Pit-bull ban proponent says Denver paper threatened to pull political ad after ban critics complained

Recently Denmark made it’s Ban on 13 pit bull type dogs permanent across the country.

The Ban on pit bulls in one King County city will remain.
Enumclaw, WA. Bans pit bulls and the Enumclaw City Council was looking at an ordinance to end the ban.
After more than an hour of public comments were heard, the city council voted unanimously to keep the ban.

The Burlington City Council upheld an ordinance that bans pit bulls after hearing feedback from members of the community Monday Oct.6th in Burlington N.D.

LaFayette, Tennessee enacted a highly restrictive pit bull type dog BSL requiring it be registered with AC, a short leash, muzzle, confirmed kennel, photo, sign, no resale or transfer within the city.

Carroll County, Miss. recently enacted a pit bull Ban as well with all grandfathered pit bull type dogs having to be leaches, muzzled, kenneled with liability insurance.

Reynoldsburg, Ohio & Yakima WA both recently reaffirmed their pit bull type dog BSL Bans and kept them in place.!

FORT THOMAS, Ky, A 26 year ban on owning a pit bull in the city of Fort Thomas was kept in place Aug.4th after attempts to have it over turned were rejected by city council.

Over 700 Cities, Towns & 40 Counties in the US currently have BSL against pit bull type dogs as do over 40 other countries.

In the Prov. of Ontario in Canada Pit Bull type dogs have been banned in all 444 cities and towns in Ontario.

Country’s,
Cities, county’s, Provinces, Military Services & Towns where Pit
Bulls type Dogs are Banned or severely restricted:

https://www dot scribd dot com/doc/56495216/Estimated-U-S-Cities-Counties-States-and-Military-Facilities-with-Breed-Specific-Pit-Bull-Laws

Animal Planet
Pit Bulls Already Banned in a Dozen Countries
By Terrence McCoy Wed., Feb. 27 2013
Pit bulls have been banned the world over as well as over 700 cities, towns and counties in the US alone.

The prohibition on the pit bull type dog wouldn’t be anything unusual.
In 1989, Miami may have been one of the first communities to ban pit bulls — but it sure hasn’t been the last, raising questions as to whether it’s only a matter of time before every municipality imposes some sort of regulation on the animal.

Already, more than a dozen countries have banned pit bulls, making it, quite possibly, the most regulated and feared dog in the canine world.
Composed from various online resources, here’s a breakdown of the bans and regulations:

Countries that have enacted regulation on pit bulls (or some deviation):
**In 1991, Singapore prohibited the entry of pit bulls into the country.
**In 1993, the Netherlands banned pit bulls.
**In 1997, Poland enacted legislation enforcing pit bull owners to display “clear warning signs” and keep the animal behind reinforced fencing.
**In 2000, France banned pit bulls. The goal was to let the breed “die out.”
**In 2001, Germany banned pit bulls.
**In 2001, Puerto Rico banned pit bulls.
**In 2003, New Zealand banned the importation of pit bulls.
**In 2004, Italy banned pit bulls.
**In 2009, Australia prohibited the imports of pit bulls.
**In 2009, Ecuador banned pit bulls as pets.
**In 2010, Denmark banned pit bulls and pit bull breeding.
**In 2014, Venezuela will ban pit bulls.

Nationwide, a ban on pit bulls is also far from exceptional.
Cities that have laid down some sort of legislation:
Sioux City, Iowa
Council Bluffs, Iowa
Independence, Missouri
Royal City, Washington
Denver, Colorado
Springfield, Missouri
Youngstown, Ohio;
Melvindale, Michigan
Livingston County, Michigan.

MIKE JOYNER –
“As a judge in Environmental Court who has had to deal with numerous cases of dog on dog and dog on human attacks, I can without any bias say that pit bulls are a dangerous breed. The facts speak for themselves. You cannot argue against the data.

My wife owns a doggie daycare and I have dealt with every possible breed. In the six years she has been opened there have been over 1600 dogs that have been through the doors with the exception of the pit bull. Her liability insurance company will not insure her if she takes pit bulls, and as much as I love ALL dogs I do not trust pit bulls around children or other dogs.

I have been on the bench for several cases where a pit bull attacked a child and literally pulled the scalp off of a 12 year old girl’s head. It was a neighbor’s dog and she had pet it a week before the incident, which occurred in her own backyard with the pit bull jumped the fence and attacked her without any provocation or warning. I have had numerous cases where a pit bull attacked another dog and held it down or shook it until it was dead…even in the presence of the owner of the pit bull who could do nothing to separate the dogs.

“Knowing what I know I would be negligent if I promoted pit bulls as pets to any family with children or neighbors with pets.”

Remove the ban and people, mostly kids will die,hundreds of people will receive life changing attacks which unlike other normal dog bites will involve years of plastic reconstruction.

In 2014 35 people have been killed by dogs. 31 of them by pit bulls.

Pit bull is not one breed of dog. It is not any breed of dog. It’s a label. Not an accurate term to describe any dog. It’s a term of endearment or a term used to instill fear or hate.

More then 70,000 attacks by pit bull type dogs last year against people, pets and livestock of which over 45,000 deaths in those attacks with the number likely double this year that Kill, Maul, Maim, Disfigure, Dismember, cause Life Flights or trips to the Intensive Care Unit.

With a human being usually am child killed every 7 days this year, what about those numbers do you NOT understand??????

The Myth:

“There’s no such breed as a pit bull.” “Pit bulls aren’t a breed; they are just a ‘type’ of dog.”

The Reality:

The term “pit bull” in lower-case letters refers to three closely-related breeds. The original breed was the Staffordshire Bull Terrier, a dog bred for pit fighting in the 18th and 19th centuries in the UK.

After importation to the U.S. in the late 19th century, they continued to be used for fighting, but were bred to be taller and heavier.

These larger cousins were then registered in the UKC as “American Pit Bull Terriers” (1898) and in the AKC as the “American Staffordshire Terrier” (1936). Note that these are identical breeds under two different names, and many individuals hold conformation championships in both registries.

In addition, some of the original, smaller dogs were reimported from the UK and were recognized in the AKC as the original “Staffordshire Bull Terriers” (1935).

A recent ASPCA study revealed that 93% of shelter workers were able to properly identify a “pit bull,” meaning one of the three closely-related (or identical) breeds above (click here to see the study).

The American Pit Bull Terrier is actually one of the purest and oldest of registered breeds. The second-largest national kennel club in the world, the UKC, was originally founded in 1898 for the express purposed of registering fighting pit bulls.

For approximately the first 50 years, a pit bull not only had to be purebred, but had to win 3 dog fights in order to be registered with the UKC. Today, these dogs’ descendants compete to win prizes in conformation, weight pull, and other sports.

Thousands have earned the title of UKC Conformation Champion.

Verdict: The three “pit bull” breeds, including the American Pit Bull Terrier, are just as purebred as St. Bernards, Schnauzers or Dalmatians

The CDC stopped trying to identify breeds in fatalities after 1998 because it was inaccurate in mixed breed dogs that killed of which the majority of fatalities each year are caused by mixed breed dogs.

Implications for Veterinarians and Other Dog Professionals

It is customary in our society to look at a dog and guess its breed or breed composition. In fact, our reporting on dogs (for example: in a veterinarian’s record-keeping, when licensed or when admitted to an animal care and control agency) will usually require these guesses. Statistical compilations of these guesses then make their way into official or academic reports that influence how we view – even how we may feel we ought to regulate – different “breeds” of dogs.

An article by two veterinarians and an attorney published in November 2012 in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) has considered the implications of these undisputed findings for veterinary practice, and recommends that veterinarians stop attempting to assign breed labels to mixed-breed dogs whose parentage they do not know. Click on the thumbnail for NCRC’s summary of the JAVMA paper

[Article%20Rethinking%20Dog%20Breed%20Identification%20in%20Veterinary%20Practices%20Available%20in%20JAVMA_thumbnail]

NCRC has developed a series of posters that further illustrate the problem with visual breed identification. The photos on each poster (below) were obtained from the Mars Wisdom Panel® website, along with the DNA analysis of each dog pictured. Look at each picture, then compare your guess with the DNA analysis at the bottom.

German Shep. Visual ID Poster Visual ID poster Labrador Visual ID Poster – “Pit Bulls”

Breed labels assigned to dogs of unknown origin are usually inaccurate. We need a different and more effective way of identifying and thinking about the many dogs of unknown parentage in our midst.

Read and Learn.

Expand your understanding with these additional resources:

The Relevance of Breed in Selecting a Companion Dog, Janis Bradley

Video Interview with Janis Bradley

Breed Labeling Dogs of Unknown Origin, Amy Marder, V.M.D., CAAB and Bernice Clifford, CPDT

Breed Specific or Looks Specific, Kristopher Irizarry, Ph.D.

Video Interview with Dr. Kristopher Irizarry

Don’t Let Liability Hysteria Keep You From Sending Good Dogs Home, Bonnie Lutz, Esq.

Breeds and Behavior, by Janis Bradley, The Bark, April/May 2011.

Canadian study shows no difference in suitability as pets between “pit bull” dogs and other kinds of dogs, MacNeil et al

It’s Not Just Semantics, Words Do Matter, by Pamela J. Reid, Ph.D., CAAB.

Swedish Study found no link between modern breeds and their traditional work.

