Reporting dangerous dogs?

[LondonLassi]

Something has been on my mind for a few days after hearing about the poor 12 day old baby who died after being attacked by a dog.

My sister’s neighbour has a 16 year old son who is regularly in trouble with the police. I spend a lot of time there. The screaming and shouting that comes from next door is horrendous and the police are often called out to restrain him. He is not in school. Smokes weed all day. I’ve never seen his face because he wears a hoodie over a face covering (even pre-COVID) I’m just trying to paint a picture of the kind of troubled youth we’re dealing with here. If you make eye contact with him he will swear at you, call you names and threaten you. He is quite frankly a bit scary.

About a year ago they got two puppies from the same litter. They are fully grown now and they look like some sort of pit bull cross. Possibly pit bull/mastiff. They are huge. I’ll attach a pic of what I think they might be. When we sit out in the garden we can hear them next door fighting and growling, they barge my sisters fence to try to get to her small jack Russell terriers. They’ve had to repair the fence three times already after the dogs broke it.

This boy walks the dogs regularly. They are not muzzled. If we happen to leave the house at the same time the dogs go up on their hind legs and get very over excited. The boy has to pull them back to get them away. They try to break free to get to anyone walking near them if they’re out for a walk. Tonight we happened to be leaving as the boy was walking home. The dogs immediately started barking at us and were trying to run towards us and had to be restrained. We often hear people shouting when they walk by because of the dogs trying to get to them. It’s very scary when it happens because they are big and intimidating.

I am terrified of what would happen if these dogs managed to get loose. They have been raised by someone with a violent, anti social background. I can’t shake the image of them getting hold of a child. The boy has a little brother in the house, probably around 6 years old.

What would you do in this situation? I’m thinking of reporting them as potentially dangerous dogs. If IABU please tell me. It just seems like an awful attack waiting to happen.

www.news24.com/News24/Toy-pom-kills-baby-20001009
Pomeranian

@Heffalooomia I appreciate you backing me up and I wholeheartedly agree with everything you’ve said. Especially the part about dog owners being so unreasonably defensive about particular breeds. You can throw all the facts and statistics in the world at them but they will still insist that a chihuahua is just at dangerous as a type of dog that was literally bred to kill and maul 🤨

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-33211099
‘Small terrier’

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/uk/2013/apr/09/baby-died-bitten-jack-russell
Jack Russell

still insist that a chihuahua is just at dangerous as a type of dog that was literally bred to kill and maul
yup, and it feels a bit 'cult like' to me....like the way maga people defend trump!

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2132912/amp/Horror-family-dog-kills-dismembers-month-old-baby-father-slept.html
Golden retriever

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.foxnews.com/us/texas-boy-2-mauled-to-death-by-family-dog.amp
Labrador and Schnauzer

@Dogsarebetterthanpeople an entire pack of
Dachshunds? Very poor example, they were also mixed with terrier. An entire pack of any kind of animal could be dangerous. Seems like the Pomeranian incident was an extremely rare occurrence but well done for finding an example. Nothing on the flesh eating chihuahuas then?

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.usatoday.com/amp/10257643
Catahoula hound

The breed most likely to bite you in the UK is the Labrador. Yes, that's partially because there are a lot of labradors here, but it's still a statistic worth mentioning.

Yet on 90% of dog threads, people recommend labradors as being fantastic family pets - sometimes ignoring the fact that fully grown male labs can easily weigh 50kg, and that, untrained, a 50kg mass of dog can do a hell of a lot of damage.

In fact, in America in 2016, labradors were responsible for the second highest amount of fatalities from bites (after pit bulls).

www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities-2016.php

In 2017, they came in at number 4.

www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities-2017.php

Now, I have nothing against labradors as a breed at all, but it's interesting to see how bias people are towards pitbull breeds, when the number of genuine pitbulls in the UK is tiny. "Pitbull" in the UK refers to a type based on measurements and size - it has very little to do with the actual breed.

The fact that most genuine pitbulls must be licensed, leashed and muzzled in public means that they're incredibly likely to be owned by responsible people, not "chavs in tracksuits".

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/nypost.com/2020/09/17/dog-mauled-uk-newborn-to-death-because-he-was-jealous/amp/
Chow mix.
Note that not a single dog posted so far is a bull breed.
Also note that with the exception of the catahoula they are all fairly common pet breeds

@vanillandhoney did you not read my post from a few minutes ago? I’ll copy and paste it again for you.

Can I also just make myself very clear here.. some of you that have said you have pit bull type dogs sound like lovely, responsible dog owners. I don’t doubt for a second that the breeds that could be potentially dangerous can also be lovely pets when raised in the right environment by the right people. I have never said that all big dogs are dangerous killing machines. I’m talking about the potentially dangerous breeds that are being raised by the wrong people.

