A Shocking Number of Dogs in Shelters Are Misidentified as ‘Pit Bulls’

Using DNA psychoanalysis , research worker have evince that shelter prole ofttimes mislabel dogs as “ pitfall bulls . ” They say this is a serious problem turn over the social brand palisade the strain — which , technically talk , does n’t really live .

Thenew work , published in The Veterinary Journal , shows that fauna shelter staff — and even some veterinary surgeon — consistently mistake dogs , particularly those class as infernal region bull - type hot dog . Much of this has to do with the fact that animal shelter stave are expected to guess the breed of dogs purely found on physical visual aspect alone . And even when frump are assessed at the same time , stave members often disagree on what strain it actually is .

“ Unlike many other things people ca n’t quite define but ‘ know when they see it , ’ identification of dogs as stone pit pig can trigger an raiment of negative event , from the loss of housing , to being seize by animal control , to the taking of the dog ’s life , ” said study confidential information generator Julie Levy in a pressstatement . “ In the high - stakes humanity of animal shelters , a frump ’s life-time might count on a possible adoptive parent ’s fleeting coup d’oeil and assumptions about its suitability as a ducky . If the shelter staff has labeled the dog as a quarry bull , its chances for adoption mechanically go down in many shelters . ”

William Duplessie

There ’s really no such thingas a purebred “ pit bull , ” which makes the finding of this study all the more problematic . The stop - all terminus “ pit Samson - character strain ” describes any dog derived from the heritage breedsAmerican Staffordshire terrierorStaffordshire bull through terrier . The purebredAmerican pit bull terrieris also descended from these stock , and is often let in in the liberal definition of “ pit bull . ”

For the written report , University of Florida researcher observed four staff members ( include some veterinarian ) at each of four different fauna shelters , recording how they identified incoming dogs . In total , there were 120 dogs involved in the study , incorporate 16 dissimilar breeds ( admittedly , not the greatest sample size , both in terms of stave members and dogs analyzed ) . After this , the researcher took blood samples from the dogs for DNA analysis ; their genetic profiles were then compared to the staff ’s assessments .

The researchers learned that one in three dogs lacking DNA for pit bull inheritance were labeled by at least one staff phallus as being a cavity horseshit - type detent , while one in five dogs who actually had some kind of pit bull DNA were missed by all shelter stave . Dogs with pit bull’s eye heritage were correctly labeled only 33 to 75 percent of the time , depending on which stave extremity did the judging . And bounder with no relevant desoxyribonucleic acid were mislabeled as quarry bulls anywhere from zero to 48 percentage of the time .

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According to theASPCA , near four million hotdog enter animal shelters in the United States each twelvemonth , of which 1.2 million are euthanized . About 1.4 million dogs are follow each year . How many of these dogs are not being adopted because they ’ve been mislabeled ?

Many jurisdiction are enact legislating restricting certain breeds , let in pit bulls and weenie that resemble them . “ The restrictions are based on the assumption that certain breeds are inherently unsafe , that those breeds can be reliably identify , and that restricting these breeds would improve public safety gadget , ” the authors compose in their written report .

But many dog are identify base on their physical visual aspect alone , and these assessments are often wrong — even when made by experts . It ’s quite difficult , if not impossible , to augur a dog-iron ’s behavior even when its genetical profile is know .

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“ A firedog ’s physical appearing can not assure commentator anything about its conduct , ” said Levy . “ Even dogs of alike appearance and the same strain often have divers behavioral trait in the same way that human siblings often have very unlike personalities . ”

Previousstudieshave shown that injuries from dogs have not decreased in jurisdictions where certain strain have been censor . Public safety would be best serve , argue the researchers , by focusing on other variables , including the supervision of children , recognizing a frankfurter ’s consistency linguistic process , not approaching an unfamiliar dog in its territorial dominion , neutering dogs , identifying “ grievous dogs and reckless hotdog owners , ” and raising puppies to be societal companions .

As for brute protection staff , they should simply participate “ interracial breed ” or “ strange ” in their disc when a blackguard ’s real bloodline is unavailable .

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