A study by Dr. Victoria Voith showed that 87.5%

of dogs that were identified by DNA were not labelled correctly by the adoption agency. Click here

to see a poster of ‘Comparison of Adoption Agency Breed Indentication and DNA Breed Identification of Dogs’ by Dr. Victoria Voith. This poster is a great visual tool to gain insight into how there is little correlation between a shelter staff breed mix guess, regardless of experience, and the DNA the DNA analysis.

Many people have preconceived ideas about what breed of dog would suit them and their lifestyle. This can stem from family experience, media, marketing and myths. In this link, Janis Bradley discusses the relevance of breed when a person is searching to purchase a pet. There needs to be a shift in how we as a community, and how shelter protocols continue to create unrealistic expectations of how a dog ‘should’ behave based on a breed label.

If breed labelling is inaccurate, why do we do it?

Many Australian shelters and pounds advertise a dog by its breed. This advertising has a high probability of being inaccurate and can lead to a false misrepresentaion. But, it can also decrease the chances of the dog being adopted. For example, not everyone is looking for a Terrier mix, but many people may be looking for a small, friendly and loyal dog. So what is being suggested by the experts? Do not guess a breed. Advertise the dog for its qualities and merits to optimise its chances of finding a home and finding its perfect match. Improved human-canine matches also decrease the likelihood of the dog being resurrendered to the shelter. Inaccurate breed guessing can also have fatal consequences for dogs that visually appear similar to the dogs that are included in breed specific legislation. The National Canine Research Council state that dog breed identification is no basis for shelter policy and Animal Farm Foundation encourage shelters to assist potential adopters to view each animal as an individual, regardless of current software requirements. Please click on the poster to download your free copy.

What is Breed Specific Legislation?

The National Canine Research Council defines breed specific legislations (BSL) as:

“Breed-specific legislation is a law or ordinance passed by a legislative body pertaining to a specific breed(s) of dog, and/or to any dogs that appear they may be mixes of those breeds. The most drastic form of BSL is a complete ban; but BSL also includes any laws or governmental regulations that impose other requirements or limitations on specific breeds or mixes: mandatory spay-neuter, mandatory muzzling, special liability insurance requirements, special licensing, property posting requirements, enclosure requirements, breed-specific pet limit laws, sale or transfer notification requirements, and prohibitions in government and military housing. BSL, in all of its forms, results in the destruction of many pet dogs.”

The Australian Government, Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry has banned the importation of the Japanese Tosas, Dogo Argentino, Fila Brasileiro and the Perro de Presa Canario or Presa Canario and Pit Bull Terrier or American Pit Bull.

Click here to view the state by state legislation

Click here to view the changes in Victorian legislation

In Australia in 1927, there was an import ban on the German Shepherd which lasted up to 1974. It was based around the ideology that this particular breed was a sheep killer. The assumption was that if the German Shepherd mated with the Dingo, it would produce a ‘super sheep killer’. It was not scientific based, just like breed specific legislation. While Australia was banning the importation of the German Shepherd, in 1928 this same dog breed became the world first civilian seeing-eye dog in the United States. His name was Buddy, and a statue of this dog can be found out the front of The Seeing Eye Dog headquarters in Morristown, New Jersey.

Click here to see Buddy

The Australian Veterinary Association (AVA) does not support breed-specific legislation for dog bite prevention, because experience in other countries has shown that such legislation has failed to reduce the frequency of dog bites. Since there is NO registered breed called the Pit Bull, there is no DNA test to identify a dog as a Pit Bull or Pit Bull cross. The breed that the media and legislation refer to as the Pit Bull is the American Pit Bull Terrier, Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Bull Terrier, American Bulldog and English Bulldog.

A blanket ban for the ‘Pit Bull’ is based on the assumption that all ‘Pit Bulls’ are aggressive. Many Australians assume that when they purchase a Labrador Retriever it will be just as obedient as the Guide Dog. It is the intense training that produces the end product in both the fighting dog and the Guide Dog, not the breed. The media and some Shelter Directors continue to release misinformed and uneducated opinions that have caused myths, opinions and has influenced politicians into passing legislation that kills innocent dogs and does not make the community safer.

Karen Delise, Founder and Director of Research at the National Canine Research Council is the author of The Pit Bull Placebo. It has taken more than twenty years of reserach to create an accurate report on the media, myths and politics of canine aggression. It includes a history on breed demonisation, common myths of the Pit Bull like the lock jaw, canine aggression and the real reason for dog attacks. This book is highly recommended to all people that seek answers to understanding dog bite prevention. Please click on the link to download your free copy.

Brad Griggs, Director of Canine Services International specialising in canine aggression and lecturer at the National Dog Trainers Federation in Melbourne Australia, says that “In my professional experience, breed consistently proves to be a poor predictor of aggression”. He also adds that “While the animal management community is forced by poor legislation to enforce laws that focus on breed instead of individual temperament, the public is lulled into a false sense of security that dog bite prevention starts and ends with a handful of breeds.”

In 2003, Italy revoked BSL and replaced it with legislation that made the owner accountable and in 2009, Italy scrapped the dangerous list of 17 breeds altogether and has since reduced the number of dog attacks dramatically. Click here to read about Italy

Overcoming Obstacles To Success

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What’s Wrong with Breed-Specific Laws?

BSL carries a host of negative and wholly unintended consequences:

Dogs go into hiding

Rather than give up their beloved pets, owners of highly regulated or banned breeds often attempt to avoid detection of their “outlaw” dogs by restricting outdoor exercise and socialization and forgoing licensing, microchipping and proper veterinary care, including spay/neuter surgery and essential vaccinations. Such actions have implications both for public safety and the health of these dogs.

Good owners and dogs are punished

BSL also causes hardship to responsible owners of entirely friendly, properly supervised and well-socialized dogs who happen to fall within the regulated breed. Although these dog owners have done nothing to endanger the public, they are required to comply with local breed bans and regulations unless they are able to mount successful (and often costly) legal challenges.

They impart a false sense of security

Breed-specific laws have a tendency to compromise rather than enhance public safety. When limited animal control resources are used to regulate or ban a certain breed of dog, without regard to behavior, the focus is shifted away from routine, effective enforcement of laws that have the best chance of making our communities safer: dog license laws, leash laws, animal fighting laws, anti-tethering laws, laws facilitating spaying and neutering and laws that require all owners to control their dogs, regardless of breed.

– See more at: https://antibsl.com/bsl-facts#sthash.P7ENBy7I.dpuf

“the U.S. had a grand total of 15 dog attack fatalities:

9 by pit bulls, 2 by Dobermans, four by unidentified

mutts.” ,, you see this is were i have the problem, you see BSL targets pitbulls and assuming this statements right then, that means even if BSL works a charm what about the 6 deaths involving non pitbulls?? doesn’t anyone care about them? just because it wasn’t a pitbull that killed them they’re still dead, So these 6 dead mean nothing and it’s perfectly acceptable for there to be deaths by dog attacks so long as they’re not pitbulls?? this is the massive big hole in the logic of BSL it only protects and or prevents victims of pitbulls not any other breed it’s as if they’re saying there’s an acceptable level of deaths by dog? Any law for it to work has to breed neutral as that’s the only way to stop all the deaths BSL on;y effectively is meant to stop pitbull bites??

What Is The Solution?

There are several dangerous dog laws out there that are geared towards owners and individual dogs with no mention of any breed. Owners need to be held responsible for their dog?s behavior – if an owner cannot properly train or socialize a dog, let alone an APBT, then that person should not have a dog. It is high time that dogs stopped being killed after biting another dog or a person, it is not hard to reform a biter and why should the dog have to suffer for the idiocy of their owner. Unless the dog has an irreversible medical condition causing the aggression, every and all biting dogs should be given a second chance. Humans need to step back and realize that dogs do not go out and seek little children to gnaw on, there is no feeling of malice being expressed by these dogs – in fact, MOST bites occur because of miscommunication between humans and dogs, why should the dogs be killed and not the people? If both made a mistake, both need to learn what is proper and appropriate and a dog is more than capable of being taught discrimination (say between a squeaky toy and a screaming child) and proper behaviors.

The term “numbers needed to ban” (NNB) is coined to describe this statistical parameter. In the paper, the authors calculate several outcome scenarios based on statistics available from data published in the dog bite literature, such as emergency department visits due to dog bite injury, reconstructive surgery following a dog bite, and frequency of hospitalizations because of a dog bite injury. For all calculations result showed that the numbers needed to ban, based on a particular set of assumptions, were extremely high, therefore, indicating impracticality and implausibility of BSL.

In this writer’s opinion, the argument presented in this paper, using this kind of statistical analysis, is compelling. Nevertheless, the impact the science reported in this paper might have on an emotive real-world problem like dog bite frequency is dubious because of what the authors identify as a “perceptual gap” – that is, the gap between (a) what scientifically is correct and (b) what people believe due to their own biases and belief structures.

The authors believe this gap exists in part because of the widespread fear people have of certain types of dogs, created largely through the dissemination of misinformation about dogs and through highly publicized events in which people are severely attacked or killed by a dog. People feel the need to immediately control the problem, hence the knee-jerk reaction favoring the implementation of BSL. The authors conclude that BSL is based largely on fear, and that animal care professionals need to enlighten the public and policy makers about the widespread faulty beliefs that exist concerning the behavioral nature of certain breeds, and about the lack of effectiveness of breed-specific legislation in curtailing the dog bite problem. Expert Breed Specific Legislation

“Breed-specific” legislation (BSL) is, essentially, canine bigotry. More specifically, the term refers to regional laws that ban or regulate certain breeds of dog in the hopes of reducing attacks on humans.

