Dogs that Bite

I was looking at old journal entries from when Seppel first arrived. I'll preface this entry by saying a dog biting a human is never acceptable IMO. I mean I guess outside of defending themselves from being beaten, there is never a time that it should be okay.

I put my dogs through very uncomfortable situations, I have vaccinated them, taken their temperatures, trimmed their nails, bathed them, cleaned ears, drawn blood and they have never offered to bite me.

Back in November of last year I was playing Seppel's favorite game. The game consists of me taking a rope toy and swinging it around, Sepp will do back flips and jump for it. A woman came up to me in the parking lot, commenting that it was good exercise. I think it happened when she turned to walk off, but I casually moved my hand and Seppel grabbed my wrist! He immediately let go and you could tell he was like "That is not what I meant to grab." I was so stunned, but it was kind of funny at the same time because it must have been just ask shocking for him as it was for me.

I think Seppel was raised specifically to not be mouthy. He will not wrestle, he won't mouth me or chew on me ever. I know his owner had a very aggressive dog before him, and I think she really tried hard to make sure he would never think using his mouth on a person was acceptable. I could also be talking out of my ass and he's just that way - but I firmly believe his former owner worked very hard to make sure it wasn't a behavior he had.

Through everything I have put Seppel through, he has never ever offered to bite me. It absolutely blows my mind that people would live with a dog that would bite them, that people are willing to walk on eggshells in their own house, tip toeing around their dog.

A particular situation I wanted to talk about is a dog I know that at 16 weeks his owners wanted to euthanize him because he was so aggressive towards them. A veterinarian took it upon themselves to save this dog, they placed him with a breed rescue [he was a purebred], the breed rescue adopted him to someone I know. This person has him knocked out 2x a year to be shaved down, she cannot handle him, if he doesn't want to get into the car she can't make him because she doesn't want to get bitten. He's the kind of dog who will sit there wagging his tail and suddenly lash out and bite you. It completely boggles my mind. There is no way I would put up with that kind of behavior!

We used to have a toy poodle that came in for grooming when I first started working at the vet clinic. The owners actually had all of his teeth pulled[not at our clinic] because he was so aggressive. When they brought him in he would be trying to bite them/gum them. They took care of him until he was like... 18 years old or something ridiculous.

I guess for me, I wonder, what kind of life is the dog having? If the dog feels like it needs to lash out and a eat a person all the time - is that dog really living a good life?

These types of situations with human aggression and lack of bite inhibition are pretty few and far between, but there are just some dogs out there that are wired wrong and it doesn't matter what kind of training you do, outside of not touching the dog as 'management' it's sometimes better to let these kinds of dogs come back as something else, at least that is how I feel.