is a year old and they brought her in to see us. I'll be darned if she is anything but a bearded collie. So much for the schnauzer!

We try our best at our shelter to ID dogs correctly by breed. The problem is that what one person sees as a pit mix, another person sees as a lab mix, so it depends on who is doing the IDing as to what the dog is called.

Yeah, I try to let it go, but the one thing about it is that often it's easier to ID the dog just by watching it move.  For example, we had a black dog that to a non-dog person would look like a small lab with longer hair and smaller ears.  The shelter called it "lab mix".  Two minutes out in the run and everything about the dog said BORDER COLLIE.  Or, they had a little black and white dog with little muted spots (dunno the correct term).  It was a puppy so they couldn't know exactly how big it would get.  They called it a pit mix or something way off.  We had it out in the dog run and it was pointing at birds!  Hello, GSP mix anyone?

I just wish they'd ID the dog as they are watching it move rather than just looking at it in a cage for a few seconds.

I absolutely feel that purposely mislabeling a dog is wrong.  People need to choose the dog that is most compatible with thier lifestyles in order to have the best "fit".  JQP is trusting the shelter workers to help him reach that decision.  I would go home and look up the breeds in whatever the mixed is IDed as so that I could make the best choice possible

Late to the game on this thread, but had to share the story of how I got Rosco!

I was 22, just out of college, renting an apartment, and wanted to adopt a dog. I lived in downtown Boston (the North End) and went to a very reputable local shelter, where I saw a "beagle mix" puppy. He was brown and white, 25 lbs., cute and I had honestly never seen a pit bull in my life. So I adopted him. (His paperwork even says, beagle mix!)

If you look at my profile, it is clear that this little boy is no beagle mix. And, while I understand it is sometimes hard to ID breeds, and shelters have to make their best guess, I am certain this shelter knew/or had a very good idea what he was and just iced it over because they wanted to adopt him out. To adopt a pit to someone with my profile at the time (young, renting, no pit bull experience) was 110% irresponsible. I still get angry when I think about the hands he could have ended up in.

Fortunately, I am a responsible person, and when my vet told me what he really was, and that he would be 60 lbs. not 30, I didn't take him back to the shelter, I started reading to learn about the breed. When we moved, my husband and I had to search high and low to find a place we could rent and have him, when we bought our house we had to shop around for home owners insurance because some companies won't cover them, when we go out for a walk or tell anyone we own a pit it requires an explanation that they are great dogs, not blood-thirsty savages, etc. To own a pit is to be a breed activist, not just a dog owner.

Owning a pit is truly a great joy. Rosco is a once-in-a-lifetime dog, but with all the little challenges it adds to dog ownership (housing, insurance, etc.) it is just not fair to put adopters in that position without any info. Plus, it give the dog a smaller chance of staying in that adoptive home forever, which was the point of adopting the dog out originally!

Ok, so that's all. I will get off my soap box now![sm=soap%20box.gif]

ORIGINAL: Pit_Pointer_Aussie

Late to the game on this thread, but had to share the story of how I got Rosco!

I was 22, just out of college, renting an apartment, and wanted to adopt a dog. I lived in downtown Boston (the North End) and went to a very reputable local shelter, where I saw a "beagle mix" puppy. He was brown and white, 25 lbs., cute and I had honestly never seen a pit bull in my life. So I adopted him. (His paperwork even says, beagle mix!)

If you look at my profile, it is clear that this little boy is no beagle mix. And, while I understand it is sometimes hard to ID breeds, and shelters have to make their best guess, I am certain this shelter knew/or had a very good idea what he was and just iced it over because they wanted to adopt him out. To adopt a pit to someone with my profile at the time (young, renting, no pit bull experience) was 110% irresponsible. I still get angry when I think about the hands he could have ended up in.

Fortunately, I am a responsible person, and when my vet told me what he really was, and that he would be 60 lbs. not 30, I didn't take him back to the shelter, I started reading to learn about the breed. When we moved, my husband and I had to search high and low to find a place we could rent and have him, when we bought our house we had to shop around for home owners insurance because some companies won't cover them, when we go out for a walk or tell anyone we own a pit it requires an explanation that they are great dogs, not blood-thirsty savages, etc. To own a pit is to be a breed activist, not just a dog owner.

