Another fatal dog attack

[SilverLinings]

Another fatal attack on a child has just been reported, it is so sad that this has happened again.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-64476833

 

[millikins]

Poor child.

 

[SadKen]

Poor little girl. It’s tragic that the whole country is now waiting to hear what the breed is and whether the child was attacked by her own family dog or someone else’s out of control dog.

You only have to read the Fail’s comments to see that anger against all dog owners and dogs in general is growing. From calls to have all dogs on leads and muzzled to banning anything over terrier size. And when joe public starts demanding a solution, mr govt will provide one. Not one that will help but it’s nailed on to be something the law abiding will follow, that the dregs will not, that will not reduce attacks, but which can be TAXED or FINED.

The Fail’s top comments include ‘…aaaaaand it’s an XL bully’ (paraphrased). Speaking non emotionally as a large breed owner, if it is, the solution will likely to be to look at banning that breed which I would prefer to having to muzzle my well behaved large breed dogs or pay a licence fee that I know won’t be paid by the people causing the problem.

 

[Sandstone1]

Its so sad. Somethings going to have to be done but I do not know what. Sounds like it happened in childs own garden so we do not know if its a pet dog. More details will come out but whatever happened its a sad loss of life.

 

[Barton Bounty]

If this is a family dog that has attacked the owners child! She will be feeling the worst about it. No one expects it to happen ever! ?

 

[splashgirl45]

As a family we have never left a young child alone with the family dog or visiting dog , no matter what the size or temperament of the dog , and at that time , there didn’t seem to be reports of dog attacks but we only had the tv or daily papers to see any info , so sad that a child has died . Maybe we need some sort of advert on the tv and social media to make people aware of the dangers , similar to the HIV ads..

 

[meleeka]

As a family we have never left a young child alone with the family dog or visiting dog , no matter what the size or temperament of the dog , and at that time , there didn’t seem to be reports of dog attacks but we only had the tv or daily papers to see any info , so sad that a child has died . Maybe we need some sort of advert on the tv and social media to make people aware of the dangers , similar to the HIV ads..

I think you make a good point. Years ago we didn’t have news at our fingertips, so maybe that’s why there seems more cases these days. I think there are also greater numbers of dogs now, so a lot more interactions happening. My Auntie was attacked by her own German Shepherd when I was small. The two dogs lived in the garden with no stimulation and weren’t neutered, so easy to see why now. German Shepherds were the fashionable breed for stupid people to get status, whereas how it’s XL bullies.

 

[splashgirl45]

And at that time German shepherds were classed the same as bullies are now, too many people got them as hard dogs but didn’t understand how to train them. Friends had German shepherds and they were lovely family pets , not bought for guarding etc and they got plenty of exercise which I think can be lacking in many pet homes now.. so many of them think that a half an hour on lead walk is enough and it may be for an older dog but the young ones need to have their minds exercised as well as time to have zoomies.

 

[Ratface]

Many years ago, I had a German Shepherd Dog. She was walked four times a day, either by me or her lovely dog walkers. I took her to Good Citizen Dog Training Scheme classes from Puppy Training level to Gold level. She was well-socialised and responsibly managed. The Burmese cat socialised her to cats, along "Don't Even Think About It . . ." lines.
She lived until she was 13, when hip dysplasia was diagnosed and she was quietly pts by her favourite vet.

 

[Equi]

One thing so so so many of these cases with young kids have in common is they have just bought the dog a few days or weeks ago. Utterly tragic for the family.

 

[Mrs. Jingle]

I can remember as a child an elderly person fairly near to us was killed by her two Bullmastiffs. I don't know any details as it was only talked about by the adults in hushed whispers when children were around.

We used to walk past the gate on the way to school and they always stood by the gateway wagging their gigantic bums hoping for a fuss!

But, unlike these days, we were always taught to never ever interact with unknown dogs, and woe betide we ever disturbed our home dogs if they were eating or sleeping. But I can remember one of the Collies was allowed to sleep at the foot of my bed, so not sure why that one was deemed OK.