Not only is BSL unjust, it just doesn’t work. Anywhere. And the stats prove it.

Because of this, many cities (and states and countries) have repealed their antiquated BSL laws over the years, but far too many cities and municipalities (including Denver and Miami) have them intact.

Legalized discrimination, much? These laws are based on nothing more than misconceptions, misinformation and fear.

So, here are ten facts about BSL, and what you can do to take action:

1. BSL Kills.

Because of these BSL (and widespread misinformation), pit bulls have almost no chance of survival in public shelters. In many regions, they’re killed immediately upon shelter admission, with no opportunity to find a new home. Their euthanasia rate, overall, hovers around a staggering 93 percent.

2. Dog Bite Fatalities are Extremely Rare.

Between 1999 and 2006, an average of 27 Americans died each year as a result of a dog attack, according to a Journal of the American Medical Association report. Meanwhile, estimates suggest an average of 40 to 50 Americans die each year from lightning strikes.

3. There’s No Evidence That Banning Breeds has Any Impact on Dog Bites.

Period.

Stop calling dogs pit bulls. It is not an accurate term for any dog type.

Fatal dog attacks in the United States

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article contains an incomplete list(s), which may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding the list(s) with reliably sourced entries.

Fatal dog attack scenarios include escaped guard dogs and children wandering into their territory.

Fatal dog attacks in the United States are a small percentage of the relatively common occurrences of dog bites. While at least 4.5 – 4.7 million Americans (2%) are bitten by dogs every year, only about 0.0002% of these (less than 0.00001% of the U.S. population) result in death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which published a special report on the subject in 2000.[1]

The second part of this article consists of an annotated list of individual U.S. dog-attack fatalities. The list is not meant to be exhaustive nor conclusive. It relies mostly on news reports as references, but at points it runs concurrent with studies reviewed in the first part and may include information from the studies at those points. Care has been and should continue to be taken that this information is verifiable in the sources and that any contradictions or other indications that the information might not be valid are addressed reasonably. Nevertheless, the reader should bear in mind that data from news investigations is generally less reliable than information from published scholarly studies, and that where specific breeds listed, they are rarely based on conclusive proof of ancestry.

The tables that follow the list summarize the data from the list by age group of victim(s), and by category of dog(s) involved. In addition to the main list, it is also important to ensure the continued accuracy of these two tables.

Understanding how a dog’s appearance is determined by its DNA helps explain why the DNA test is better than a visual breed identification. Visual identification is based upon the observation of a handful of variable breed-associated physical traits, such as coat color, body size, skull shape and whether the ears or erect or floppy. These physical traits are found in many different breeds and are controlled by approximately 50 of the roughly 20,000 genes that create a dog. Sometimes, a breed may exhibit a certain physical trait because all the members in the breed have exactly the same version of the gene that encodes the trait.

If this trait is recessive (for example like the trait associated with long fur), only dogs with two of the same version of the gene will exhibit long fur. If one of these dogs is the ancestor of a mixed- breed dog, the mixed-breed dog may contain both the DNA for the recessive version of the trait (long fur) and the dominant version of the trait (short fur). However, the long-haired recessive appearance will not be observed because the dominant short-haired DNA would determine the visual appearance of coat length (making it short). Subsequently, the visual identification of breed would inaccurately specify short-haired breeds based upon the visual observation of short hair.

The DNA test would be able to detect the recessive version of the gene for the long hair along with the dominant version of DNA for the short-hair and the DNA test result would use that information to determine the breed. The DNA results might report both long-haired and short-haired breeds in the dog’s ancestry even though the dog only has short-hair. Coat length is not the only trait that can be “hidden” from visual observation due to dominant and recessive patterns of genetic inheritance in dogs.

Although the genetic test may not assess every gene or even each physical attribute of a dog, the regions of the genome that it uses to assess breed take into account much more information than visual observation. The DNA test is better than visual breed identification because it takes into account the pattern of genetic variation at many different regions across the dog genome to generate a “genetic snapshot” of a mixed-breed dog’s ancestry. The resulting genetic evidence for what breeds make up a mixed-breed dog may or may not agree with visual observations, but they do agree with what scientists have discovered from two decades of sequencing and studying genomes.

While breed identification by DNA analysis is more accurate than visual breed identification, it’s important to remember that neither identifies genetic markers influencing specific traits, or predicts behavior of any particular dog. Each dog is an individual, and its physical and behavioral traits will be the result of multiple factors.

– See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/breed-identification-1/#sthash.ABBc3tKN.dpuf

Inaccuracy of Breed Labels Assigned to Dogs of Unknown Origin

Victoria Voith, PhD, DVM, DACVB, and colleagues from Western University of Health Sciences originally compared the breed identifications assigned by adoption agencies to dogs of unknown parentage with DNA breed analysis of the same dogs. They found low agreement between the two. Their findings, first published in 2009, are presented in the following two documents:

Two separate, additional studies conducted at the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Florida, further confirm the unreliability of visual breed identification used by dog adoption agencies, animal control (lost and found), and in regulation. Click below to read NCRC’s two whitepapers discussing the significance of the findings in each, and to view the poster associated with the first study.

Observers Don’t Agree on Breed Identifications

In a second paper published in 2013, Dr. Voith and her colleagues surveyed more than 900 people in dog-related professions and services and showed that respondents frequently disagreed with each other when making visual breed identifications of the same dog, and that their opinions may or may not have correlated with DNA breed analysis.More than 70% of the study participants reported that now or at one time, their breed descriptors were used in record keeping. The results of the survey call into question the validity of a variety of data that has been collected over the decades pertaining to breed identification of dogs.

Reliabiltiy of DNA Breed Identification

We take very seriously the reliability of the studies on which we report and understand that there are those who are skeptical of breed identification obtained through DNA analysis. And indeed, it is important to note that DNA identification is not 100% accurate when analyzing mixed-breed dogs, nor do the companies who conduct the analyses claim it to be so. At the time Dr. Victoria Voith conducted the first of these studies, the accuracy of the Mars Wisdom Panel® used in the studies was reported to be 84%, for identification of breed in F1 crosses (offspring of 2 different registered purebreds). Accuracy is currently reported to be 90%. The Mars Wisdom Panel®, is specifically intended for mixed-breed dogs. The test was developed by analyzing more than 19 million genetic markers taken from 13,000 dogs.

We can say with confidence, that this documented rate of accuracy for DNA analysis is much higher than that achieved by looking at the dog for at least 2 reasons:

•In Genetics and the Social Behavior of the Dog, a seminal work on dogs and the significance of documented pedigree, John Paul Scott and John L. Fuller showed that that even F1 crosses very rarely have much physical resemblance to either of their parents’ breeds.

Understanding how a dog’s appearance is determined by its DNA helps explain why the DNA test is better than a visual breed identification. Visual identification is based upon the observation of a handful of variable breed-associated physical traits, such as coat color, body size, skull shape and whether the ears or erect or floppy. These physical traits are found in many different breeds and are controlled by approximately 50 of the roughly 20,000 genes that create a dog. Sometimes, a breed may exhibit a certain physical trait because all the members in the breed have exactly the same version of the gene that encodes the trait.

If this trait is recessive (for example like the trait associated with long fur), only dogs with two of the same version of the gene will exhibit long fur. If one of these dogs is the ancestor of a mixed- breed dog, the mixed-breed dog may contain both the DNA for the recessive version of the trait (long fur) and the dominant version of the trait (short fur). However, the long-haired recessive appearance will not be observed because the dominant short-haired DNA would determine the visual appearance of coat length (making it short). Subsequently, the visual identification of breed would inaccurately specify short-haired breeds based upon the visual observation of short hair.

The DNA test would be able to detect the recessive version of the gene for the long hair along with the dominant version of DNA for the short-hair and the DNA test result would use that information to determine the breed. The DNA results might report both long-haired and short-haired breeds in the dog’s ancestry even though the dog only has short-hair. Coat length is not the only trait that can be “hidden” from visual observation due to dominant and recessive patterns of genetic inheritance in dogs.

Although the genetic test may not assess every gene or even each physical attribute of a dog, the regions of the genome that it uses to assess breed take into account much more information than visual observation. The DNA test is better than visual breed identification because it takes into account the pattern of genetic variation at many different regions across the dog genome to generate a “genetic snapshot” of a mixed-breed dog’s ancestry. The resulting genetic evidence for what breeds make up a mixed-breed dog may or may not agree with visual observations, but they do agree with what scientists have discovered from two decades of sequencing and studying genomes.

While breed identification by DNA analysis is more accurate than visual breed identification, it’s important to remember that neither identifies genetic markers influencing specific traits, or predicts behavior of any particular dog. Each dog is an individual, and its physical and behavioral traits will be the result of multiple factors.

Pit bull is not a breed of dog.

