Reply #19: Yep, thats typical. [View All]

Hate to say it, but if I see dogs harming our livestock, they don't last long and are buried on the spot. I learned this from my old time neighbor who raised cattle, and it was a given. He had plenty of dogs, but they were trained and cared for and never harmed any animal. It was only the roamers that would maim and kill for sport.

I remember we had some laborers working on the filter system for the orchard, and I pointed out the Swains Hawk with a 6 foot rattlesnake flying to the next in the Cottonwood up canyon.

I mentioned that they took a chicken anf he said that I should shoot it.

I told him that I can buy a chicken for .25 cents, but I doubt if I could replace the Hawk that feasted on rattlesnakes every season as easily, he thought about it for a minute and went back to work, shocked that a wild creature had more weight than a chicken.

Dogs, in my mind are the same way. We give them a life that torments them with lack of exercise, and feed them food that gods only know what has in it. At the say time we feed a huge industry that supplies to whatever cockamamie idea we dream up for their comfort. It's the Disney-fication of animals, without regard as to how they were meant to live.

Hundreds of animals roaming free "Because "They're Ugly" and dumped on the side of the road, because they do not fit the capitalist model.

I used to love cats, and grew up with them, but I don't trust the Pet Food Industry at all, especially since the pet food technology is worming it's way into Human food production.

Raising pets is just another expense as far as I'm concerned, especially if they produce nothing. The best pets I have are the wild animals that acknowledge my presence, either positive or negative, and then watching the behavior change over time to more positive. This cannot be done with a pack of dogs at your heels.