I think splashgirl is right, we didn't have access to social media so it probably just didn't get reported as widely as it is now.

 

[MurphysMinder]

I've seen a later report where neighbours state "it was a big brown dog" and "the family had the dog no more than about 8 weeks" . Poor little girl.

 

[SadKen]

The Mail is reporting that the dog was an American Bully the family got from a rescue a few weeks ago according to a neighbour. I’d be amazed if a rescue rehomed such a dog to a family, they are surely culpable to some degree if they did. There is a post on Facebook about an American bully needing to be rehomed in MK a few weeks ago because it killed a chihuahua. I really, really hope it isn’t the same dog. Because imo that is morally (albeit not legally) murder.

 

[pistolpete]

I watch the way people are with dogs in the park and on the tv and I’m amazed that more dogs don’t bite nastily. Most dogs are saints to put up with the way people expect them to be good without putting any training in. Wouldn’t dream of leaving mine with a child even though she’s soppy. If she got her eye poked or tail yanked she’d be justified to say leave me be! Doesn’t take away from the utter tragedy of course. Awfully sad.

 

[stangs]

Interesting reading how different newspapers have described the case - "humanely destroyed" versus "gunned down by armed cops". The Mail is reporting that it's allegedly an American Bulldog (and then has added pictures of various stories of bullies to the article - I do love the Mail and their never ending campaign to implement further BSL). The description "big brown dog", from the Express I think, is making me think Presa/Bullmastiff more, but definitely would have been a bull or mastiff type.

Either way, after this I hope people won't be complaining about rescues not adopting out to families with young children.

 

[ester]

There was a bully in essex being posted for rehoming/help a couple of weeks ago.
They had just bought it (2/3 days previously), it had bitten several people on the arm and gone for one face. They'd shut it in a car as didn't know what else to do.
Thankfully the kids were away for the weekend, dog was PTS

 

[Dexter]

Either way, after this I hope people won't be complaining about rescues not adopting out to families with young children.

Theres plenty of dogs in rescues that would be ideal for a family with children. The issue is rescues adopting out these huge dogs with temperament issues, if that's what happened.

 

[stangs]

Theres plenty of dogs in rescues that would be ideal for a family with children. The issue is rescues adopting out these huge dogs with temperament issues, if that's what happened.

Generalising here, as we obviously don't know what happened, and I don't want to insinuate that the parents were negligent in any way:

It's not the dog that's the problem. The risk is that the parents accidentally leave a young child alone with the dog; the dog bites or attacks for whatever reason; and then the rescue is stuck with a PR nightmare on their hands.

Yes, a small dog may not have killed her, but it certainly could do some damage, and no rescue wants a dog getting sent back, or people posting on social media that the rescue was neglectful.

 

[splashgirl45]

A police officer said on the news earlier that the dog was humanely put down by police officers. Very interesting, how do they define humanely ? A bullet to the head? I assume police officers would have any other way , he didn’t say a vet did it

 

[cbmcts]

The Mail is reporting that the dog was an American Bully the family got from a rescue a few weeks ago according to a neighbour. I’d be amazed if a rescue rehomed such a dog to a family, they are surely culpable to some degree if they did. There is a post on Facebook about an American bully needing to be rehomed in MK a few weeks ago because it killed a chihuahua. I really, really hope it isn’t the same dog. Because imo that is morally (albeit not legally) murder.

My bolding - this is exactly why rescues are so wary when rehoming. Because they are immediately blamed when something goes wrong. I know of at least 3 homes that the application for rehoming stated they were adult only homes, that they had the facility to shut the dog away from visitors if required, 6 ft fences yada yada. The dogs they applied for had disclosed issues. Home checks found children's toys - oh yes, they minded their pre school grandchildren 4 days a week - another was a fully open plan downstairs and the 6ft fence was a scraggly hedge about 30 ft from a A road embankment. The third had his primary aged children living there every other weekend and half the holidays and again was noticed on a home check when the wedding photos were spotted. Would it have been the rescue's fault if a child had got hurt? It's a hell of a responsibility for a volunteer home checker to take, trying to spot irresponsible liars who are meant to be adults.