ARAGON, SPAIN

Spain passed the Dangerous Animals Act in 2000, placing restrictions on nine breeds of dogs and dogs possessing “characteristics” of those breeds. A scientific study analyzing dog bites reported to the Aragon health department during a five year period before the Act was passed (1995 to 1999) and the five year period after passage (2000 to 2004) found that there was no significant difference in the number of dog bites in Spain before or after the Dangerous Animals Act passed.

Furthermore, the study found that the most popular breeds (none of which were targeted by the legislation) were responsible for the most bites both before and after passage of the BSL. The targeted breeds accounted for a very small portion of bites both before and after passage of the BSL. The scientists concluded that there was no rational basis for Spain’s BSL.

Ed Boks, Executive director, Yavapai Humane Society (responsible Jan 2004 as director City Center for Animal Care & Control in NYC for trying to rename pit bulls New Yorkies; is pb owner)

Pit bull type dogs represent 3000% the actuarial risk compared to other types of dogs.
Insurance companies will have calculated the risks the other listed breeds represent based on what they’ve had to pay out through the years.

This isn’t ‘prejudice’, this is cold statistical reality. Actuarial realities don’t yield to sentiment or a feeling of entitlement — they just are what they are

well all you haters: here’s just something you will have to live with: there are 100’s of thousands, maybe millions of dogs people call “pit bulls” or “pitties” or “pibbles” or “blockheads” in this country. They are owned by average people, who love them. 99% of them, like 99% of all dogs, will never cause a moment of trouble other than pee’ing on the floor or eating a sock. They are JUST dogs, not cheetahs or lions. Their owners are JUST ordinary people, not monsters or abusers or dogfighters. That’s just the plain truth. The millions of people who love their dogs (whose numbers are reflected by the number of “likes” for various positive pit bull Facebook pages, as I mentioned in another comment) are the vast majority, compared to the few pathetic losers who spam comment sections like this and put together their Facebook pages and websites spewing hatred and encouraging acts of cruelty against innocent dogs. And that’s why BSL is falling all over this country (despite the few setbacks). The vote to rescind in Aurora may fail, under the weight of the biased, irresponsible “journalism” and hysteria promulgated by the Sentinel and the willingness to lie by the Aurora Animal Control. But the direction of history is clear: Just as marriage equality is becoming reality because Americans understand the truth: that people who love each other want to be married to the ones they love, and why not? and in the same way, discriminatory laws against dogs with a certain appearance are falling because Americans understand the truth: that it’s unenforceable, unfair, cruel, ineffective and divisive. The vote may fail, but progress continues. Some day, even the Denver ban will fall. In the end, hatred and lies lose.

Actually Foamer Talk……but that was a GREAT Freudian slip! 🙂

Banaine, the same goes for anti propagandists. Look at some of the comments on “The pitbull propaganda machine revealed”, or a mirad of other anti satirical pitbull sites.

They were NEVER known as the nanny dog. That is a clever bit of propaganda created in the 1970s by a group of pit breeders trying to gain acceptance into the AKC. Some old pictures of children posing with pit bulls does not mean they were great around children. There are so very many tragedies concerning family pit bulls suddenly attacking a child- ending in death all too often. Don’t take that chance.

A new national survey commissioned by Best Friends Animal Society reveals that 84 percent of those polled believe that local, state or federal governments should not infringe on a person’s right to own whatever breed of dog they choose.

This survey*, conducted by Luntz Global, is consistent with a growing trend by many state and local governments that have repealed breed discriminatory provisions and enacted behavior-based, breed-neutral dangerous dog laws. Of the 850 polled, 59 percent were dog owners. Only four percent of those polled believed the federal government should dictate what breed of dog a person could own, while six percent supported state government restrictions and 11 percent local government limits.

Supporting the survey is the fact that 17 states have passed laws that prohibit cities and counties from banning or restricting dogs because of breed. Even the American Bar Association passed a Resolution 100 in August, 2012 calling for all political subdivisions to repeal breed discriminatory provisions.

ASPCA Position

Although multiple communities have been studied where breed-specific legislation has been enacted, no convincing data indicates this strategy has succeeded anywhere to date (Klaassen et al., 1996; Ott et al., 2007; Rosado, 2007). Conversely, studies can be referenced that evidence clear, positive effects of carefully crafted, breed-neutral laws (Bradley, 2006). It is, therefore, the ASPCA’s position to oppose any state or local law to regulate or ban dogs based on breed. The ASPCA recognizes that dangerous dogs pose a community problem requiring serious attention. However, in light of the absence of scientific data indicating the efficacy of breed-specific laws, and the unfair and inhumane targeting of responsible pet guardians and their dogs that inevitably results when these laws are enacted, the ASPCA instead favors effective enforcement of a combination of breed-neutral laws that hold reckless dog guardians accountable for their dogs’ aggressive behavior. Ideally, a breed-neutral approach should include the following:

Enhanced enforcement of dog license laws, with adequate fees to augment animal control budgets and surcharges on ownership of unaltered dogs to help fund low-cost pet sterilization programs in the communities in which the fees are collected. To ensure a high licensing rate, Calgary, Canada—its animal control program funded entirely by license fees and fines—imposes a $250 penalty for failure to license a dog over three months of age (Calgary Responsible Pet Ownership Bylaw, 2006).

Laws that mandate the sterilization of shelter animals, ideally before adoption, and make low-cost sterilization services widely available. (See ASPCA Position Statement on Mandatory Spay/Neuter Laws, 2008[link])

Enhanced enforcement of leash/dog-at-large laws, with adequate penalties to ensure that the laws are taken seriously and to augment animal control funding.

Dangerous dog laws that are breed-neutral and focus on the behavior of the individual guardian and dog (taking care to ensure that common puppy behaviors such as jumping up, rough play and nipping are not deemed evidence of dangerousness). Graduated penalties should include mandated sterilization and microchipping (or other permanent identification) of dogs deemed dangerous, and options for mandating muzzling, confinement, adult supervision, training and owner education. In aggravated circumstances—such as where the dog seriously injures or kills a person, or a qualified behaviorist who has personally evaluated the dog determines that the dog poses a substantial risk of such behavior—euthanasia may be justified. In Multnomah County, Oregon, a breed-neutral ordinance imposing graduated penalties on dogs and guardians according to the seriousness of the dog’s behavior has reduced repeat injurious bites from 25 percent to seven percent (Bradley, 2006).

Laws that hold dog guardians financially accountable for a failure to adhere to animal control laws, as well as civilly and criminally liable for unjustified injuries or damage caused by their dogs. Calgary, Canada, has reduced reported incidents of aggression by 56 percent and its bite incidents by 21 percent by requiring guardians of dogs who have displayed aggression to dogs or to humans to pay fines ranging from $250 to $1500 (Calgary Responsible Pet Ownership Bylaw, 2006).

Laws that prohibit chaining or tethering (taking care also to prohibit unreasonable confinement once a dog is removed from a chain), coupled with enhanced enforcement of animal cruelty and animal fighting laws. Lawrence, Kansas, significantly reduced dog fighting and cruelty complaints by enacting an ordinance prohibiting tethering a dog for more than one hour (Belt, 2006).

Further, the ASPCA supports a community-based approach to resolving the reckless guardian/dangerous dog question whereby all stakeholders—animal control, animal shelters, medical and veterinary professionals, civic groups, teachers, public officials—collectively identify an appropriate dog bite prevention strategy. Central to this model is an “advisory council or task force representing a wide spectrum of community concerns and perspectives” whose members review available dog bite data, current laws, and “sources of ineffectiveness” and recommend realistic and enforceable policy, coupled with outreach to the media and educational efforts directed at those in regular contact with “dog owners and potential victims” (e.g., medical and veterinary professionals, animal control/shelters, teachers) (AVMA, 2001).

In summary, the ASPCA advocates the implementation of a community dog bite prevention program encompassing media and educational outreach in conjunction with the enactment, and vigorous enforcement, of breed-neutral laws that focus on the irresponsible and dangerous behavior of individual guardians and their dogs. The ASPCA believes that this approach—promoting education in the appropriate care, training and supervision of dogs as well as state and local laws that address licensing, reproductive status, chaining/improper confinement, cruel treatment and at-large dogs; imposing civil and criminal liability on guardians for their negligent and reckless behavior; and targeting problematic dogs and guardians early with progressively escalating penalties—constitutes the most compassionate, fair, efficient and ultimately effective means of resolving concerns related to dangerous dogs in the community.

What’s Wrong with Breed-Specific Laws?

BSL carries a host of negative and wholly unintended consequences:

Dogs go into hiding

Rather than give up their beloved pets, owners of highly regulated or banned breeds often attempt to avoid detection of their “outlaw” dogs by restricting outdoor exercise and socialization and forgoing licensing, microchipping and proper veterinary care, including spay/neuter surgery and essential vaccinations. Such actions have implications both for public safety and the health of these dogs.

Good owners and dogs are punished

BSL also causes hardship to responsible owners of entirely friendly, properly supervised and well-socialized dogs who happen to fall within the regulated breed. Although these dog owners have done nothing to endanger the public, they are required to comply with local breed bans and regulations unless they are able to mount successful (and often costly) legal challenges.

They impart a false sense of security

Breed-specific laws have a tendency to compromise rather than enhance public safety. When limited animal control resources are used to regulate or ban a certain breed of dog, without regard to behavior, the focus is shifted away from routine, effective enforcement of laws that have the best chance of making our communities safer: dog license laws, leash laws, animal fighting laws, anti-tethering laws, laws facilitating spaying and neutering and laws that require all owners to control their dogs, regardless of breed.

