To think that putting to sleep very difficult dogs is not the most awful thing for them?

A really interesting thread. I agree with you OP - a lot of dogs in UK shelters should be quietly and peacefully put to sleep. I'm not a fan of people adopting from overseas - frankly on cost grounds and it does nothing to change the animal culture in those countries - or keeping dogs alive for another couple of years by spending a small fortune on vet bills. I rescue pedigree cats so not the same level of risk at all but I would like to see animal welfare organisations have greater powers to be able to remove animals from poor owners, shut down poor quality breeders and offer more reasonable vet support. The number of times I see official charity posts asking for help for vet bills (£high hundreds/low 1000s) to help the animal (1-2 cats) stay in their home or to repatriate yet more dogs/cats to this country from overseas. The other thing I have noticed is the people I know who adopted dogs from overseas (having complained they couldn't find a dog to their taste in UK rescues) do nothing for animal welfare here. So do nothing to improve the situation for the next time they want to rescue a dog. (And they are great dog owners)

I think are some scenarios when dogs should be PTS. My Dsis had a rescue which was not great with her kids (not apparent immediately but contempt grew over time). The dog then bit her child twice, unprovoked and so my Dsis had the dog PTS. It was one of those binary things, the dog wasn't safe and wasn't predictable. She knew the dog couldn't be rehomed easily if at all. So that was the kindest thing in the circumstances.

I do think any shelter being dishonest about past is terrible. I just don't get it. Equally I think they have some frankly bonkers rules, I know someone who can't get an indoor cat from a shelter because she lives in an apartment on the 5th floor. And it seems quite a lot have rules about flats not being above 2 or 3th floor. For an indoors cat! Crazy. Especially as she was happy to have FIV cat (given it was going to be indoors).

My Aunt had a rescue dog for about 10 years which had what could only be described as severe mental health issues due to abuse and homelessness as a young dog. While my Aunt cared for the dog until he became too ill and had to be pts, that dog ruled her life for 10 years leaving her unable to go anywhere even for a few hours and leave him even in the care of someone else, he would go for anyone who came into her home and was extremely possessive of my aunt and this was with training and seeing behaviourists. When he was finally pts due to illness it was like my Aunt got a new lease on life, travelling, seeing friends, taking classes and so on. As a life long dog lover and owner she said she would never have another dog again due to her last experience.

I think it was an amazing thing she did to give that dog a nice life for 10 years but it was at huge cost to herself.

When I was a kid, we rescued a dog.
It was a wired hair patterdale terrier. Not our first dog by a long way, we are a farming family.
It was walked for 4 hours a day. 2 lots of 2 hours and not really ever left alone. It was a little shit, would run out into the road and cause havoc, once chewed through his lead and chased sheep that were in Ewe, not come back to his name, leap up on to the counters of kitchen etc. my parents spoke to a dog specialist, their advice didn't work. The last straw was dog was dicking about in the road and was nearly hit by an elderly couple who were distraught, my step dad took dog straight to the vets as soon as he caught him and he was put to sleep. My step dad knew dog would hate kennels and o agree in this situation it was the kindest thing.

We tried to adopt from local dogs trust, got overlooked so many times. Rang up begging practically and all said was to complete form and wait.

We got a whippet from reputable local breeder. We'll that dog is my absolute furbaby and doggy love of life.

People say adopt, shelters put many barriers in place.

Considering how many people bought and bring rescues from those charities to be PTS at the practice I co-owned and worked at…I’d say I’m not.

Follow-up support is awful, vetting is awful. The whole process is just designed to fail.

YANBU but many dog ‘lovers’ are emotionally motivated and selfish. They don’t see the balance of dog well-being and the greater good.

One day is more than 99% of people have with their dogs before they take them home.

He had never bitten anyone - he just warned people away, doing everything right as a dog should. And we're not talking about a 5yr old child with no understanding or self-preservation here, our daughter was 13 and a) understood the risk, and b) understood the canine escalation ladder. Unlike the two people who pushed my hand away to shove theirs in his face because "dogs love me" and got a minor bite for their troubles (still didn't break the skin, though).

My point is that his temperament was "determined" in the worst possible circumstances, in an environment in which he was constantly terrified and unable to cope. Taking him out of that, with a human that he instantly trusted for some reason, removed the problem.

Y'all keep saying we got really, really lucky. Well, we've been "really, really lucky" 7 times so far with various dogs that nobody else would adopt. At what point is it no longer luck?

And yet other people complain "the big five" are too fussy. This is a prime example of why rescues can't win. I've worked for a two of those "big five" rescues and it is absolutely false that they routinely lie about behaviour issues, in fact they have extremely strict policies about disclosure and get people to sign disclaimers to confirm they have been informed of the dog's history and another disclaimer to confirm they will muzzle the dog in public. So I'm afraid you're speaking in utter ignorance there. It's smaller rescues in my experience that are more likely to have dodgy practises because they can get away with it more easily than a big public-facing organisation can.

I have been saying for ages that rescues are dodgy and they routinely lie about dogs behavioural issues - and I get shouted down every time.

Someone died in Norfolk last year after her rescue XL bully (with a bite history!!!) attacked her. The charity didn’t inform her it had a bite history - it came out in the press when the dogs previous owner went public!

Personally, as someone who does a lot of fostering, I would never touch the ‘big five’ rescues.

I’ve fostered maybe a dozen dogs in the last two years with Spaniel Aid and another breed specific one - never had an issue. But they are very fussy about who they let foster and who they let adopt - because they care about dogs, unlike the big five.