We rehomed a young male dog, no major issues but bouncy and untrained to an older couple, experienced with the breed and the photo sent the following day was of him with 2 young boys draped over him with their arms round him. The 'experienced ; owners didn't seem to notice the pinned ears or whale eye and the message was that the whole family had come to meet him after he had a 4 hour drive home. FFS. Another bitch was returned after she snapped at an 8 year old who had climbed into her crate to kiss her good bye while the dog was eating. We had a day to get someone to collect her from the other end of the country or she was going to be PTS. The child amazingly was uninjured and no, we didn't know about the child being a regular visitor/resident. The SM fallout from that one was spectacular and the rescue was totes unreasonable a) because we took 24 hours to collect the dog and b) didn't return his rehoming fee and damages (for what?). He had the dog for 4 months...

I really, really hate that some people who would provide a great home struggle to get a dog through a rescue but honestly and truly are you surprised that rescues are so cautious? And while there are tons of dogs in rescue, the 'perfect' dog that will slot into a busy home but not mind being left while you work, get on with resident dogs, visiting dogs but behave perfectly in the busy local park, be good with kids but not knock them over/wipe them out with their tail, never bark or behave aggressively but guard the family/house probably doesn't exist. If it did, we have a waiting list of about 30 good homes... the current 18 dogs in are not perfect dogs but you know what? They were as near perfect as you going to get when their first owners got them as pups.

 

[splashgirl45]

I think the trouble with my applications were that I was completely honest about my existing pets(if I had them) how long I would be leaving dog at home etc and my age !! As age seems to be a big block for some reason. Most of us horsey lot are much fitter than people half our ages but the rescues only look at the age on paper and therefore lose some very good homes. I have 3 dogs one of them is on my lap , one is on the other chair and the third is on a nice bed in front of the log burner ,they had a hour and a half walk round the fields mostly off lead which is what happens every day , the only exception would be if the weather is too hot.. a rescue could have had that sort of life if they had been prepared to take more interest. As you can tell it makes me cross because there are 2 of my friends who have had the same problems and they also bought puppies.

 

[SaddlePsych'D]

I don't understand how rescue organisations are allowed to discriminate based on age (older rather than young children), it seems so wrong to me!

ETA - sorry, in-keeping with the thread topic - it is awful that there is yet another case. I keep thinking of how traumatic it is for the families but also neighbours and others who knew the child to lose them in this way (friends, nursery/school etc.)

 

[splashgirl45]

One of my friends would have been the perfect home , both her and her partner are retired , they take the dogs on holiday with them, one of them will be at home while the other does the shopping etc. if one of them has a hospital appt they both go and have the dogs in the car and one stays in the car with them … they own their own house which has a good sized well fenced garden, the dogs get walked every day . After satisfying all of the criteria they were told sorry we don’t rehome to people who are over working age , they were both under 70… well who the hell do they rehome to ??

 

[misst]

My lovely older neighbour lost her staffy who she adored when she was 78. We went to the Dogs Trust and she took a chihauhau x jrt home having lied about her age. She told them she was 68. The dog had come from a family home where he had snapped at the children. He had a wonderful home for another 9 years living with her older shitzu and herself. She was always home or took them everywhere with her, she walked them on the common off lead twice a day for an hour every day regardless of weather.

Yes she did get dementia and so they were rehomed together when she went into a home, to another older lady. I assume the reason for older people not being given dogs is that they might not be able to keep the dog for its whole life - but my friend was over 70 when she took on her staffy and her dogs had lovely lives.

Our oldie from the CT only lived for two and a half years with us but she had a fantastic retirement I believe with us and our dogs. She would have been a wonderful gentle companion for someone with slightly limited mobility or someone older as well.