They may actually encourage ownership by irresponsible people

If you outlaw a breed, then outlaws are attracted to that breed. Unfortunately some people take advantage of the “outlaw” status of their breed of choice to bolster their own self image as living outside of the rules of mainstream society. Ironically, the rise of Pit Bull ownership among gang members and others in the late 1980’s coincided with the first round of breed-specific legislation

New Study Confirms Preventable Factors in Dog Bites, Breed Not Relevant

As advocates, we are all too familiar with the dog bite fatality report that was published in 2000 titled “Breeds of dogs involved in fatal human attacks in the United States between 1979 and 1998.” This data set has been used incessantly to support breed discriminatory laws, even though the authors of this report themselves have made several statements explaining why the report does NOT support these ineffective and costly laws. This data set was based mostly on unreliable media reports and its authors concluded that their research did not support the idea that one kind of dog was more likely to bite someone than another kind of dog. Nevertheless, proponents of discriminatory laws have pointed to this data set to support their positions.

This was the only study of its kind, until earlier this month when the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) published the “Co-occurrence of potentially preventable factors in 256 dog bite–related fatalities in the United States (2000–2009).” The objective of the study was to “examine potentially preventable factors in human dog bite-related fatalities (DBRFs) on the basis of data from sources that were more complete, verifiable, and accurate than media reports used in previous studies.” Instead of relying on news accounts like in the previous study, the researchers used reports by homicide detectives and animal control agencies, and interviews with investigators.

The study found that the major factors in the fatalities studied include: the absence of an able-bodied person to intervene (87.1%), incidental or no familiar relationship of victims with dogs (85.2%), owner failure to neuter dogs (84.4%), compromised ability of victims to interact appropriately with dogs (77.4%), dogs kept isolated from regular positive human interactions versus family dogs (76.2%), owners’ prior mismanagement of dogs (37.5%), and owners’ history of abuse or neglect of dogs (21.1%). Four or more of these factors were present in over 80% of the dog bite related deaths. Considering that over 75% of dog bite related deaths were caused by resident dogs (a dog not kept as a family pet, but isolated from positive human interactions and usually kept for protection and/or chained outside), reducing this practice is a huge factor in preventing dog bites, as is neutering male dogs.

Most dog bite related fatalities had the above preventable factors in common, but no where was breed found to be a factor. The authors of this new report found that breed could not be reliably identified in over 80% of the cases, as news reports often differed from each other or from animal control reports

Dog behavior experts have been recommending prevention techniques based on improved ownership practices, such as learning to read and understand dog behavior signals, teaching children how to safely interact with dogs, and providing dogs with proper socialization and veterinary care, for decades. Now, we have a JAVMA article in support of these practices. We all want to live in safe communities, and focusing our animal control laws on the preventable factors identified, is the road to get there.

To read more about this study from the National Canine Research Council, click here.

The full citation for the report is:

Gary J. Patronek, Jeffrey J. Sacks, Karen M. Delise, Donald V. Cleary, and Amy R. Marder. Co-occurrence of potentially preventable factors in 256 dog bite–related fatalities in the United States (2000–2009). Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, December 15, 2013, Vol. 243, No. 12 , Pages 1726-1736. (doi: 10.2460/javma.243.12.1726)

Britain introduced the Dangerous Dogs Act in 1991, outlawing several breeds of dogs including types of pit bull, and thousands were impounded and put down. The law was changed in 1997 to give the courts discretion to allow a dog with a good temperament and that posed no danger to the public to be kept subject to tight restrictions.

However, with dog attacks still a significant problem there and countries such as the Netherlands and Italy having repealed their breed-specific legislation, there is now a debate about what should be done in Britain.

Lord Redesdale, who spoke to The Age from London, introduced a private member’s bill proposing to remove the emphasis on selected breeds and introducing greater punishments for irresponsible owners. However, without the support of the British government the bill is doomed to failure, but Lord Redesdale believes the publicity would encourage a rethink of the legislation.

Read more: https://www.theage.com.au/victoria/good-dog-bad-dog-20111206-1oh1q.html#ixzz391DTxMuX

Breed-specific legislation has been introduced in many countries, including Ireland, Germany and many US states. There are five types of dogs prohibited from being imported into Australia, of which only pit bulls and the Perro de Presa Canario are known to be in the country.

The current debate revolves around those who believe pit bulls and similar types of dogs are inherently dangerous, and must be removed from society, and those who believe dogs of any breed can be dangerous depending on how they have been reared, and whether they have been trained to be aggressive.

Those who argue the latter say targeting certain types of dogs does not reduce dog attacks because those who want an aggressive or ”status” dog will simply train another large breed.

”I think it’s important that we don’t allow it to become simplistically about an animal that has an appearance of being a pit bull terrier and if we get rid of them we’re going to make the community safer,” says Susan Maastricht, the Victorian branch president of the Australian Veterinary Association. ”Because that would be giving everyone very much a false sense of security.”

Those arguing against banning selective breeds, and that comprises many animal welfare associations including the RSPCA, say a more effective and humane approach is to implement a system of education and training of dogs enforced by policing with fines and jail for irresponsible owners. They say a dog should be deemed irredeemably dangerous on the basis of its temperament not the way it looks.

This system used in the Canadian city of Calgary is being held up as a successful way to effectively reduce dog attacks.

Bill Bruce, Calgary’s director of animal and bylaw services, oversees the program. ”If you come to Calgary you rarely see a dog roaming loose in the street, you don’t see a lot of aggressive dogs,

Read more: https://www.theage.com.au/victoria/good-dog-bad-dog-20111206-1oh1q.html#ixzz391DxNgbk

merican Animal Foundation

case law on bsl

Zuniga v. San Mateo Dept. of Health Services (1990) 218 Cal. App. 3d 1521,

267 Cal. Rptr. 2d 755. The court found there was not sufficient evidence to prove Pit Bulls

have an inherent nature of being dangerous.

Carter v. Metro North Assocs. (1998) 255 A.D. 2d 251; 680 N.Y.S.2d 299 A New

York appellate court determined that the alleged propensities of Pit Bull Terriers to behave

more viciously than other breeds had not been authoritatively established.

ACF litigated the city of Huntsville Alabama in 2002 in a case that was heard by

the Alabama Supreme Court. Huntsville v. Four Pit Bull Puppies (Ala. 08-30-02), No.

1010459, unreported. The court determined that American Pit Bull Terriers were not

dangerous.

In March 2003 ACF sued the city of Ottumwa Iowa for 750,000 for passing a

breed ban, the case is in litigation. ACF v Ottumwa EQEQ 103700

On July 16th 2003 ACF brought forth a constitutional challenge against

Ohio’s state law that declares the Pit Bull vicious. The case was heard in the Toledo

Muni Court and the court found the American Pit Bull Terrier was not dangerous and granted

Pit Bull owners due process , the case is in appeal. Tellings v State of Ohio CRB02-15267

In August 2004 a case ACF assisted in was heard by the Ohio Supreme

Court. State v. Cowan 103 Ohio St. 3d 144 , 2004 – Ohio – 4777 The court found ORC 955:

22 violative of the right to be heard as applied to ORC955:11 which declared the Pit Bull

vicious in Ohio. The decision struck down Ohio’s breed specific legislation at the state level.

Inability to determine risk scientifically

In Clifton’s analysis, he attempts to evaluate dog behavior based on breed, bite frequency, and “degree of relative risk.”

Yet Clifton has shown numerous times in his report that he cannot identify a breed properly, or even spell breed names correctly.

Both bite frequency and degree of relative risk are impossible to calculate. No one knows how often breeds bite since hundreds of bites go unreported. And to attempt to determine a “degree of relative risk,” Clifton would have to know every factor that contributed to every dog bite.

Even the CDC concluded at the end of their own flawed study (see above) that there is no way to determine relative risk:

There is currently no accurate way to identify the number of dogs of a particular breed, and consequently no measure to determine which breeds are more likely to bite or kill.

Merritt Clifton apparently does not understand the many factors that go into a reliable calculation of relative risk, nor does he wish to acknowledge that trained researchers realize that many, if not most, of those factors can never be known or calculated.

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION

BREEDS OF DOGS INVOLVED IN FATAL HUMAN ATTACKS IN THE UNITED STATES BETWEEN 1979 AND 1998

This is perhaps the most misused and misunderstood dog bite report. Politicians and the media often quote this report inaccurately.

The main flaw in the CDC study is that it attempts to characterize dog attacks by breed, while ignoring all other possible factors.

Media as a source of data

The CDC study uses media accounts in their findings. The media is known to misreport and skew articles on dog attacks and misidentify breeds (see Difficulty of Breed Identification).

Missing data

The report also admits that it does not cover twenty-eight percent of fatal dog attacks. It is not clear what the study results would have been if all fatal dog attacks were included.

Miscategorization and misidentification

In the study, on the chart showing the number of dog bite-related deaths, the CDC has divided the attacks into sections titled Purebred and Crossbred. The CDC has listed Pit Bull-type and Husky-type under both the Purebred and Crossbred divisions. A “type” is not a breed.

