Liz Prough

An Sci 201
Section 4
Are no kill shelters more humane than conventional shelters
for the Pit Bull dog breed?
Most people in society see Pitbulls as a dangerous dog breed that
should not be allowed in our homes or in our lives. There are many pit
bulls in shelters throughout the United States. The big question is
whether or not the no kill shelters are more humane than the
conventional shelters. I found through research that the more humane
thing for them would be a conventional animal shelter. Society sees
these dogs as Americas most wanted dog. Pit bull is not even a
registered breed according to any of the registered dog breeding
associations and clubs around the world. It is just a name to make the
dog seem more menacing. Only thirty six percent of adoption agencies
and animal shelters agree on the label of a pit bull or a pit bull type
dog (Weaver, 2013). According to the media these dogs are portrayed
as demonic animals- unpredictable and savage in their behavior
towards humans and by having this stereotype it makes them very
hard to be adoptable in shelters. Although there are still people willing
to adopt pit bulls they still sometimes register them under a different
name in order for their dog to seem less scary to society. Even with the
change in breed name if people see a dog on a walk that even
remotely looks like a pit bull they tend to walk the other way in order
to avoid it. Pit bulls have such horrible reputations that even family

members of pit bull owners will be weary of a family dog until someone
else in the family says that the dog is safe. This leads me to believe
that this breed of dog has a very difficult time getting adopted,
because shelters seek to avoid adoptions that lead to unsuccessful
relationships which is all too common for this breed (Twining, 2000). I
can therefore make the assumption that these dogs that are in the
shelters will most likely be spending most of their lives if not the rest of
their lives in a shelter.
Although euthanizing Pit Bulls right upon seizing them is also not
a very effective method of managing this breed of dog. The
conventional shelters typically keep any dog that gets brought into its
care for a predetermined amount of time before euthanizing the
animal. This is true unless the animal is a threat to the employees or is
deemed unadoptable. In the article Dead Dogs by Colin Dayan it
describes a situation where pit bull dogs got seized from an owner who
had been breeding them to fight. The Louisiana Society for Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals proceeded to euthanize the dog by injection and
was going to the extremes of killing pregnant dogs and nineteen of
them were puppies less than a year old. Conventional shelters should
be able to try to adopt fit pit bulls for the specific amount of time the
shelter has before beginning the euthanasia process. Because society
sees these dogs as too aggressive to live it becomes almost

impossible to keep them in no kill shelters regardless of how adoptable

these dogs could be (Dayan, 2010).
If pit bulls were kept in no kill shelters all around the world a
majority of them would end up spending their entire lives there.

This

could be more severely detrimental to not only their physical health,

but their behavioral health as well. Like humans, dogs need
interaction with other dogs or in most cases in domestic dogs human
interaction. A study was done where dogs in shelters were tested on
the effects of different forms of human interactions on the
concentrations of circulating cortisol and stress related behaviors of
dogs within 40 hours of admittance to a county animal shelter.
Glucocorticoids are steroids that take the form of cortisol that we can
measure in order to help us see the amount of stress a dog may be
under. The types of human interactions that the dogs would get were
thirty-minute sessions of a passive human petting or play. The
experiment had dogs that did not receive any human interaction and
were in secluded areas. Human interaction decreased the amount of
visual stress the dog was under for example the heavy stress panting
and the barking or whining. All three of the human interactions were
able to reduce the cortisol levels in the dogs. As a result, the human
interactions reduced the dogs stress levels in the shelter. The dogs in
the secluded areas showed no change in cortisol levels. The dogs in
isolation also showed more behavioral stressors. Human interaction

also seemed to reduce the more fearful and dangerously unpredictable

reactions of shelter dogs (Shiverdecker, 2013). Most conventional
shelters do not have the means to provide human interaction for these
dogs especially in no kill shelters with the dogs that have been there
almost all their lives. So in the case of a pit bull in a no kill shelter, it
could spend its entire life in a shelter with little to no human
interaction that was just proven to be detrimental to their stress level
and health. It is sad to think about these dogs getting put to sleep
after a certain amount of time, but it does not seem all that different
than their fate in a conventional shelter for the rest of their lives. If
they cant get the human interaction and behavior simulations that
they need to be healthy they being put to sleep could put them out of
their suffering.
Not many studies have been done on animal shelters and how it
affects the animals behaviorally. It has been a fairly recent topic
especially the study of temperament in shelter animals. People do not
really recognize the effect shelters have on animals if they are staying
there for prolonged periods of time. These tests could also help
understand the behavior of dogs in shelters and how it could
potentially act outside the shelter. Even though these tests could help
us understand how an animal will react, it is still hard to be sure
because if an animal spends a long time in the shelter, being adopted
might be a stressor for the dog as it is considered a break in routine

(Contaza, 2005). Although this research is helpful in making the no kill

shelters more successful at adopting dogs it still does not help the
negative reputation that comes with being a pit bull. In most cases
even if the behavioral study showed that the dog is going to make a
great house pet people would still shy away from the dangerous breed
which would result in the animal living a stressful life in the shelter for
the rest of its days.
In a different experiment it tests the behavioral and
psychological responses of shelter dogs to long-term confinement.
This is a topic that could relate really well the pit bull breed because in
most cases once they get put into shelters they rarely get adopted if at
all. Places that prohibit the euthanasia of shelter dogs unless they are
seriously unhealthy or dangerous often forget the behavioral and
psychological impacts being in a shelter for a long period of time could
have on the animal. This study compared group and pair housing for
dogs in these long-term shelters. Saliva was collected to monitor the
health of the animals through cortisol levels as well as observing the
animals for behavioral changes. The different types of housing did not
affect the animals stress levels. The different types of behavior that
the dogs showed did vary with the types of housing.

The kennel size

also could affect the way the dog can be active. If the kennel is too
small the dog may only be able to turn around causing it to become
less active. Most dogs strive on being active and for an extremely

athletic dog like the pit bull this could be a very boring and sad
environment to live the rest of its life in. Activity can only be
stimulated if the dog is socially or environmentally stimulated. So if
the dogs get little interaction or time in a larger space to play they will
typically be inactive and most likely unhappy. The study found that
although the dogs were equally inactive the dogs that were in grouped
housing spent more time standing up whereas the dogs in paired
housing spent more time lying down. They were both equally inactive,
which is not a good sign for long-term housing of any dog (Villa, 2013).
In conclusion, through research it became clear that it would be
more humane for pit bulls to be kept in conventional shelters versus
the no kill shelters. The media has such a negative perception of the
breed that it makes it almost impossible for these dogs to get adopted
out of the shelter. Through research I found that dogs that had human
interaction in shelters would lower their stress levels, but if the animal
spends the rest of its life in a shelter it may not get the human
interaction it needs to be healthy. Also, the animals are less active in
shelters and an athletic dog like the pit bull needs exercise to thrive. It
seems so inhumane to keep a dog for the rest of its live in a jail like
atmosphere. Even though they may not have serious health problems
to show that they are suffering their behavioral and psychological
wellbeing could be suffering greatly and no animal deserves to spend
the rest of its life miserable.

Bibliography

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