 

[cbmcts]

Some of the reasons where age can be a barrier, considering that we are talking about a large guardy breed are concerns about physical strength, not just walking them but when it all goes tits up - but I have also seen issues with small dogs causing trips and falls - finance, these are not cheap dogs to insure and feed and sadly, as people age, more and more need carers going into the home. We have had multiple requests in the past year to take dogs because carers will not go into a home with a large dog. Understandable in a way but very sad for both dog and owner. The dogs that we would consider for someone 70+ are also the dogs that are suitable for many homes so I'm afraid we would probably take the home with younger applicants.

CT dogs have already lost a home through age or illness. I can understand why they want to minimise the risk of it happening again.

I say this as some one who is mid fifties with a partner in his seventies. I know (reluctantly!) that my current big dog, assuming that he makes a decent age for the breed will probably my last challenging dog. I enjoy working through issues with a dog - despite the regular whinging I did on here a few years ago - but I know that I don't have the strength that I had 20 years ago. My OH doesn't walk this dog, he's content that he's strong enough to hold him but not strong enough to deal with issues caused by other dogs/people. He can carry this dog - I can't - but he's not as agile as he used to be if that makes sense? A previous dog of mine suffered terribly when his owner got Parkinson's with associated dementia. A lot of the confusion and anger was directed at him and of course, there was the common problem of under/over feeding, lack of exercise and vet care when people start to suffer with age related issues. Nobody wants to be ageist but it's not a human right to have the dog you want and in some (many?) cases, it would be irresponsible to rehome without taking all aspects of a home into account. Some of the saddest dogs we get are the ones that have come from elderly homes, often delivered to kennels by emergency services, they weren't battered as such but they were neglected badly and take a lot of time and money to get right. Also, it can take forever to get them signed over to the rescue as the owner probably doesn't have capacity to do so and you are relying on a social worker to do the paperwork. Funnily enough, they are easy to rehome as they are generally easy dogs who are so 'grateful' for any love or attention. They knew it once.

 

[YorksG]

Can we please stop the narrative that dementia will happen to every older person? 1 in 6 of people over 80 have the illness, which means that 5 out of six willNot have the disease

 

[cbmcts]

Can we please stop the narrative that dementia will happen to every older person? 1 in 6 of people over 80 have the illness, which means that 5 out of six willNot have the disease

Apologies, I didn't mean to imply that dementia affects everyone as they age. . When it does though, it causes an extra layer of complexity in rehoming their pets!

 

[misst]

I get all the reasons for not rehoming to older people but I still maintain that even though my lovely friend did get dementia in her LATE 80s she gave a loving a caring home to four dogs over 20 years all of whom were rehomes - one privately, one from Battersea, one from Dogs Trust and one from RSPCA. She provided a safe and loving environment and her dogs were small to medium sized ( staffy, shitzu, chi x jrt and a spaniel x).
She was very comfortable financially and her dogs were her world. She had a large house and secure garden. She lived opposite a common where the dogs were walked twice daily. I do not believe she was unusual.

 

[SaddlePsych'D]

The dogs that we would consider for someone 70+ are also the dogs that are suitable for many homes so I'm afraid we would probably take the home with younger applicants.

I don't want to derail the thread too much (sorry folks!) When considering applicants, if you (one) have two potential homes which are both assessed as suitable in all other ways but choose based on age then that is ageist. I sincerely hope that this is not actually happening.

There are lessons here in how we all, regardless of age, need to think ahead and plan for what provision there will be for our dogs if we are incapacitated physically or mentally. That's not age-dependent, anything could happen to any of us at any time.

 

[cbmcts]

I get all the reasons for not rehoming to older people but I still maintain that even though my lovely friend did get dementia in her LATE 80s she gave a loving a caring home to four dogs over 20 years all of whom were rehomes - one privately, one from Battersea, one from Dogs Trust and one from RSPCA. She provided a safe and loving environment and her dogs were small to medium sized ( staffy, shitzu, chi x jrt and a spaniel x).
She was very comfortable financially and her dogs were her world. She had a large house and secure garden. She lived opposite a common where the dogs were walked twice daily. I do not believe she was unusual.