Pit Bull-types are often categorized as dogs with short fur and a boxy head. There are over twenty breeds of dogs that fit this description, including the American Bulldog, Boxer, Olde English Bulldogge, Alapaha Blue Blood Bulldog, American Staffordshire Terrier, Bull Terrier, Bull Mastiff, American Pit Bull Terrier, Dogo Argentino, Tosa Inu, Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Dogue de Bordeaux, Fila Brasileiro, Presa Canario, Catahoula Leopard Dog, Cane Corso, Black Mouth Cur, and the Shar Pei.

Husky-types are often identified as medium sized dogs with long fur. This is extremely vague. Dogs that meet this description include the Akita Inu, Shiba Inu, Alaskan Malamute, Samoyed, Elkhound, Hokkaido Inu, Laika, Siberian Husky, Chow Chow, Alaskan Husky, and the Greenland Dog.

It is inaccurate to list all such breeds under one title; such groupings distort the study’s findings. Yet few people could recognize all these breeds correctly.

The CDC study uses inconclusive sources, fails to account for breed misidentification, and erroneously groups breeds.

Study conclusion

Despite the study’s flaws, the study authors conclude that breed-specific legislation is inefficient; BSL fails to recognize that any dog of any breed can exhibit aggressive behaviors.

With rescue groups, shelters, nonprofit animal protection groups, the American Bar Association, the Center for Disease Control, and even President Obama against BSL, let’s hope these six states stand up to discrimination and finally take more effective steps to combating the real root of the “pit bull problem”: poor guardianship.

If you live in Maryland, Vermont, South Dakota, Missouri, Utah, or Washington, be sure to contact your state representatives and senators and urge them to end BSL today!

Image source: Steph Skardal / Flickr

Q. How costly is it to implement and enforce BSL?

A: BSL is very costly, penalizes responsible pet owners, diverts resources, and is open to challenge.

Use the Best Friends Fiscal Impact Calculator: https://bestfriends.guerrillaeconomics.net/ to calculate an estimate of the additional expenses for your community (and you as a taxpayer) that will result from BSL: costs for enforcement, kenneling, euthanasia and litigation, among others.

• Miami-Dade County banned “pit bulls” in 1989. The ban did not reduce dog bites, but has generated litigation costs. Hearing officer proceedings, as well as a circuit court case, have questioned the enforceability of the law.

• The Department of Justice guidelines for the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) state that it is contrary to the Act to deny a disabled person equal access to public facilities based upon the presumed breed of their service dog. This has exposed municipalities with BSL to litigation costs when they have attempted to deny such access based the presumed breed of a person’s service dog.

– See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq/#sthash.VC2tNE0z.dpuf

Q. Does BSL reduce dog bites?

No. BSL has not succeeded in reducing dog bite-related injuries wherever in the world it has been enacted.

• An analysis published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association explains why BSL does not reduce serious dog bites. The authors calculated the absurdly large numbers of dogs of targeted breeds who would have to be completely removed from a community in order to prevent even one serious dog bite-related injury. For example, in order to prevent a single hospitalization resulting from a dog bite, the authors calculate that a city or town would have to remove more than 100,000 dogs of a targeted group. To prevent a second hospitalization, double that number.[4]

• Denver, CO enacted a breed ban in 1989. Citizens of Denver continue to suffer a higher rate of hospitalization from dog bite-related injuries after the ban, than the citizens of breed-neutral Colorado counties.[5]

• A study published in the Journal of Veterinary Behavior (2007), compared medically treated dog bites in Aragon, Spain for 5 years prior to and following enactment of Spain’s “Law on the legal treatment of the possession of dangerous animals” (sometimes referred to Spain’s Dangerous Animal Act) (2000). The results showed no significant effect in dog bite incidences when comparing before and after enactment of the BSL.[6]

• The Netherlands repealed a 15-year-old breed ban in 2008 after commissioning a study of its effectiveness. The study revealed that BSL was not a successful dog-bite mitigation strategy because it had not resulted in a decrease in dog bites. [7]

• The Province of Ontario in Canada enacted a breed ban in 2005. In 2010, based on a survey of municipalities across the Province, the Toronto Humane Society reported that, despite five years of BSL and the destruction of “countless” dogs, there had been no significant decrease in the number of dog bites.[8]

• Winnipeg, Manitoba enacted a breed ban in 1990. Winnipeg’s rate of dog bite-injury hospitalizations is virtually unchanged from that day to this, and remains significantly higher than the rate in breed-neutral, responsible pet ownership Calgary.[9]

– See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq/#sthash.2jYRPnMe.dpuf

Writing Effective Letters to Officials

One of the most difficult things for those new to fighting BSL is expressing your feelings to the legislators and/or other officials who have proposed it. There are some very important things to remember when communicating with officials:

First and foremost, ALWAYS BE POLITE AND RESPECTFUL in all your communications with officials. Don’t be combative or argumentative regardless of the difference between your point of view and theirs. Our dogs are worth putting your personal feelings of anger aside in order to communicate effectively.

Stick to the facts. Try to avoid being emotional. It is a given that you love your dogs or you wouldn’t be fighting for them. The simple truth is, the officials do not care how much we love our dogs — they care about the safety of their constituents and their community. To that end, the facts related to the inefficiency of breed specific legislation and the integral part that irresponsible owners play in dog attacks are important facts to get across to them.

Below are some talking points that you can use in conjunction with your own words when writing letters to officials. The talking points hit on important flaws of breed specific legislation, and should give you good groundwork to customize and build your own letter.

TALKING POINTS

The Cost of BSL. One thing that always catches the ear of any official is the cost or potential cost to his or her constituents. Reinforce the fact that breed specific laws cost a lot of money – additional animal control, shelters fees, vetting, litigation, etc. The bottom line is simple… BSL costs tax payers A LOT of money!

The states of Tennessee and New Mexico issued fiscal reports on financial impact breed specific legislation. Those reports are an excellent illustration of the tremendous financial impact and strain BSL has on communities.

Breed Identification. Another important flaw with breed specific laws is breed identification. There are a minimum of twenty (20) dog breeds that possess the physical traits of ‘pit bulls.’ The “Find the Pit Bull” game is an excellent tool to demonstrate the difficulty of identifying ‘pit bulls.”

Most animal control and/or law enforcement officers are not able to identify specific breeds of dogs with any degree of accuracy because the commonly stated physical characteristics are similar in many breeds.

Breed bans carry with them too much potential for arbitrary or improper enforcement: inaccurate breed identification by officials and difficulty enforcing breed bans against mixed-breed.

Because breed identification by animal control officers is subjective and/or arbitrary, it opens the city to liability and litigation issues in the event of mistaken identification.

Failure to Address Irresponsible Owners. Perhaps the most compelling argument with respect to why breed specific legislation fails is that it simply does not address the issue of irresponsible dog ownership. BSL places all the blame on the dogs and removes the responsibility from the dog owner. Dog ownership is a responsibility, and dog owners must be held accountable for the actions of their dogs.

Restricting breeds of dogs does not address the real issue of irresponsible owners. Only when such owners are held accountable for the actions of their dogs, will adverse dog incidents be reduced.

Because breed specific legislation fails to address irresponsible dog owners, many areas that have enacted breed regulations have actually experienced an increase in dog bite/attack incidents of the dog breeds NOT covered by the breed specific law.

Developing a proactive solution

Our society coexists with almost 80 million dogs—living in 40% of American households—so it’s vital that communities have preventative, effective dog-bite solutions that are backed by stakeholders and lawmakers. Such solutions involve understanding the real risk factors for bites, helping minimize those risk factors, and ensuring that bites are handled effectively and uniformly to eliminate future risk.

Dog bite incidents will decline when all dog owners are given access to critical services such as veterinary care, spaying and neutering resources, training and behavior assistance, and other socialization and health information. Proactive strategies aimed at preventing bites from happening in the first place—paired with appropriate enforcement-based responses to bite incidents—create a safer, more humane approach to managing dogs in communities

Understanding the real risk factors

Though breed or type don’t affect a dog’s behavior, there are a variety of other factors and influences that do, including:

The dog’s hormones. Dogs who have not been neutered are more likely to bite than dogs that have.

The dog’s quality of life. Dogs who spend their lives isolated or chained may bite out of frustration or fear. Those are determinations that must be made by owners to prevent their dogs from biting.

The dog’s upbringing. Dogs raised by owners who understand and manage their behaviors and provide veterinary care may avoid painful or uncomfortable conditions that can cause overreactions to being handled.

The dog’s personality. Like people, some dogs are more easy-going than others, while others don’t adjust well to new situations. No two dogs will ever react exactly the same way to a given circumstance.

The person’s ability to recognize warning signs. Dogs who bite usually give some kind of warning, whether subtle or overt. If people ignore or misunderstand such warnings, dogs may feel the need or urge to bite.