Owning a pit is truly a great joy. Rosco is a once-in-a-lifetime dog, but with all the little challenges it adds to dog ownership (housing, insurance, etc.) it is just not fair to put adopters in that position without any info. Plus, it give the dog a smaller chance of staying in that adoptive home forever, which was the point of adopting the dog out originally!

Ok, so that's all. I will get off my soap box now![sm=soap%20box.gif]

 
Great post and great story.
 
It is totally irresponsible and counterproductive to lie about a dogs breeds.  I've seen so many badly labeled shelter dogs around here.  I'm not talking about the hard to ID ones, but many many obvious pits or pit mixes here are labeled as anything but a pit in hopes of adopting them out, and I don't think this helps the dogs in the long run.  It isn't unreasonable for a person to not want to adopt certain breeds of dogs or to get people into a commitment of any breed, but especially legislated against ones, when they aren't informed on this decision.  Pit owners have to be willing to deal with much more than many dog owners and some people simply can't deal with that.  Whether it be the dog aggressiveness or the issues finding apartments to rent.  It's a lifetime commitment that shouldn't be taken lightly by the adopters or the rescues.  I understand why they do it- to try to save a dog's life, but I just can't see this is being right.
 
I know many shelters simply are bad at IDing breeds, but I do know that around here at least many shelters are simply dishonest about breeds and tend to gloss over the bully parts of the dogs.  Not good in my opinion.

I think calling the dog a "lab mix" or "boxer mix" is fine.... hook em in and when they fall in love then tell them what it's mixed with

I think that is very very wrong and I would be furious if someone at a shelter did that to me. I personally do not want a pit in my home,  My choice, I would hope that I, myself could tell if there was pit in a dog, but on the chance I couldn't,  I think it is wrong to try and deceive me. I think if a shelter purposely misrepresents a dog, they are doing a grave disservice to the adopter and the animal.
 
edited to add, I didn't mean to bash pitbulls, just not a dog I would ever want to own. I think they need to have a certain owner that knows how to train and manage them, not something I want or am qualified to do.

ORIGINAL: mudpuppy

The shelter has a responsibility to be up front and honest.

shelters usually have no idea what breed(s) the dogs are. They guess. Lots of mixed-breed dogs that haven't a drop of pit blood in them can look vaguely like a pit-mix.

mudpuppy is quite right that a lot of shelters don't know what mix the dog is.  Quite often, that happens in shelters staffed by volunteers, who do the best they can, but really aren't that well educated sometimes, or are new to it all.

I don't  understand how a person can go into a shelter, meet a dog and after some deliberation, adopt it and then turn around and bring it back because someone, somewhere suggested that it was a pit mix.

I don't agree with it, but I understand it - quite a few JQP's have an irrational fear of this breed, and since many of them have children, the fear becomes even more irrational... We even have people who come to this board, dog lovers, who have the same fear.  So, until they are educated, it'll probably always be an issue.

quote:

I don't understand how a person can go into a shelter, meet a dog and after some deliberation, adopt it and then turn around and bring it back because someone, somewhere suggested that it was a pit mix.

I don't agree with it, but I understand it - quite a few JQP's have an irrational fear of this breed, and since many of them have children, the fear becomes even more irrational... We even have people who come to this board, dog lovers, who have the same fear.  So, until they are educated, it'll probably always be an issue.

I don't think either of these statements are necessarily fair. The whole point of dog ownership is that you are supposed to hold onto the dog and take care of it until it dies, and shelters make this harder because they lead with the emotionally-driven idea that you are "saving" the dog. To stick to the topic, there are rational reasons for returning a pit or pit mix that are not about irrational fear or "someone, somewhere suggesting that it was a pit mix."

Pits are powerful and drivey, and that can scare people, and that's rational. They can be prone to dog aggression, and that can scare people or turn them off, and that is rational. Sometimes home insurance can get cancelled or all messed up if you are honest about owning a "dangerous" dog. It is rational not to want that.

Of course, in a perfect world, people would do a lot of research before they get a dog, would always get the dog they wanted, and would never, ever get a dog for emotional reasons. But shelters make this hard, just like pet stores do. Shelters, by fronting with the idea that you are "saving" the dog, can make it easy to make an emotionally driven decision that works in the short term but not in the long term.

I can see someone falling for the idea of "saving" a dog that is completely inappropriate for one's needs, and figuring out quickly that the dog is too intense, too big, too drivey or too not-into other dogs. And I can see how mislabeling a dog would exacerbate this problem.