Yesterday, Caveat had a nice little post about the what a "pit bull" looks like -- if you believe the media reports. Let's just say, the media is none to good at determining what a pit bull looks like.
Then, today, there were several news stories about a dog attack in Council Bluffs, IA that popped up in my google reader.
Most of the stories started off as stories about a "pit bull attack" (you can tell through Google's cache feature -- if you look at the older stories, they all have "pit bull" in them, with it often in the headline -- but if you click on the links, they have been updated). This story calls the dog an "American Bulldog", as does this one, while this one refers to it as a Boxer and meanwhile this one just went with "dog" instead. Breed ID is easy right? And because the media says it is a pit bull, they must know...
Anyway....
The victim was a 77 year old woman that was out walking her dog and the dog came up to her and attacked her and her dogs. As someone was driving by, he saw the woman's situations, tried to help her from the dog, but ended up having to stab the dog and kill it with his pocketknife to stop the attack. Fortunately it's pretty cold in Iowa this time of year and the woman was protected by a heavy coat and only sustained fairly mild injuries.
Which then leads us back to Council Bluffs. In January 2005, Council Bluffs enacted a ban on "pit bulls" in the community. The head of animal control in Council Bluffs has been very vocal that his ban is "working" because they've virtually eliminated bites by 'pit bulls' in the city -- however, based on their own data, there is no evidence that the number of total bites has decreased. While 'pit bull' bites have virtually gone away with the ban, the number of bites by all other dog breeds has gone up, and at no point have they even come close to having as few bites as their 2003 pre-ban bite numbers.
Breed ID is innaccurate at best.
The media is more likely to report something if it is a 'pit bull' attack (even if they have to change it later). And often makes reporting errors because they aren't experts at Breed ID either. This is also why any study based 100% off of media reports is going to be misleading and biased.
And cities that enact Breed Bans are not overall safer because of it -- because until you deal with the irresponsible owners, you're still going to have dog bite problems.
I'm really not sure why any of it is that hard to figure out.
Update: And I'm going to post the picture below because, well, let's just say that Breed ID is apparently REALLY hard.
Most all of the articles noted that the woman that was attacked was walking a "Miniature Doberman". Here's a picture of the woman and her dog:
The dogl looks like a great dog -- but either that's not the same dog she was walking when she was attacked, or breed ID is REALLY hard.
The Bloomington Pantagraph identifies the dog she was walking as a young Rottweiler mix.
Is it really possible that breed identification is not even attempted in many of these dog attack cases? Instead a bigger dog that attacks is immediately identified as a pit bull, no matter what it is. The newspaper loves it since they can get the clicks on their story. The fear mongers love it since they can say see another one of those, them there, killer dogs causing big ole problems again. Can we use this to our advantage in some way? HMMMMM....
Posted by: Carianne | February 02, 2009 at 01:33 PM
Great post, Brent.
'Breed' is usually identified by bystanders, animal control or the victim. I'm sure the reporters nudge them in that direction as well.
Basically any mutt is a 'pit bull' in media. I wish they'd run pics every time but they rarely do, unfortunately. We should all be scooping them up when available.
Miniature Doberman - that's the second time I've heard about that in a news story but I've never seen one myself :>)
Posted by: Selma | February 02, 2009 at 04:35 PM
Regarding Council Bluffs, they obviously have a HUGE incentive to now purposely mis-identify dogs they would have previously named a "pit bull" as no longer a pit bull when there is a dog bite. So as to make their numbers look better and seem that their pointless legislation actually did anything to make their community safer.
Posted by: BrianC | February 02, 2009 at 04:38 PM
Did you see this one? The Aussies picked it up (sigh), they say it's a Bulldog, don't know if this is a file pic or not, they're always vague that way:
http://www.livenews.com.au/Articles/2009/02/03/Passerby_kills_dog_as_it_attacks_woman
Posted by: Selma | February 02, 2009 at 06:08 PM
"Unofficial Wactchdog"?
the typo watchdog
Posted by: Mikey | February 03, 2009 at 12:09 PM
2 1/2 years I've been online and no-one has pointed that out to me?! I'm now just a watchdog...
Selma - -that HAS to be a file photo...no way the Aussies got an exclusive pic that no one here has published.
Posted by: Brent | February 03, 2009 at 12:15 PM
File photo of an English Bulldog...
Posted by: MichelleD | February 03, 2009 at 01:34 PM
I dunno, those Ozmen are pretty intrepid, mate! Nevah say die, Bruce! Moight a hedda Sheila in the billabong coming the raw prawn that snepped the ol' gehl while she was et it then blahsted the pics into the ol' Aitch Queue jist as they was hevin' their furst Oice Ceold Fostah's o' tha day.
Or Not.
Posted by: Barry McKenzie | February 03, 2009 at 02:02 PM