I suspect that the sizes of her dogs helped her in rehoming at an older age! Believe it or not, I think that older homes can be and are fabulous homes. Dogs Trust rehomed a 5 yo french bulldog to a lovely lady who I believe is in her mid 80s (she'll never tell us her age!). There's been a few issues, dog wasn't house trained and she struggled with getting her outside in time and the time spent in the garden in the very cold weather but she can afford support for dog walking and getting the dog for her frequent vet visits - she's an ex puppy farm bitch with appalling skin, ears and a spinal problem, all uninsurable but over all it's been a great success. And I'm sure she's not alone in being a great owner.

I don't want to derail the thread too much (sorry folks!) When considering applicants, if you (one) have two potential homes which are both assessed as suitable in all other ways but choose based on age then that is ageist. I sincerely hope that this is not actually happening.

There are lessons here in how we all, regardless of age, need to think ahead and plan for what provision there will be for our dogs if we are incapacitated physically or mentally. That's not age-dependent, anything could happen to any of us at any time.

The lady above has had GSDs all her life and was very disappointed when she couldn't rehome another one last year - but was adamant that she wouldn't consider one older than 3 years old. Would that have been a good idea? Even 10 years ago?
Please remember that I'm talking about a big powerful breed - Rottweilers - as that is the rescue I'm involved in. I'm not anti older people having a dog. I sincerely hope that me and a suitable dog will live the entirety of our lives out together. But when I am looking at potential homes for a dog, I like most people have a mental matrix that I'm ticking off as I go along. Age is not an automatic disqualifier but likely longevity of a home is a consideration. So, when we have a dog who is not too young, untrained and boisterous - about 60% of our dogs come in between 8 and 18 months, mostly males - not too old with their own mobility/medical issues who are about 10% of the dogs and tend to be long term fostered rather than rehomed. Another 20% of dogs would not be suitable due to behavioural issues. Yay, that leaves 10% of about 200 dogs a year currently that could potentially go to a home where the new owner might not be up to a challenging dog at the moment. The reasons that that owner needs a less challenging or easier dog could include a busy household, having older children or other pets, needing to use a dog walker or day care, living circumstances such as a flat or only having a communal garden, lack of experience with this type of dog but a real desire to have one having done their research, let alone age related reasons - the reasons why people cannot have a more difficult dog are legion and very valid. We have all these great homes on a waiting list and if we are very lucky, we will have 20 dogs a year that would possibly be suitable for them. If I pick a younger person over an older person, it's not just their age as the reason, it will be that the younger person fills in just a little bit more on that matrix. We have rehomed to 70+ people but experience tells us that it is more likely fail in the longer term, due to health and finance usually leaving the rescue having to take back - which we ALWAYS do - an older dog who usually ends up in long term foster. This is not in the dogs interest. A lot of the long term fosterers are older, life long breed supporters who love having a dog in their life but no longer want to take the responsibility of owning one - the support provided to fosterers is considerable both financially and practically. We also very very rarely rehome to people who have children under 5 - is that ageist or just being responsible? The reality is that there are very few dogs in our rescue who would suit these homes so there is a lot of competition for them.

An home owner will also be preferred over a renter if everything else is equal. Yes that's unfair too. Even though we ask for written permission from a landlord, rental housing unless it's social housing is unstable and we get between 30 - 50 dogs a year where the owners cannot find housing that allows dogs, especially large ones.

And yes I completely agree with you that as soon as we take responsibility for an animal, we should have plans in place in case anything happens to us. I'm worth more to my animals dead than alive as there is financial support in my will for them! There are written instructions that are updated annually for each current pet stating what should happen to them if I am incapacitated or die. Sometimes I even remember to inform the lucky recipients of my animals of my plans (It's ok, we all know the broad plan and they were asked if they were prepared to take them ) But considering that many people haven't got anything in place for their children, let alone their pets if anything happened to them, I wouldn't hold your breath on that level of forethought.