Humane Society of the United States (HSUS)

(click above for direct link)

HSUS Statement on Dangerous Dogs and Breed-Specific Legislation

The HSUS opposes legislation aimed at eradicating or strictly regulating dogs based solely on their breed for a number of reasons. Breed Specific Legislation (BSL) is a common first approach that many communities take. Thankfully, once research is conducted most community leaders correctly realize that BSL won’t solve the problems they face with dangerous dogs…

Read entire text here.

nternational Association of Animal Behavior Consultants

(click above for direct link)

Position Statement on Breed-Specific Legislation:

The International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC) is an organization representing professional animal trainers and animal behavior specialists. The IAABC strongly opposes any legislation specifically designed to target or discriminate against dogs based solely on their breed or appearance. The IAABC does not believe that a dog poses a danger to society solely because of its breed. Dogs can become dangerous as a result of faulty socialization, inappropriate training, poor living conditions and other factors having nothing to do with their breed. The IAABC believes that the objectives behind breed specific legislation can be met more effectively through rigorous enforcement and, where necessary, the strengthening of existing laws. We fully understand and support the need for laws to protect society, human and animal alike; however, our organization feels that any new legislation should be based on specific behaviors or actions and should not discriminate based on breed alone.

Abstract

Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association

September 15, 2000, Vol. 217, No. 6, Pages 836-840

doi: 10.2460/javma.2000.217.836

Breeds of dogs involved in fatal human attacks in the United States between 1979 and 1998

Jeffrey J. Sacks , MD, MPH Leslie Sinclair , DVM Julie Gilchrist , MD Gail C. Golab , PhD, DVM Randall Lockwood , PhD

Division of Unintentional Injury Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, US Department of Health and Human Services, US Public Health Service, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 4770 Buford Hwy NE (MS K-63), Atlanta, GA 30341. (Sacks, Gilchrist); Present address is National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 4770 Buford Hwy NE (MS K-45), Atlanta, GA 30341. (Sacks); The Humane Society of the United States, 2100 L Street, NW, Washington, DC 20037. (Sinclair, Lockwood); Present address is Shelter Veterinary Services, 9320 Jarrett Ct, Montgomery Village, MD 20886. (Sinclair); Division of Education and Research, American Veterinary Medical Association, 931 N Meacham Rd, Ste 100, Schaumburg, IL 60173. (Golab)

Objective—To summarize breeds of dogs involved in fatal human attacks during a 20-year period and to assess policy implications.

Animals—Dogs for which breed was reported involved in attacks on humans between 1979 and 1998 that resulted in human dog bite-related fatalities (DBRF).

Procedure—Data for human DBRF identified previously for the period of 1979 through 1996 were combined with human DBRF newly identified for 1997 and 1998. Human DBRF were identified by searching news accounts and by use of The Humane Society of the United States’ registry databank.

Results—During 1997 and 1998, at least 27 people died of dog bite attacks (18 in 1997 and 9 in 1998). At least 25 breeds of dogs have been involved in 238 human DBRF during the past 20 years. Pit bull-type dogs and Rottweilers were involved in more than half of these deaths. Of 227 reports with relevant data, 55 (24%) human deaths involved unrestrained dogs off their owners’ property, 133 (58%) involved unrestrained dogs on their owners’ property, 38 (17%) involved restrained dogs on their owners’ property, and 1 (< 1%) involved a restrained dog off its owner's property.

Conclusions—Although fatal attacks on humans appear to be a breed-specific problem (pit bull-type dogs and Rottweilers), other breeds may bite and cause fatalities at higher rates. Because of difficulties inherent in determining a dog's breed with certainty, enforcement of breed-specific ordinances raises constitutional and practical issues. Fatal attacks represent a small proportion of dog bite injuries to humans and, therefore, should not be the primary factor driving public policy concerning dangerous dogs. Many practical alternatives to breed-specific ordinances exist and hold promise for prevention of dog bites. (J Am Vet Med Assoc 2000;217:836–840)

According to the National Canine Research Council and an October, 2010 report in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA), studies done in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands found that breed discriminatory laws in those countries didn’t reduce the number of dog bites or improve public safety. (https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/uploaded_files/tinymce/NNB%20now%20available%20in%20JAVMA%20dated.pdf)

Based on these studies and concerns about due process and property rights infringement, the National Animal Control Association, the American Veterinary Medical Association, Best Friends Animal Society, the ASPCA, and the Humane Society of the United States are against breed discrimination.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC), based on its September, 2000 study of human fatalities from dog bites, published in JAVMA, also promotes a breed-neutral approach to legislation. The CDC found that many other factors, besides a dog’s breed such as reproductive status, heredity, sex, early experiences, socialization and training, can affect the likelihood that a dog could attack someone. (https://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/abs/10.2460/javma.2000.217.836)

Many breed discriminatory laws are aimed at pit bull terriers, one of the more popular breeds in the United States. An estimated 5-7 million pit bull terriers live as pets in the United States, and the vast majority of pit bull terriers are loving, loyal family pets.

What position do legal, animal-related, and non-animal related organizations take on BSL?

A: All of the following organizations do not endorse BSL:

American Animal Hospital Association, American Bar Association, American Dog Owner’s Association, American Humane Association, American Kennel Club, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, American Veterinary Medical Association, American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior, Association of Pet Dog Trainers, Australian Veterinary Association, Best Friends Animal Society, British Veterinary Association, Canadian Kennel Club, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Federation of Veterinarians in Europe, Humane Society of the United States, International Association of Canine Professionals, National Animal Control Association, National Animal Interest Alliance, National Association of Obedience Instructors, Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (UK & Australia), United Kennel Club, and the White House Administration. In addition, many state and local-level veterinary medical associations and humane organizations oppose BSL.

– See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq/#sthash.VC2tNE0z.dpuf

The Maryland General Assembly gave its final approval to legislation that overrules a state high court ruling that claims pit bulls are an “inherently dangerous” breed of dog that must be held to a stricter liability standard for bites than other breeds.

In 2012, in the case of Tracey v. Solesky, Maryland’s highest court labeled pit bulls and pit bull mixes as “inherently dangerous” and held both the owner and landlord “strictly liable” for any attacks. As a result of the ruling, landlords evicted and refused to rent to dog owners, and a huge number of pit bulls were surrendered to shelters. All this was taking place at the same time as President Obama, the Centers for Disease Control, the American Veterinary Medicine Association and others were opposing breed-specific legislation laws that were especially aimed at pit bulls and restricted the ownership of dogs by breed.

Opponents to the legislation claimed that it failed to increase safety while imposing numerous, heartbreaking hardships on the dogs, their caretakers, and others. “Breed Specific Legislation has consistently failed in communities around the world. It has no quantifiable impact on a decrease in dog bites or an increase in public safety,” said longtime advocate Lisa LaFontaine, president of the Washington Humane Society. “At the Washington Humane Society we have successfully changed the perspective of pit bull type dogs in our communities and our policies, and we are pleased to see Maryland follow suit.”

The bill, HB 73, holds owners liable for their dog’s injuries, regardless of the breed. HB 73 also removes liability for landlords, unless the landlord knew or should have known that the dog was actually dangerous. Injuries committed while a dog is running loose will still incur owners’ strict liability.

“It’s liberation for dog owners. It gives us an equal footing with the rest of the breeds and we’re not locked down for owning these dogs,” said pit bull advocate Eric Vocke.

“Any dog can bite. The simple truth is breed is not a factor in bites. All dogs are individuals,” said Ledy VanKavage, an attorney with Best Friends Animal Society, a group which is working to overturn breed specific legislation in multiple jurisdictions around the country.

Maryland’s Senate won praise from the Humane Society and other animal advocacy groups when it passed its version of the bill, SB 247, in late February. “Passage of this compromise legislation ends this disgraceful era of court sanctioned canine profiling, in which families with pit bull-type dogs were forced to choose between their homes and their beloved pets,” said Tami Santelli, Maryland state director for the Humane Society. “Lawmakers today voted against singling out particular breeds and in favor of raising the bar for all dog owners to protect victims of dog bites,” she added.

Actress Rebecca Corry, organizer of the upcoming One Million Pibble March on Washington and caretaker of a formerly abused pit bull named Angel, put it a bit more bluntly. “Angel just high fived me, farted and went back to sleep,” she said to HuffPost. “It’s about time the ignorance of the ‘inherently dangerous’ argument get laughed at and tossed out. There is no place or tolerance for abuse and discrimination in our society and humans that think otherwise are who are dangerous.”

Won by an overwhelming margin, the House has now sent the Senate-passed bill to Governor Martin O’Malley. Baltimore Humane Society spokesperson, Wendy Goldband believes there is reason for optimism. “Everyone seems to think he will sign without a problem,” Goldband said.

Miami Dade County Dog Bite Numbers

I touched on this a bit in yesterday’s roundup but another article came out that means I get to bring it up again. In an article that Caveat brought to my attention last week, it was noted that the state of Florida is considering repealing its law forbidding cities from enacting BSL. In the article it notes that Miami Dade County, which enacted its breed ban 20 years ago, has failed to keep any statistics to give any indication about whether the ban has worked, or not worked.

Later, the Miami Herald published the top 10 biting breeds for both Dade County (basically Miami and has a ‘pit bull’ ban) and Broward County (basically Ft. Lauderdale, and has no ban) based 0n 2007 statistics.