We have re-homed several 'hard to place' and somewhat unstable rescue dogs from a specific breed rescue over the years. They have been tricky to manage but are very much our type of dog. Ancient breed, stunningly beautiful, not really that trainable and very attached to 'their' people. For us, the compromises are worth it.

Sadly the general public don’t agree and rescue centres get absolutely dammed if they PTS a dog. Then they lose support and money and can’t help as many dogs.
They cannot win unfortunately.

You were lucky, not right.

Totally agree with you. I love dogs but I am not sentimental about keeping every dog alive at all costs. Euthanasia is quick, peaceful and painless whereas a stressful and confusing life being shunted back and forth between failed adoptions, or merely existing in a shelter for years on end, never knowing what it is to be loved or properly stimulated, is no life. Some dogs, for whatever complicated reason are never going to be chosen, and taking up valuable space and resources that could help 20 other dogs that could be re-homed just seems daft. The dog won't know it's about to be euthanised, it's no different to going in for a general anesthetic, just that they don't wake up from it. The dog isn't going to be aware that it's dead. There won't be a family mourning its loss, so really, where's the harm?

People like to say 'but why should the dog suffer/be punished?' But the truth is that the dog doesn't suffer at all, and has absolutely no concept of being 'punished' when it's unconscious and anesthetised.

You spent one day with a bite risk dog and then brought it home to live with your kids.

The mind boggles.

Most people don't offer homes to biters because it's beyond stupid to bring a bite risk dog around children. You just got really, really lucky.

I agree. Everyone says they would put a suffering dog down but they only mean a physically suffering dog, not a mentally suffering one.

Behavioural euthanasia should really be more common than it is. Sure, with time, money, training etc you can probably improve the reactivity, fearfulness etc but honestly that time and money and kennel space could save 5-10 other dogs in the same amount of time.

Childfree, dog free homes with people home all the time, with the time, money and inclination to carefully manage every single moment and interaction of a dog are rare.

@ntmdino "He was perfectly safe with her"

No one who actually knows about dogs would EVER say that. No dog is "perfectly safe" with a child.

There are a lot of reprehensible rescues out there, ones that are determined to rehome unstable dogs, ones that spends hundreds of thousands on dogs with disabilities who it would be kinder to let go.
There's a rescue in America under scrutiny at the moment as they moved a litter of puppies who had been exposed to rabies all over the place exposing multiple people and animals to them.

No, you've got it wrong. Conventional wisdom said we weren't the right home for the dog. However, the presence of our daughter was the only thing that had ever made him calm down, in six months of being at the shelter. It's something I've never seen, before or since; and it's not like we just took him home right there and then. We spent the day with him, making sure he was safe when she was around, and we took all the sensible precautions when we got him home.

He was perfectly safe with her. We never had him around other children, and there was never a hint of danger, other than the two strangers who ignored both his warnings and ours.

As for "hated me", he wasn't stressed; it was more a thinly-disguised contempt and a refusal to do anything I told him to. Weirdly, if he was ever scared (eg by thunder) it was always my desk he crawled under, and me that he fetched if he needed to go out. Basically, I was a convenient servant and bodyguard, but apart from that he simply refused to acknowledge my existence.

He had a long, happy life. The fact that I wasn't happy is irrelevant ;)

Rehoming a dog to a home with a child in it when it had a bite history was incredibly stupid and irresponsible. Why would you put your child at risk like that?

Forcing a dog to live in a home where it hated one of the people isn't the great story you think it is- that dog must have been so stressed every day.

It sounds like you weren't the right home for that dog.

I absolutely agree. I have no patience with the "no PTS" brigade. There are so many lovely dogs needing homes- I see no reason to keep alive the difficult, the challenging who can't possibly be having nice lives.

I think rescue shelters should have some kind of regulation - how can they justify passing that foster dog around when it's bitten so many people? It's probably stressed out of it's head - how can it be the kindest thing to keep it alive?

To many people keep animals alive at any cost without thinking of the welfare of the animal.

Even for dogs out of kennels, I think it’s sometimes the best option. I have a friend with a very “reactive” aggressive / nervous rescue dog and the poor creature must frankly spend most of its time thoroughly miserable. It can’t stand other dogs, people who aren’t my friend (including her partner), anyone approaching towards it, bicycles, runners, loud noises, cars, the wind blowing the trees, plastic bags, the list is endless. It can’t be allowed off the leash and barks and lunges constantly. Imagine a human living with that level of stress and terror and anxiety and rage all day long and the quality of life they’d have. Having a pet is supposed to be a positive experience for both owner and pet. This poor dog would be better off out of its misery.

I work for a rescue. Dogs with no issues usually do get rehomed quickly, no rescue actually wants dogs hanging around when they don't need to be. The Pissfingers meme is funny but you've had experience yourself with a dog with very specific needs, rescues don't put restrictions in place for no reason. If the dog can't live with kids, cats, other dogs etc there will be a reason.

The question you raise is one rescues deal with on a daily basis and there are different approaches and different points of view but most reputable rescues will, after a certain point, PTS dogs who face little prospect of rehoming and won't cope in a kennel environment long term. Even the rescue whose slogan is that they never destroy a healthy dog will PTS on welfare grounds if it is plainly in the interests of the dog.

Rescues to be honest are damned if they do and damned if they don't. If they try and give dogs a chance they get torn to shreds; they also get torn to shreds for putting dogs to sleep. It's very easy to sit back and think you could do it better; very hard to actually do it, day by day, and have to witness and be involved in making these decisions every day.