As much as I love animals, I would do anything I could to prevent my animals from being injured.
About 10 years ago, one of our neighbors had 3 Rottweillers that were lovely teddy bear types. They were so trusted by the family that the dogs were left unsupervised to play with their 4 childrn ages 3-10. One night at about 3 am we were awakend to the sound of horses screaming & thundering hooves. After brief inspection of ours, we figured it was coming from another neighbors with 2 very old mare s & called the Sheriff. The mares were housed in a 100' x 50' drylot with very safe 5 foot post/board/bumper board buried in the ground covered with horse wire. Apparently the Rotts had scaled the "no climb" fence & had brought one of the mares down. The other was just frantic. It took the Sheriff over 45 min to come & by that time the dogs had been subdued by the owners & the Vet called to suture the mares. These dogs were so intent on their prey that being hosed down with a pressure hose didn't deter them. The dogs owners finally had to hit them with shovels to prevent the mare from being seriously hurt. All animals recovered & fortunately the dogs owners built special chain link kennels with lids for containment when they were not supervised. The only thing they could figure was that "pack mentality" eventually got the best of them when the aged mares layed down at night & perhaps rolled looking like a dying or injured creature. It was one of the most awful things I have ever heard & seemed to go on forever. As much as I love & trust my 2 very gentle face licking Whippets, I have seen the two literally rip a squirrel in two before I could prevent it. They are so into instinct that these normally obedient dogs don't even know I'm there. One of them accidently nicked me when I was trying to get them off a rabbit before it was too late. All of these incidents happened on our totally fenced one 1/2 acre property when hapless wild animals somehow tunnelled in under the bumper board or in the case of the squirrels over the 5' fence. After seeing this, I can imagine what could happen with larger dogs when instinct takes over. Kaaren