Here are the numbers:

MIAMI-DADE ANIMAL CONTROL

Total dog bites: 992

1. Terrier: 108, 2. Labrador mix: 95, 3. Shepherd mix: 90, 4. Mixed breed: 81, 5. German shepherd: 53, 6. Chow mix: 50, 7. Boxer: 39, 8. Rottweiler: 33, 9. Pit bull: 32, 10. American bulldog: 30,

BROWARD COUNTY ANIMAL CONTROL

Total dog bites: 616

1 Pit bull: 182, 2. Labrador retriever: 50, 3. German shepherd: 40, 4. Rottweiler : 36, 5. Shepherd: 29,

6. Chow chow: 23, 7. Bulldog: 17, 8. Boxer: 14,

9. Unknown (mixed): 14, 10. Jack Russell Terrier: 13

I normally wouldn’t have given a lot of thought to this except some ‘pit bull’ hate groups, which are apparently really horrible at math, have decided to try to use this information to ‘prove’ that the ‘pit bull’ ban in Miami Dade County is a great success – -because ‘pit bull’ bites are lower in Miami Dade County than they are in Broward County. However, they’ve apparently failed to note that Miami Dade county has 61% more dog bites than Broward County. Even when you take the population differences (Dade County has 35% more people) into account, Dade County still has a higher bite rate per capita than Broward County.

This doesn’t even begin to note the flaws in their logic. It should also be noted that there appears to be a significant difference in how breeds are reported when Dade County has 5 of its top 6 biting “breeds” being mixed breeds of some type, vs Broward County which has grouped all but 14 of their bites into nice, tidy breed categories which means a lot of the breed categories have become catch-all categories for mixes (which is fairly common for ‘pit bulls’ to get used as a catch all for any mixed breed Bulldog, boxer, bully etc).

I don’t put a whole lot of stock in comparing numbers between cities — just because differences in demographics, lifestyles, ways bites are reported, etc can vary quite substantially. Howevever I thought I’d bring this up to show how ridiculous some of the anti-pit bull groups have become in trying to read numbers without having any earthly clue as to what they’re looking at.?

What about severe dog attacks?

Miami-Dade’s breed ban has not made Miami-Dade any safer than the rest of the state.

In enacting its ban in 1989, Miami/Dade argued that pit bulls inflict more serious injuries than other dogs, and promised that banning pit bulls would reduce serious injuries by dogs.

This promise has not been kept.

dogThe percentage of Miami/Dade dog bite incidents that result in the victim’s being hospitalized continues to be higher than the rate for the state as a whole. In 1998, ten years after the breed ban had been enacted, the county’s population was 14% of the total population of Florida; yet it had 18% of the dog bite hospitalizations. In 2007, Miami/Dade’s population was 13% of Florida’s total population, but it had 16% of the state’s dog bite victim hospitalizations. Miami-Dade is the only Florida county with a breed ban

“If you asked me if there was a predominance of pit bull bites versus other dogs, we don’t see a predominance of pit bull bites,” Munoz said. “Some say it’s that the ban works. Some say it’s just because they’re no different from any other dog.”

Other experts concur. In a recent report on dog-bite prevention, published in April, the American Veterinary Medical Association, the nation’s leading veterinary organization, concluded: “Owners of pit bull-type dogs deal with a strong breed stigma. However, controlled studies have not identified this breed group as disproportionately dangerous.”

The report points out that pit bulls are not more prone to biting than breeds such as German shepherds, Rottweilers, Jack Russell terriers and even collies and St. Bernards, but some are made dangerous by owners who abuse them or use them for fighting. A pit bull’s size and strength can make its attacks more lethal, but that also applies to other large dogs, the report said.

The AVMA concluded that because of the lack of solid data, “it is difficult to support the targeting of this breed as a basis for dog bite prevention.”

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention agrees, offering this statement: “There is currently no accurate way to determine which breeds are more likely to bite or kill.”

The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) also opposes breed-specific legislation, arguing that such legislation is discriminatory and costly to taxpayers, and results in the unnecessary deaths of thousands of innocent dogs.

In Miami-Dade County, owning American pit bull terriers, American Staffordshire terriers, Staffordshire bull terriers or any dog “substantially conforming” to any of the checklist of characteristics has been illegal since 1989. A dog in the county shelter that is identified as meeting these characteristics – even if there is no DNA proof of “pit bull” genes – is only eligible for adoption outside Miami-Dade county boundaries. If the dog is not adopted, it is euthanized, regardless of whether it has any bite history at all.

This means that any “pit bull” that winds up in the county shelter, even the most gentle family pet, faces almost certain death.

The HSUS points out that killing innocent dogs fails to address the real issues of irresponsible dog ownership, animal abuse, and public safety.

Miami-Dade County: Two decades of BSL has produced no positive results

July 29, 2009 Posted by russmead under Breed Bans

3 Comments

by Karen Delise (reprinted with permission)

Update Aug. 1: Math Saves Dog in Challenge to BSL in Miami-Dade

In 1989, Miami/Dade County passed an ordinance banning from the county all “pit bull” dogs. The county claimed that pit bulls were different from other dogs, that they inflicted injuries different from the injuries that a person might suffer from another dog, and that they posed a greater danger than other dogs.

The county claimed that the ban would keep the community safer by reducing the number of serious incidents involving dogs.

Has the Miami-Dade ban reduced the number of dog bites? Has it averted severe dog attacks? Has it eliminated dog bite-related fatalities?

Can the county even identify which dogs it has banned?

The answer to all these questions is: NO.

Banning pit bulls won’t solve problem

By Gina Spadafori, Globe Correspondent

Sometimes I think having no pit bulls wouldn’t be that bad a thing, but not for the reasons you might imagine.

If pit bulls weren’t around, they couldn’t be beaten, starved, left chained outside with little protection from the elements, subjected to ear croppings with scissors and no pain relief, made to bear puppies with next to no food. And finally, if pit bulls weren’t around, they couldn’t be tossed dead (or nearly so) into a vacant lot when they come up on the losing side of a dogfight.

For every headline-grabbing attack by a pit bull, there are countless cruelties inflicted on these dogs by humans. As a person recently noted on a dog-related Web log: ”It’s amazing how many other kinds of dogs in the best homes bite. It’s amazing how many pit bulls in the worst homes don’t.”

But those who do . . . oh, what fear and anger they cause. It’s no surprise, given the horror of recent attacks, that the call to eliminate pit bulls has never been louder. But that call remains the wrong one: Breed-specific legislation is not the answer to the problem of dangerous dogs.

It doesn’t help much to argue that the odds of an attack by a pit bull are so low as to be insignificant compared with life’s other risks, not in the face of saturation media coverage of every such attack. It doesn’t help much to argue that a well-bred and properly raised pit bull can be a better companion than many other popular breeds, based on temperament-testing statistics that show these dogs to be stable and calm.

So let’s try this: If you want to be protected against a dog attack, banning the pit bull isn’t going to accomplish that goal. That’s because every large breed or mix you can think of, and many small ones you can’t imagine, have been involved in attacks on humans.

You cannot predict the likelihood of an attack by the type of dog, but you can see clear trends based on other criteria.

Poorly bred, unsocialized, unneutered, and untrained dogs are most often involved in attacks. If you want to prevent those attacks, you need to address those root causes.

We need to make it harder for people to casually breed and quickly sell dogs, and we need to make it easier to have animals neutered. We need to recognize that dog-fighting is as much of a danger to our communities as it is to the animals participating in this illegal but popular blood sport. We need to outlaw keeping dogs on chains, a cruel practice that leaves animals feeling isolated, territorial, and more likely to attack.

And even as we need to crack down on irresponsible and criminal dog owners, we need to help those people who want to do right. We need to educate prospective dog owners on responsible care, training, and socializing, so that they may raise dogs who are not dangerous.

And yes, we need to establish zero tolerance for all dangerous dogs, with no second chances: If a dog attacks someone, that animal needs to be put down.

We need to stop looking for scapegoats in the face of every pit bull, and address the human reasons behind the problem of dangerous dogs.

Only then can we hope to be safer around not only the pit bull, but all dogs. And maybe then the pit bull will be safer around us, too.

What breeds of dogs have been targeted by BSL? A: Various breeds have been or currently are targeted by BSL. Until the law was repealed in 2009, Italy regulated the keeping of 17 breeds. In the United States, jurisdictions have either banned or put discriminatory restrictions on one or all of the following: Akita, “Alapaha Blue Blood Bulldogs”, Alaskan Malamute, “American Bandogge”, American Bulldog, American Staffordshire Terrier, American Pit Bull Terrier, Belgian Malinois, Bullmastiff, Bull Terrier, Cane Corso, Chihuahua, Chow Chow, Dalmatian, Doberman Pinscher, Dogo Argentino, “Fila Brasileiro”, German Shepherd Dog, Miniature Bull Terrier, Neapolitan Mastiff, “Pit bull” (please note that “pit bull” is not a breed of dog), Perro de Presa Canario, Rottweiler, Shar Pei, Siberian Husky, Staffordshire Bull Terrier, “Tosa Inu”, and wolf-hybrids. These ordinances also target dogs suspected of being mixes of one or more of the named breeds. – See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq/#sthash.jMaySQOn.dpuf

Q: Aren’t certain breeds of dogs more likely to injure or bite than others? A: There is no evidence from the controlled study of dog bites that one kind of dog is more likely to bite a human being than another kind of dog. A recent AVMA survey covering 40 years and two continents concluded that no group of dogs should be considered disproportionately dangerous.[1] Additionally, in a recent multifactorial study published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association on the exceptionally rare events of dog bite-related fatalities, the researchers identified a striking co-occurrence of multiple, controllable factors in these cases.[2] Breed was not identified as a factor. – See more at: https://nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq/#sthash.jMaySQOn.dpuf