@Dogsarebetterthanpeople Good God, I would be here all night if I posted links to stories about pit bull type related deaths and you know it.

I’m still waiting for the deadly chihuahua story.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1288786/Familys-border-collie-leaps-car-mauls-baby.html
Mauling not death but Border collie.
This is actually the breed I have so no, I’m not defensive as you and your comrade are trying to make out.
Just pointing out that dog attacks are not an almost exclusively bull breed problem, it’s acrosd the board

@Dogsarebetterthanpeople some interesting reading for you.. www.google.com/amp/s/dogbitelaw.com/vicious-dogs/pit-bulls-facts-and-figures/amp

No, I don’t know it at all.
The only thing I know is some people are so breathtakingly ignorant there is no reasoning with them.

[quote LondonLassi]@vanillandhoney did you not read my post from a few minutes ago? I’ll copy and paste it again for you.

Can I also just make myself very clear here.. some of you that have said you have pit bull type dogs sound like lovely, responsible dog owners. I don’t doubt for a second that the breeds that could be potentially dangerous can also be lovely pets when raised in the right environment by the right people. I have never said that all big dogs are dangerous killing machines. I’m talking about the potentially dangerous breeds that are being raised by the wrong people.[/quote]
No, I must have cross-posted with you.

But my argument stands - any breed can be dangerous in the wrong hands. Breed "fashions" come and go, and when a breed is fashionable, the more likely it is to end up in the wrong hands - with an inexperienced owner who doesn't do the training. Years ago, it was huskies. Staffies have also had their day, and now it's "bully breeds", akitas and chows.

I've never met an aggressive dog of any of those breeds. I have met aggressive collies, Jack Russells, labradors, dachshunds and bedlington terriers. I walk dogs for a living - and the breed I've been snapped, growled and lunged at by the most is the Jack Russell.

But because they're small, they don't seem to count. It's only big dogs that seem to matter - people ignore shit behaviour by small dogs, and thus they keep getting away with it. All breeds are dangerous in the wrong hands, big or small. So, when you say "potentially dangerous breeds" you really mean "all dogs".

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/oklahoma-woman-mauled-to-death-by-pack-of-7-small-dogs/
More dachshund x terrier

Report them. If they’re not dangerous dogs then there will be no issue. If they are, your report might help contribute to making things safer.

[quote LondonLassi]@Dogsarebetterthanpeople some interesting reading for you.. www.google.com/amp/s/dogbitelaw.com/vicious-dogs/pit-bulls-facts-and-figures/amp[/quote]
Why are you posting websites about pitbulls? The American pitbull is banned in the UK, so statistics saying it's dangerous are largely irrelevant here.

Yes, there are pitbull owners here, but if you legitimately own an actual pitbull (not a staffy that you refer to as a pit to sound tough), you need to have a license. You also need to have the dog chipped, neutered, leashed and muzzled in public. If you're caught breaking those restrictions, your dog will be taken off you and PTS.

So, the likelihood of a genuine pitbull actually attacking someone in this country is vanishingly small, as there are very, very few of them here to start with. Bull breeds and pitbulls are not the same thing - people mixing the two up aren't helping themselves.

Have the dogs ever actually hurt anyone (knocking them over, biting, etc.) OP?
Because lunging on a leash and being a large breed are not particularly good reasons for reporting them.

@vanillandhoney again.. maybe read the thread? I posted a link in response to all the links that were provided for me by @Dogsarebetterthanpeople. Constantly having to repeat myself is really tedious. Follow the thread before posting.

@Dogsarebetterthanpeople I couldn’t agree more.

I would report if you are concerned op like you say even if it just put you and your sisters mind at rest that you done everything you could just in case anything did happen.

People say that the lunging and pulling behaviour are just “ playful “ which is not wrong however, and I’m saying this as a someone who’s owned all sorts of breeds of dogs in my life from Bull type’s to Jack Russells and everything in between, for people who are not dog people or people who are scared of dogs, this kind of behaviour is scary. A controlled, trained dog does not go up on its hind legs, lunges at people and barks and I don’t care what anyone says, people have a right to walk in a park or even just walk down their street without being lunged at by a dog it’s terrifying to some and they should not be expected to just get over it and get on with it! I’m saying that as a dog lover myself and it’s not just the big breeds it’s the smaller ones too. Defo report OP.

People need to get a grip about dogs in this country. Adults can’t go around baring their teeth at people, intimidating people and knocking people over but some owners seem to think that this is acceptable, cute even. No it is really annoying. Train your dogs properly and many thanks to the brilliant dog owners out there that realise that not everyone appreciates it has any tolerance for poorly trained dogs.